NORTH KOREA: Today is Party Foundation Day in North Korea, an annual public holiday typically marked with fiery speeches and parades featuring ostentatious displays of military hardware, and these days, a ballistic missile firing or two. Pyongyang is 13 hours ahead of Washington, so by the time you read this, Oct. 10 will be in its waning hours, but next week there’s another big event that North Korea’s Kim Jong Un could use to dramatize his defiance of international condemnation of his nuclear weapons and ballistic missile development programs, namely of China’s 19th Party Congress. Stand by.
STAND READY: Defense Secretary Jim Mattis continues to say that the effort to curb North Korea’s expanding nuclear ambitions is “a diplomatically-led economic sanction-buttressed effort,” but at yesterday opening session of the Association of the U.S. Army’s annual meeting, he had a stark warning for the U.S. Army, “be ready”
“Now, what does the future hold? Neither you nor I can say,” Mattis told the massive crowd at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center. “So there’s one thing the U.S. Army can do, and that is, you have got to be ready to ensure that we have military options that our president can employ, if needed.”
Later at an afternoon news conference, Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley said Mattis’ keynote address was full of “not-so-subtle guidance to us,” and when asked specifically about North Korea, he said “There is a timeline on this, I’m not going to be explicit about it, based on the technological development of the North Korean missile testing.
“It’s not an indefinite amount of time, and there will be decisions made,” Milley said, although he was quick to add that the uniformed military will not be making what he called the “extraordinarily difficult and dangerous” decisions about North Korea. “That decision will be made by the duly elected representatives of the United States of America.
“There are no easy, risk-free options here,” said Milley, repeating the warning that all-out war with North Korea would be catastrophic. “A full-blown war on the Korean Peninsula would be horrific by any stretch of the imagination, no one has any doubt about that,” Milley said, “the damage to infrastructure, the economic effects, the casualties, the humanitarian impact would be enormous. There’s no question about it.
“So yes, it would be horrible. There’s no question about it. But so would an intercontinental ballistic missile striking Los Angeles or New York City. That would be equally horrible.”
PURLOINED OP-PLANS? Media reports from South Korea say that North Korean hackers last year managed to get their hands on secret war plans that included an option for a “decapitation” attack to take out Kim Jong Un. A member of the South Korean legislature said the hackers managed to penetrate the South’s defense center in September and steal copies of Operational Plan 5015, the most recent version of the war plan with the North.
MATTIS KEEPS PRESSURE ON CONGRESS: Mattis used his keynote speech at AUSA to again hammer Congress to repeal defense budget caps that he said are causing fiscal confusion in Washington. “I am among the majority in this country that believes our nation can afford survival and I want the Congress back in the driver’s seat of budget decisions, not in the spectator’s seat of automatic cuts,” Mattis said.
The Pentagon and defense hawks on Capitol Hill have stepped up warnings in recent days as lawmakers face down a December deadline to reach an agreement to lift the $549 billion defense cap for 2018 and pass an annual budget, or punt with another stopgap budget resolution. In what is now a familiar message, Mattis said the U.S. is losing its edge over adversaries. “There are times when those of us who wear the uniform can be rightly condemned for being overly conservative, wanting more insurance, and more boats and planes and guns and tanks, and I understand that,” Mattis told the Army crowd. “I think the more we can explain we have the time right now to prepare for war as the best way to prevent war. But should conflict break out, to get money later will not be good enough because we will not have the time at that point.”
Good Tuesday morning and welcome to Jamie McIntyre’s Daily on Defense, compiled by Washington Examiner National Security Senior Writer Jamie McIntyre (@jamiejmcintyre), National Security Writer Travis J. Tritten (@travis_tritten) and Senior Editor David Brown (@dave_brown24). Email us here for tips, suggestions, calendar items and anything else. If a friend sent this to you and you’d like to sign up, click here. If signing up doesn’t work, shoot us an email and we’ll add you to our list. And be sure to follow us on Twitter @dailyondefense.
HAPPENING TODAY, AUSA ROLLS ON: A luncheon speech by Milley at 12:30 p.m. will top the second day of the AUSA conference. The conference also has a panel scheduled on foreign military sales with Lt. Gen. Charles Hooper, director of the Defense Security Cooperation Agency. The sprawling, all-things-Army event will continue with numerous speeches and panels as well as exhibition floors packed with new military technology, such as Lockheed Martin PAC-3 missile mockups, light combat vehicles, sniper rifles and a V-280 Valor, Bell Helicopter’s would-be tilt-rotor replacement for the Black Hawk. A full schedule of events is available here.
AT CSIS, ONE STAGE, FOUR NAT SEC ADVISERS: At 5:30 p.m. Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, the national security adviser, will take the stage for a panel discussion with Henry Kissinger, who served as President Richard Nixon’s national security adviser. The Center for Strategic and International Studies event looks at the role of the National Security Council as it turns 70 years old and will also include former national security advisers Stephen Hadley and retired Gen. James Jones. The discussion will stream live here.
NOT FEELING THE DRAFT: Members of Congress are less likely to vote for pro-draft measures if they have family members who could be shipped off to war, according to a new analysis published by the National Bureau of Economic Research. The study, which reviewed the votes of thousands of legislators during World War I, World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War, provides a glaring example of a dynamic that is often obscured in politics: Politicians vote differently when they or their own families are likely to be affected by the bill in question.
“[R]epresentative democracy may better enhance social welfare when voters are aware of legislators’ private incentives,” conclude the authors, including economists associated with Brown and Yale Universities.
The paper, which has not yet undergone peer review, reviewed 249 roll call votes in the Senate and House between 1917 and 1974, cross-checked with data about legislators’ families. The economists found that lawmakers with draft-eligible sons were 10 percent to 17 percent less likely to vote for conscription than politicians with daughters of the same age.
MILLEY SEES MORE TRAIN, ADVISE, ASSIST: Questions remain over what exactly led to the deaths last week of four soldiers on a train, advise and assist mission in Niger. But Army Chief Milley said he expects such operations to increase in the coming years. “We are training, advising and assisting indigenous armies all over the world and I anticipate and expect that’ll increase and not decrease in years to come,” he told reporters during his AUSA press conference. The service is standing up the first of its new formal units this month, called security force assistance brigades, that are specifically designed to provide the military aid. Six of the brigades will be stood up in a year or two, thereby “institutionalizing” what had for years been an ad hoc Army effort, Milley said.
Three Green Berets and a fourth soldier were killed last week while accompanying Nigerien forces for a train, advise and assist mission in the West African nation where the Islamic State, al Qaeda, and Boko Haram have been active. “It is a dangerous mission, TAA missions around the world. It depends on where you are at,” Milley said. Africa Command said last week it had not anticipated the ambush and review of the operations there are underway. The Islamic State has inspired splinter groups in Niger and is suspected in the attack, but Milley declined to say who was responsible. “We do have information on the group that did it, their nature, their disposition, and so on and so forth,” he said. “Appropriate organizations within the United States military are digging deeper into that for appropriate action.”
U.S. ARMY ‘MODCOM’: At the same AUSA meeting, Acting Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy announced plans to create a new command aimed at streamlining Army modernization. “The Army is at an inflection point. Having focused on restoring readiness to prevail in the future, we now must reform how we modernized the Army,” McCarthy said. “I have therefore approved the establishment of a task force to develop a new command to validate the processes that informed and deliver Army capabilities and Army modernization under one roof.” The task force has 120 days to submit a plan. Milley called the plan “the largest reengineering of the institutional Army in four decades.”
TURKEY TROUBLE: Turkish government officials may be trying to “disrupt” relations with the United States, a senior State Department official said Monday after a local employee of the department was arrested in Turkey. That official has been accused of working to overthrow Turkey’s government. But the State Department defended his work and criticized Turkish leaders for refusing to detail the allegations or evidence against the man.
“This arrest has raised questions about whether the goal of some officials is to disrupt the long-standing cooperation between Turkey and the United States,” U.S Ambassador to Turkey John Bass said in a video released by the State Department.
BOLTON LASHES OUT AT MATTIS, TILLERSON: Former ambassador John Bolton is taking Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to task for what appears to be their public break with President Trump over the Iran nuclear deal, arguing that if members of Trump’s Cabinet have reservations, they need to keep them to themselves. “I think it’s unfortunate overall, frankly, to have your top national security Cabinet members and advisers speaking in public about what their personal views are on highly important and very grave matters of foreign and defense policy,” he said on Fox News Monday.
Bolton was asked about Mattis and Tillerson, whose cautious public statements have given the impression they privately oppose Trump’s pending decision to decertify the Iran nuclear deal, a move he is expected to announce this week. “I just don’t think that these kinds of debates are to be held in public,” he said. “I think you hold them in the sit[uation] room, in a National Security Council meeting, or in the Oval Office.
“It’s a privilege to work for a president in that capacity, and part of that privilege is, you give him your absolutely candid, unvarnished advice, he makes the decision, and then you toe the line, and when the time comes that you can’t toe the line anymore, you resign,” he said. “That’s the honorable thing to do.”
In an interview with Politico, Arkansas Republican Sen. Tom Cotton expressed a similar sentiment. “Their job is now to move out and execute,” Cotton, said in an new interview for The Global Politico podcast. Or, he said, “if you feel strongly enough, then you have to resign.”
PENCE COUNTERS CORKER: Vice President Mike Pence is defending the president in the wake of Sen. Bob Corker blistering criticism of Trump’s leadership and his warning that Trump may be putting the U.S. “on the path to World War III.” In a statement Monday, Pence praised the president for “achieving real results on the international stage,” and accused his critics of engaging in “empty rhetoric and baseless attacks.”
“[U]nder the President’s leadership, ISIS is on the run; North Korea is isolated like never before; and our NATO allies are doing more to pay their fair share for our common defense,” the vice president said.
GERMANY: US RISKS BEING SEEN AS UNRELIABLE DEAL-MAKER: Trump’s expected decision to declare the Iran nuclear deal is not in America’s national security interests could jeopardize a peaceful resolution to the North Korea crisis, argues Germany’s top diplomat. “It is very unlikely that the North Korean dictatorship would sign an international agreement in which it agrees to renounce nuclear weapons when the one agreement like this [with Iran] is being called into question,” German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel told reporters in Berlin, according to Reuters.
The warning is part of a flurry of last-minute diplomacy to change Trump’s mind about the Iran deal, and Gabriel indicated that Germany is willing to take steps to keep the deal in place. “We are also offering to help influence Iran’s behavior in the region,” Gabriel said. “Germany is ready to do this, but not at the price of sacrificing the nuclear deal.”
REX TILLERSON: The latest issue of The New Yorker has a fascinating behind-the-scenes account of the first meeting between Tillerson and Iran’s foreign minister Javad Zarif, the man who negotiated the Iran deal with the U.S. and six world powers. Journalist Dexter Filkins writes about the closed-door session that took place at the United Nations in late December:
Tillerson wondered aloud whether the entire effort to improve relations with Iran wasn’t doomed by history. “We have more pounds, and our hair is gray,” he said. “Maybe we don’t have it in our capacity to change the nature of this relationship, because we are bound by it—maybe we leave it to the next generation to try.” He thought for a moment. “I don’t know. I’m not a diplomat.”
As Lavrov, muttering loudly in Russian, stood and led his assistants out of the room, the meeting broke up, with the officials talking in hushed tones about what had happened. For proponents of the nuclear deal, it was an unacceptably risky bit of brinkmanship. For the Trump Administration, it was an ideal expression of a bellicose new foreign policy, based on the campaign promise of America First. An aide to Tillerson later told me, “It was one of the finest moments in American diplomacy in the last fifty years.”
GENERALS NEED TO TALK: Mattis is encouraging top military officials to engage with the media more often, according to Defense One. Mattis told military leaders at a Senior Leadership Conference Friday communications are not just reserved for public affairs officers and was part of their jobs as military commanders.
Pentagon press secretary Dana White provided additional insight on the issue in an email sent Friday to top public affairs officers of U.S. military combatant commands. “I realize there may be a perception that we have been keeping the media at arm’s length, but that is not the case and we’re doing our best to dispel that rumor and continue to be transparent with our press corps,” White said in the email. “Please communicate to your respective senior leaders that we want them to feel free, even obligated, to speak, in their lane, about their efforts and to use our OSD PA [Office of the Secretary of Defense Public Affairs] team resources to help along the way.”
MATTIS’ (SHORT) READING LIST: Mattis, known as a voracious reader of military history and student of strategy, gave out a short list of what he suggested should be required reading for anyone desiring a better grasp of the world. “if you want to know where I see modern war trending, I just ask you to reread General Milley’s remarks from a year ago at this very convention,” Mattis said during his speech at AUSA. “If you want a reminder of war’s primitive, atavistic, and unrelenting nature, reread [T.R.] Fehrenbach’s This Kind Of War. If you want to see why I believe command and feedback must supplement our approach to command and control, read Rules of the Game by [Andrew] Gordon. If you want to know where I come from in terms of strategy, read The Future of Strategy by Colin Gray, the most near-faultless strategist alive today.”
Mattis also quoted from the classic 1963 work by Fehrenbach, which explained in heartbreaking detail how America was woefully unprepared for the Korean War in the 1950s. “ ‘You may fly over a nation forever, you may bomb it, atomize it, pulverize it and wipe it clean of life. But if you desire to defend it, if you desire to protect it, if you desire to keep it for civilization, you must do this on the ground the way the Roman legions did: by putting your young men in the mud.’ ” Mattis said. “I would only modify it today by saying, ‘by putting your young men and women in the mud.’ ” The famous Fehrenbach quote comes from Chapter 25, “Proud Legions,” which can be found online here.
THE RUNDOWN
Reuters: Russia accuses U.S. of pretending to fight Islamic State in Syria, Iraq
Reuters: Russian Su-24 warplane crashes at air base in Syria, crew dies: agencies
USA Today: In patriarchal North Korea, a new decision maker: Kim Jong Un’s sister
UPI: Raytheon integrates Stinger missile with armored vehicle
Navy Times: Russia remains the greatest near-term threat to the US, intel official says
Stars and Stripes: Thought to have been destroyed by ISIS, village aided by US soldiers has endured
Marine Corps Times: Afghanistan airstrikes hit highest point in years
Foreign Policy: Trump touts military option for North Korea that generals warn would be ‘horrific’
Defense News: Army wants missiles, rockets and artillery that fire farther and deliver more punch
New York Times: Red Cross reduces presence in Afghanistan after staff is attacked
Daily Beast: ‘We don’t stand by our agreements’: Diplos brace for Donald Trump’s assault on the Iran Deal
Calendar
TUESDAY | OCT. 10
7 a.m. 801 Mt. Vernon Place NW. 2017 Association of the U.S. Army annual meeting and exposition with Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley; acting Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy; and Sergeant Major of the Army Daniel A. Dailey. ausameetings.org
8 a.m. 1919 North Lynn St. Quarterly procurement division meeting. ndia.org
9:30 a.m. 1616 Rhode Island Ave. NW. Formulating national security strategy with retired Lt. Gen. Robert Schmidle, the former deputy director of DOD’s Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation; Andrew Hoehn, senior vice president at the Rand Corp.; and Christine Wormuth, former under secretary of defense for policy. csis.org
10 a.m. 1775 Massachusetts Ave. NW. The path forward for dealing with North Korea. brookings.edu
10:30 a.m. 1000 Massachusetts Ave. NW. Afghanistan going forward, whether to surge, negotiate or get out, with Michael O’Hanlon, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution; Stephen Biddle, professor at George Washington University; and Maxwell Pappas, a U.S. Army major with three combat tours in Afghanistan and Iraq. cato.org
11 a.m. 1030 15th St. NW. The Kurdish crisis: Baghdad, Irbil, and institutional reform in Iraq with Stuart Jones, former U.S. ambassador to Iraq. atlanticcouncil.org
2 p.m. 1616 Rhode Island Ave. NW. Book discussion on Illusions of Victory: The Anbar Awakening and the Rise of the Islamic State with author Carter Malkasian. csis.org
2:45 p.m. p.m. 1330 Maryland Ave. SW. The 2017 Fortune magazine Most Powerful Women Summit with Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson. fortuneconferences.com
3:30 p.m. Cannon 121. The Iran nuclear deal and assessing the impact of de-certification. cato.org
5 p.m. 1616 Rhode Island Ave. The National Security Council at 75 and charting the future of America’s security with H.R. McMaster, national security adviser, and former national security advisors Henry Kissinger, Stephen Hadley, and retired Gen. James Jones. csis.org
5:30 p.m. 1234 9th St. NW. Cocktails and conversations: Lessons from the Eastern front with Col. Patrick Ellis, commander of the Army’s 2nd Cavalry Regiment, and Maj. Gen. Steven Shapiro, commanding general of the Army’s 21st Theater Sustainment Command. defenseone.com
WEDNESDAY | OCT. 11
7 a.m. 801 Mt. Vernon Place NW. 2017 Association of the U.S. Army annual meeting and exposition with Deputy Defense Secretary Pat Shanahan; Ellen Lord, under secretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics; acting Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy; and Gen. Robert Brown, commander U.S. Army Pacific. ausameetings.org
8 a.m. 12777 Fair Lakes Circle. TRI-Association Small Business Advisory Panel (TRIAD) conference. ndia.org
8:30 a.m. 1740 Massachusetts Ave. NW. A discussion with Rep. Rick Larsen and Rep. Don Bacon on U.S. defense needs and priorities. brookings.edu
9 a.m. 600 New Hampshire Ave. NW. Global business briefing with Michael T. Strianese, chairman and CEO of L3 Technologies. defenseone.com
2 p.m. 1211 Connecticut Ave. NW. Drones under Trump. stimson.org
2 p.m. Rayburn 2172. U.S. policy toward Lebanon with Michael Ratney, deputy assistant secretary of state. foreignaffairs.house.gov
2 p.m. Rayburn 2154. Subcommittee hearing on security clearance investigation challenges and reforms with Garry Reid, director for defense intelligence. oversight.house.gov
5 p.m. 815 Connecticut Ave. NW. Cyber risk Wednesday: Building a more defensible cyberspace. atlanticcouncil.org
THURSDAY | OCT. 12
8 a.m. 2401 M St. NW. Defense Writers Group breakfast with Maj. Gen. Stephen Farmen, Army Security Assistance Command. centermediasecurity.org
9:30 a.m. Rayburn 2172. Markup hearing on the Iran Ballistic Missiles and International Sanctions Enforcement Act. foreignaffairs.house.gov
10 a.m. 214 Massachusetts Ave. NE. A looming national security crisis of young Americans unable to join the military with Major Gen. Jeffrey Snow, commanding general of U.S. Army Recruiting Command, and Rep. Don Bacon. heritage.org
11 a.m. 1300 Pennsylvania Ave. NW. Is This the beginning of the end for the Iran nuclear accord? wilsoncenter.org
12 p.m. 214 Massachusetts Ave. NE. What’s next for the U.S. Iran policy. heritage.org
2 p.m. House Visitor Center 210. Empty threat or serious danger: Assessing North Korea’s risk to the homeland. homeland.house.gov
MONDAY | OCT. 16
11 a.m. 1000 Massachusetts Ave. NW. Terror, propaganda and the birth of the “new man”: Experiences from Cuba, North Korea and the Soviet Union. cato.org
TUESDAY | OCT. 17
11:15 a.m. 1700 Army Navy Dr. NDIA Washington, D.C. chapter defense leaders forum luncheon with Vice Adm. Robert Burke, deputy chief of naval operations for manpower, personnel, training and education. ndia.org
12:15 p.m. 1211 Connecticut Ave. NW. The diplomacy of decolonization and United Nations peacekeeping during the Congo Crisis of 1960-1964. stimson.org
