OUR PICKSCan Ukraine Win? | Does Secrecy Matter? | Questions About Red Flags, and more

Published 23 May 2022

·  Examining Incel Subculture on Reddit

·  Guam Needs Better Missile Defenses—Urgently

·  Can Ukraine Win? Five Scenarios for the War’s Next Phase

·  Intelligence and War: Does Secrecy Matter?

·  Why do Online Countering Violent Extremism Strategies Not Work? The Case of Digital Jihad

·  U.S. Removes 5 Groups from Terror Blacklist, Retains Al-Qaida

·  U.S. Says Cuba Not Cooperating Fully Against Terrorism, Inflaming Tensions

·  The Buffalo Shooting Suspect’s Online Footprint Prompts Questions About Red Flags

·  Buffalo Suspect Exposes Dangers of Accelerationist, Neo-Fascist Lone-Actor Violence

·  European Nations, Streaming Service Delete Extremist Audio

·  ‘A Catastrophic Failure’: Computer Scientist Hany Farid on Why Violent Videos Circulate on the Internet

Examining Incel Subculture on Reddit  (Brenna Helm et al., GNET)
 The online presence of incels, or involuntary celibates, has been an increasing security concern for researchers, practitioners, and policymakers in recent years, given that self-identified incels – including Alek Minassian and Elliot Rodger – used the Internet to disseminate incel ideology and manifestos prior to committing acts of violence. However, little is empirically known about the incel movement in general or their online communities in particular. The present study draws from a set of comments from r/Incels, a now defunct but once popular subreddit dedicated to the incel community, and compares the most highly-upvoted comments (n = 500) to a random set of other comments (n = 500) in the subreddit. This qualitative analysis focuses on identifying subcultural discourse that is widely supported and engaged with by members of the online community and the extent to which incels utilise this online space to reaffirm deviant behavior. Several conclusions can be drawn from this study.

Guam Needs Better Missile Defenses—Urgently  (Mark Montgomery et al., Defense One)
Here’s a two-stage plan to harden this crucial island base against China’s burgeoning missile arsenal.

Can Ukraine Win? Five Scenarios for the War’s Next Phase  (Stephen Fidler, Wall Street Journal)
Russia’s shift to a scaled-down offensive in the east and southeast looks increasingly difficult for Putin to pull off

Intelligence and War: Does Secrecy Matter?  (Joshua Rovner, War on the Rocks)
Open source intelligence has also played a large role in the public portrayal of the war, and in public debates about the best way forward. Commercial imagery provides regular views of the battlefield. Social media provides a platform for close-up views of military operations and wartime savagery. Open source analysts put these images and videos in context. A growing constellation of researchers from academia, think tanks, and private-sector intelligence firms offer detailed assessments of everything related to the war: tactics and strategy, resources and costs, adversaries and allies, winning and losing. Cont.)