Global Scramble to Tackle Deepfakes | Something Has to Give in Postwar Syria | China’s Nuclear Ambitions, and more

Is the U.K. the Security Leader Europe Needs?  (Diana Mjeshtri, National Interest)
Although the Franco-German strategic partnership is in trouble, an unlikely candidate to take the lead in European security matters has now appeared.

Finding a Way Out of the Societal War Over Ukraine  (Ariel E. Levite, National Interest)
Hope for bringing an end to this tragic, dangerous quagmire hinges on recognizing the fundamentally society-centric nature of the conflict.

U.S. Guns Are Fueling Violence in Central America, Here’s How to Help Stop the Arms Flow  (Nate Smith, Just Security)
People living in the region’s urban areas still face some of the world’s highest rates of  violence. The steady stream of weapons sourced from the United States makes the problem worse.
While many of the weapons used in crime are smuggled, one of the mechanisms for firearms proliferation is surprisingly straightforward – companies produce guns in the United States or import them from other countries and sell them to buyers in Central America. From there, the guns may or may not stay with the original purchaser: Sometimes they are sold commercially in the importing country, sometimes they are stolen and diverted to the illicit market. In some known cases, police or other security agents have pilfered guns from a government-controlled armory and resold them on the black market. In other instances, official security forces misuse the weapons to perpetrate human rights violations.

Seeing Is Believing? Global Scramble to Tackle Deepfakes  (AFP / Phys.org)
Chatbots spouting falsehoods, face-swapping apps crafting porn videos and cloned voices defrauding companies of millions—the scramble is on to rein in AI deepfakes that have become a misinformation super spreader.
Artificial Intelligence is redefining the proverb “seeing is believing,” with a deluge of images created out of thin air and people shown mouthing things they never said in real-looking deepfakes that have eroded online trust.
Experts warn that deepfake detectors are vastly outpaced by creators, who are hard to catch as they operate anonymously using AI-based software that was once touted as a specialized skill but is now widely available at low cost.

Is the U.S. Military Capable of Learning from the War in Ukraine?  (Raphael S. Cohen and Gian Gentile, Foreign Policy)
At its core, a country’s defense strategy is a very expensive gamble. Every year, the United States spends hundreds of billions of dollars on defense—all on the assumption that such investments will allow it to win the next war. Absent a conflict in which the United States is directly involved, policymakers rarely get a window into whether these bets have actually paid off. One window is when other countries fight a war using U.S. military equipment and tactics—such as the one in Ukraine today. Another example is the 1973 Arab-Israeli War, also known as the Yom Kippur War, when Israel’s near-defeat prompted a thorough reexamination of U.S. weapons and tactics in Washington. Today, Russia’s war once again poses the question whether the United States needs to reexamine the way it prepares for future conflict: not only which weapons it buys, but also how it envisions great-power wars in the 21st century—whether they will be short, sharp affairs or grinding, protracted struggles.

Hungary Most Corrupt EU Member in 2022: Watchdog  (VOA)
Hungary slid to bottom place among EU nations in a corruption index, with graft watchdog Transparency International on Tuesday alleging misuse by “political elites” of state and bloc funds.
Hungary has been embroiled in a long-running spat with Brussels over corruption and rule of law concerns that have led to the freezing of billions of euros of bloc funding.
In a bid to unlock the funds, Budapest committed to a range of legal and anti-corruption reforms, including the set-up of a watchdog that includes a Transparency International staff member.
Hungary replaced Bulgaria as the last among EU and Western European countries in the group’s “Corruption Perceptions Index” report for 2022 launched on Tuesday.
The report noted “a decade of democratic backsliding and systemic deterioration of the rule of law at the hands of the ruling party.”
“Evidence is mounting against political elites on their misuse of both state and EU funds,” it said.

Assessing the Russian and Chinese Economies Geostrategically (Jacques Sapir, American Affairs)
Since the start of the war in Ukraine, the question of the size of the Russian and Chinese economies—relative to Western economies—has become highly significant. Early on, policymakers compared the Russian GDP to that of Spain or Italy, for example, as a way of minimizing its global importance. Now that these geopolitical tensions have resurrected Cold War blocs, it is crucial to clarify our understanding of the real size and importance of these economies.