WORLD ROUNDUPThe UK Is GPS-Tagging Thousands of Migrants | Beijing’s Post-Election Plan for Taiwan | Campaign Against Hamas Could Backfire, and more
· Russia Warns of Direct Conflict with NATO If Troops From Alliance Members Fight in Ukraine
After France hinted it may send troops to Ukraine, the Kremlin warns of a Russia-NATO war
· Campaign Against Hamas Could Backfire
The targeted killings pose diplomatic and security risks
· Beijing’s Post-Election Plan for Taiwan
Expect China to double down on political warfare
· US & Japanese Aegis Missile Defense Warships to Form Protective “Shield” Around Taiwan
A US-Japanese alliance is expanding an ability to counter Chinese ballistic missiles, anti-ship missiles and nuclear missiles
· The UK Is GPS-Tagging Thousands of Migrants
Ankle tags that constantly log a person’s coordinates are part of a growing cadre of experimental surveillance tools that countries around the world are trying out on new arrivals
Russia Warns of Direct Conflict with NATO If Troops From Alliance Members Fight in Ukraine (RFE / RL)
The Kremlin has warned Kyiv’s European allies that sending troops to fight in Ukraine would lead to the “inevitability” of war between Russia and NATO after France said that, despite a current lack of consensus, “nothing,” including sending Western forces to fight on the Ukrainians’ side, should be ruled out in terms of preventing a Russian victory in Ukraine.
Campaign Against Hamas Could Backfire (Riley McCabe, Foreign Policy)
Israel has made no secret of its intent to hunt down Hamas leaders outside of Gaza in response to the group’s attack on October 7, 2023. The chief of Israel’s Shin Bet intelligence agency, Ronen Bar, said in recordings made public on Dec. 4, 2023, that Israel will kill Hamas leaders “in every location, in Gaza, in the West Bank, in Lebanon, in Turkey, in Qatar, everyone.”
Indeed, Israel’s campaign is already underway. On Jan. 2, an Israeli drone strike in Beirut killed Saleh al-Arouri, Hamas’s deputy political leader and an important liaison with the Lebanese Hezbollah.
Beijing’s Post-Election Plan for Taiwan (Craig Singleton, Foreign Policy)
At first blush, the results of Taiwan’s national elections last month read like a clear rebuke of China’s coercive reunification agenda. Despite Beijing’s incessant branding of Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) as “separatist,” Taiwanese voters extended the DPP’s presidential reign for an unprecedented third consecutive term. International headlines hailed the election as a major “setback” for China, which had warned that casting a ballot for the DPP was tantamount to voting for war with the mainland. Some media even framed the DPP’s victory as an act of defiance by the Taiwanese people, rebuffing Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s assertion in his recent New Year’s address that reunification between China and Taiwan is “inevitable.”
But the political fallout following Taiwan’s election is more nuanced. Dig deeper, and Taiwan’s fractured electoral outcome foreshadows political divisions that China will exploit. It also suggests that Beijing’s pre-election meddling may have actually succeeded in advancing Xi’s dual-pronged strategy of undermining popular support for the DPP and sowing societal discord to reduce resistance to China’s reunification calls.
