WORLD ROUNDUPGerman Atomwaffen and the Superweapon Trap | Taiwan Wants Suicide Drones to Deter China | Cold War Is Breaking Out Over Milei’s Lithium ‘Gold Rush’

Why a Cold War Is Breaking Out Over Milei’s Lithium ‘Gold Rush’  (Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, The Telegraph)
The geopolitical struggle for clean-tech supremacy is being fought at 13,700 feet on the salt lakes of the Argentine Cordillera.
It is here, in the border regions that make up the Lithium Triangle of the high Andes, where China and the West are battling for control over 60pc of the world’s lithium reserves, the critical mineral for electric vehicles and the post-carbon economy.

Blinken Says Israeli Units Accused of Serious Violations Have Done Enough to Avoid Sanctions. Experts and Insiders Disagree.  (Brett Murphy, ProPublica)
Years before Oct. 7, soldiers and officers in four Israeli security force units committed what the U.S. State Department would later determine to be serious human rights violations against Palestinians.

China Suspected of Cyberattack on Britain’s Military  (VOA News)
A mass cyberattack on Britain’s military has exposed the names and banking details of thousands of British soldiers, officials said Tuesday. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Defense Minister Grant Shapps said there were indications that a “malign actor” was responsible for the attack.

German Atomwaffen and the Superweapon Trap  (Gustav Meibauer and Christopher David Larouche, War on the Rocks)
Can nuclear weapons fix Germany’s or Europe’s complex security problems? That is what some German politicians across the political spectrum have proposed in the past few months. 

The East and South China Seas: One Sea, Near Seas, Whose Seas?  (April A. Herlevi and Brian Waidelich, War on the Rocks)
One Sea, Two Seas, Far Seas, Near Seas? For all the attention they receive as contested Indo-Pacific maritime regions, the strategic differences between East and South China Seas do not always get their due. 

Sudan’s Descent into Chaos Sets Stage for al-Qaida to Make a Return to Historic Stronghold  (Sara Harmouch, The Conversation)
“Sudan’s moment has come; chaos is our chance to sow the seeds of jihad,” warned Abu Hudhaifa al-Sudani, a high-ranking al-Qaida leader, in an October 2022 manifesto. His words may have seemed premature at the time, but a year of brutal civil war has now plunged Sudan into the kind of chaos in which terrorist groups thrive. 

Biden Administration Won’t Conclude Israel Violated U.S. Weapons Deals, AP Sources Say  (AP / VOA News)
A soon-to-be-released Biden administration review of Israel’s use of U.S.-provided weapons in its war in Gaza does not conclude that Israel has violated the terms for their use, according to three people who have been briefed on the matter.
The report is expected to be sharply critical of Israel, even though it doesn’t conclude that Israel violated terms of U.S.-Israel weapons agreements, according to one U.S. official.

Israel’s PR-War Pandemonium  (Graeme Wood, The Atlantic)
The job of international spokesperson for Israel, in a state of war, is fit for a patriot, a masochist, or a diva, or better yet all three. For most of the past six months, it was occupied by Eylon Levy, a 32-year-old British Israeli with an affinity for television cameras and seemingly infinite ability to absorb the abuse that comes from publicly defending Israel, at its least defensible and at its most. 

Taiwan Wants Suicide Drones to Deter China  (Jack Detsch, Foreign Policy)
Taiwan is looking to buy U.S.-made loitering munitions—also known as suicide drones—which have become one of the signature weapons on the modern battlefield, from Nagorno-Karabakh to Ukraine, hovering over fighting for hours at a time before swooping in for the kill.