• The U.S. Is Trying to Reclaim Its Rare-Earth Mantle

    Rare earths elements (REEs) are used in cancer treatment and electric engines, telescope lenses and TVs, cellphones and fighter jets. Many REEs are extracted and refined almost entirely in China. The U.S. was 100% net import reliant on rare-earth elements in 2018, importing an estimated 11,130 metric tons of compounds and metals valued at $160 million. The Department of Energy is funding research to make separating rare earths easier and more efficient, and to promote recycling. “There is a clock ticking in the background of this race for a rare-earth supply chain. There is a danger that the electric vehicle market, which will demand large quantities of critical minerals including rare earths, may move faster than the rare-earth supply chain, which would feed it,” Sabri Ben-Achour writes.

  • Cyberspace Is Neither Just an Intelligence Contest, nor a Domain of Military Conflict; SolarWinds Shows Us Why It’s Both

    Operations in cyberspace—at least those perpetrated by nation-state actors and their proxies—reflect the geopolitical calculations of the actors who carry them out. Erica D. Borghard writes that cyberspace is sometimes an intelligence contest, and other times a domain of conflict, depending on the strategic approaches and priorities of particular actors at a given moment in time. The SolarWinds campaign shows that “Future conversation needs to move beyond the military versus intelligence contest binary construct to more meaningfully explore how states may seek to use cyberspace for multiple objectives, either in sequence or in parallel,” she writes.

  • Claims of Microwave Attacks Are Scientifically Implausible

    Allegations about microwave attacks on U.S. personnel have been reported regularly, some going back decades. The recent wave of reports started in 2016, with reports from the American and Canadian diplomatic missions in Havana, hence the name “Havana syndrome.” “Here’s the problem,” Cheryl Rofer writes. “Aside from the reported syndromes, there’s no evidence that a microwave weapon exists—and all the available science suggests that any such weapon would be wildly impractical. It’s possible that the symptoms of all the sufferers of Havana syndrome share a single, as yet unknown, cause; it’s also possible that multiple real health problems have been amalgamated into a single syndrome.”

  • E-Waste and National Security

    End-of-life circuit boards, certain magnets in disc drives and electric vehicles, EV and other special battery types, and fluorescent lamps are among several electrical and electronic products containing critical raw materials (CRMs), the recycling of which should be made law, says a new report.

  • Sarcasm Detector for Online Communications

    Sentiment analysis – the process of identifying positive, negative, or neutral emotion – across online communications has become a growing focus for both commercial and defense communities. Sentiment can be an important signal for online information operations to identify topics of concern or the possible actions of bad actors. The presence of sarcasm – a linguistic expression often used to communicate the opposite of what is said with an intention to insult or ridicule – in online text is a significant hindrance to the performance of sentiment analysis.

  • Earthquake Early Warnings Launched in Washington

    When the Big One hits, the first thing Washington residents notice may not be the ground shaking, but their phone issuing a warning. This week, the ShakeAlert early warning system was activated in Washington state, and it will send earthquake early warnings throughout the state.

  • Twenty Years After 9/11, the U.S. Needs a Better Strategy to Prevent and Counter Violent Extremism

    With his announcement to withdraw all U.S. troops from Afghanistan by the 20th anniversary of 9/11, President Joe Biden is delivering on his promise to bring an end to the “forever wars” that were the defining features of what began as the “Global War on Terrorism” two decades ago. Eric Rosand writes that “The global terrorist threat today is qualitatively different than it was 20 years ago,” and, “therefore, the strategy for addressing it must reflect that change.”

  • Understanding 21st-Century Militant Anti-Fascism

    Anti-fascist militancy has existed for as long as fascism has, but militant anti-fascism is still largely neglected across both academic and policy-practitioner communities.A new study says that there is a need for a more robust, evidence-based understanding of the antifa phenomenon, especially in a context where militant anti-Fascist protest in the United States has been conflated with “domestic terrorism.”

  • Russian Mercenaries in Great-Power Competition: Strategic Supermen or Weak Link?

    Russia’s worst-kept secret is its increasingly heavy reliance on private security contractors—really, mercenaries—to maintain a Russia-favorable global status quo and to undermine its competitors’ interests. This reliance on mercenaries stems from a known capability gap. While its military ground forces are locally dominant, Russia’s military has strictly limited ability to project ground power worldwide. It has almost no organic ability to project and sustain ground power more than a few hundred kilometers beyond its own borders.

  • Stoner’s Quantitative and Qualitative Assessment of Russia’s New Strength

    Understanding Russia’s power and the Russian leadership’s goals is a necessary task in formulating effective policy. Moreover, as Russia has become considerably more powerful over the last two decades, the stakes in accurately discerning the Kremlin’s motives have become commensurately higher.If Russia Resurrected approached these challenges with more care, discipline and nuance, it could have been an important work.

  • Entire U.S. West Coast Now Has Access to ShakeAlert Earthquake Early Warning

    After fifteen years of planning and development, the ShakeAlert earthquake early warning system is now available to more than fifty million people in California, Oregon and Washington, the most earthquake-prone region in the conterminous U.S.

  • Next Major War Will Be “Very Different”: Def. Sec. Austin

    Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has warned of emerging cyber and space threats, along with the prospect of much bigger wars. “We can’t predict the future,” he added. “So what we need is the right mix of technology, operational concepts and capabilities — all woven together in a networked way that is so credible, so flexible and so formidable that it will give any adversary pause.” His remarks come amid concerns over China’s growing military assertiveness.

  • Unreliable Witness Testimony Biggest Cause of Miscarriages of Justice

    Unreliable witness testimony has been the biggest cause of miscarriages of justice over the past half century, a major new study suggests. The research also suggests that regulations governing the powers of police have been effective in reducing wrongful convictions caused by unreliable confessions.

  • From Bioweapons to Super Soldiers: How the U.K. Is Joining the Genomic Technology Arms Race

    Universal Soldier and Captain America are just a few Hollywood movies that have explored the concept of the super soldier. Despite its sci-fi nature, several countries are looking to explore the potential of such prospects. In the U.S., DARPA is exploring genetically editing soldiers to turn them into “antibody factories,” making them resistant to chemical or biological attacks. The U.K., too, is joining the genome technology warfare race.

  • Defending Against Chemical, Biological Threats from Inside and Out

    Chemical and biological (CB) threats have become increasingly ubiquitous and diverse, presenting significant risks to soldiers in theater and stability operators during pandemic outbreaks. PPE can be bulky, heavy, and cumbersome, often severely limiting user mobility and performance. A DARPA program aims to develop technology that reduces the need for burdensome protective equipment while increasing individual protection against CB threats.