London: China would probably establish air superiority very rapidly in any attack on Taiwan, according to leaked US intelligence assessments that raise disturbing questions about the self-ruled island’s military readiness, media reports said.
The documents emerged as G7 foreign ministers met to discuss a common China strategy and Beijing briefly halted flights over part of the East China Sea on Sunday.
The classified documents seen by the Washington Post reveal that Taiwan’s military leaders doubt their air defences can “accurately detect missile launches” and that only about half of the island’s aircraft are capable of effectively engaging the enemy.
The documents also said Taiwan feared moving its aircraft to shelters could take up to a week, leaving them vulnerable to missile strikes, and that China’s use of civilian ships for military purposes was hampering US intelligence’s ability to predict an invasion, The Guardian reported.
Pentagon analysts concluded China’s air force would find it far easier to establish early air superiority than Russia did in its invasion of Ukraine, it added.
China views Taiwan as part of its territory to be retaken one day, by force if necessary. Chinese President Xi Jinping has expanded and modernised the People’s Liberation Army and China’s armed forces are thought to be 14 times the size of Taiwan’s.
Taiwan’s Defence Ministry said in a statement to the Washington Post that it “respects outside opinions about its military preparedness” but its response to recent Chinese military exercises showed officers were “absolutely capable, determined and confident”.
Taiwan last week staged large-scale emergency response drills enacting scenarios including missile and chemical weapons attacks, after China held its latest military exercises around the island, 100 miles (160km) off the Chinese mainland.
Flights out of northern Taiwan were delayed on Sunday morning after China launched a satellite rocket that dropped debris into waters north of the capital, Taipei. Taiwan’s Defence Ministry said the incident posed no threat to “our nation’s territory”, The Guardian reported.
Washington: After Turkey approved the process of ratifying Finland’s accession to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, the US welcomed the decision of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and said that America encourage Ankara to “quickly ratify Sweden’s accession protocols as well.”
In the statement, released by the White House, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said, “The United States welcomes President Erdogan’s announcement that he will send Finland’s NATO accession protocols to the Turkish Parliament and looks forward to the prompt conclusion of that process.”
“We encourage Turkey to quickly ratify Sweden’s accession protocols as well. In addition, we urge Hungary to conclude its ratification process for both Finland and Sweden without delay,” he added.
In the statement, Sullivan further stated that Sweden and Finland, both countries are strong, capable partners that share NATO’s values and will strengthen the Alliance and contribute to European security.
“The United States believes that both countries should become members of NATO as soon as possible,” the statement read.
Earlier, Turkey approved the process of ratifying Finland’s accession to NATO.
According to the Anadolu Agency, President Erdogan at a joint press conference with his Finnish counterpart Sauli Niinisto in Ankara noted that Finland had addressed all of Turkey’s security concerns.
In the press conference, Erdogan said, “We have decided to launch the approval process of Finland’s NATO membership protocol in our Parliament.”
Citing negotiations on Sweden and Finland’s accession bids at the NATO Madrid summit in June 2022, Erdogan said that Turkiye is among the strong defenders of NATO’s open-door policy.
The President further stated that Turkey has seen that Finland had taken concrete steps to fulfil its commitments in the tripartite memorandum which was signed at the Madrid summit in June, last year, according to Anadolu Agency.
“NATO will become stronger with Finland’s membership, and I believe it will play an active role in maintaining global security and stability,” Erdogan added.
He further emphasized that Turkey-Finland relations will be strengthened on the basis of the NATO alliance following the completion of the approval process.
On Sweden’s process, Erdogan said that Turkey will continue its talk on the basis of the principles of the alliance and our approach to the fight against terrorism.
“I believe that our country’s principles and goodwill in advancing the (NATO accession) process is now more clearly seen,” he added.
Beijing: Amid escalating tensions with the US, President Xi Jinping has called for more quickly elevating the armed forces to world-class standards as he stressed opening new ground for enhancing integrated national strategies and strategic capabilities of the Chinese military to win wars.
Xi, who heads the military besides the ruling Communist Party and the Presidency, made the comments on Wednesday during a meeting of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) delegates attending the annual parliament session here, the state-run Xinhua news agency reported.
He said that consolidating and enhancing integrated national strategies and strategic capabilities has profound significance in building a modern socialist country, as well as in achieving the goals for the centenary of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in 2027 and more quickly elevating the armed forces to world-class standards.
“It is necessary to strengthen the orientation of defence science, technology and industries to serve the armed forces and win wars,” he said.
Highlighting the goal of maximising China’s national strategic capabilities, Xi told the PLA delegates that efforts should be made in integrating the strategic layouts, resources and strengths in all areas, in a bid to systematically upgrade the country’s overall strength to cope with strategic risks, safeguard strategic interests and realise strategic objectives.
Xi called for efforts to advance collaborative innovation in science and technology, with a focus on independent and original innovation, thus building high-level self-reliance and strength in science and technology at a faster pace.
Strategic capabilities in emerging fields must be bolstered in pursuit of new advantages in national development and international competitions, and the resilience of industrial and supply chains must be enhanced, Xi said.
He ordered the coordination of the construction of major infrastructure, accelerating the building of national reserves, and making the reserves more capable of safeguarding national security.
Consolidating and enhancing integrated national strategies and strategic capabilities must draw momentum from reform and innovation, Xi stressed, urging more progress on the issue.
He also called for efforts to foster a sound atmosphere of caring for, devoting to, building and safeguarding national defence among members of the public to pool strengths for consolidating and enhancing integrated national strategies and strategic capabilities and for building a strong country with a strong military.
A day earlier, President Xi said that western countries led by the US have carried out all-around containment and suppression, which brought unprecedented and severe challenges to China’s development.
On Tuesday, Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang also sharply criticised the US, saying Washington’s attempts to contain China’s progress will not succeed.
Referring to the recent incident in which a US fighter plane shot down an unmanned Chinese balloon flying over American airspace, he accused the US of violating international law, overreacting and abusing force in shooting it down.
The US perception and views toward China are seriously distorted. Containing and suppressing China won’t make the US great, and it will not stop the rejuvenation of China, Qin said.
To add to the political headache, the Justice Department will need to win over a Republican House, where many of the lawmakers with oversight of the program are the very same who are leading a sweeping investigation into alleged political motivations within the DOJ and the FBI. The party’s relationship with the law enforcement apparatus soured sharply during former President Donald Trump’s tenure, amid GOP accusations that the Feds improperly targeted Trump and his allies.
A group of House Republicans are already discussing letting the surveillance authority sunset entirely, according to a GOP aide. And in a significant red flag for supporters of the currently written program, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) — who chairs the House Judiciary Committee, one of the four congressional panels that will lead the Section 702 discussions — said he won’t support extending the program without changes.
In fact, he isn’t convinced yet that it needs to be continued at all.
“We’re working on the kind of reforms we think need to happen, but frankly I think you should have to go get a warrant,” Jordan said in a brief interview.
The Ohio Republican didn’t support reauthorizing the program in January 2018, so his skepticism is hardly surprising. But his influence has grown significantly since then: He is now wielding a gavel and has transitioned from leadership foe to ally. And his panel is now stacked with several members who not only oppose the specific surveillance authority set to sunset this year, but also have concerns about the broader Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
Those calls are being fueled, in part, by a recently declassified report on the use of Section 702 between December 2019 and May 2020. In a sign of the odd political bedfellows who are likely to push reforms, conservative Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) and progressive Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), both members of Jordan’s panel, vented publicly over a detail tucked into a footnote of the report: An FBI intelligence analyst queried surveillance databases using only the name of a U.S. House member.
The administration is aware that they are facing a heavy lift and aren’t ruling out changes to the program. Officials have stressed in interviews and in the Tuesday letter to congressional leadership that it is open to potential improvements.
And they’re taking initial steps to try to quell a fight on the front end. Biden administration officials’ opening pitch is coming much earlier than it did in past years — they estimated they waited until September to begin discussions last time — and they’ve dropped their pitch for a permanent extension, which lawmakers balked at in 2018. They’re also offering to give lawmakers classified briefings to make their case for reauthorization.
But the Biden Administration is drawing a red line on an overhaul that would change the essential function of the authority. Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines and Attorney General Merrick Garland, in a letter to congressional leadership, wrote that they needed to “fully preserve its efficacy.”
In a second prong of the administration’s opening salvo, Assistant Attorney General Matthew Olsen made his pitch for continuing the program during a Brookings Institution event on Tuesday using stark terms.
“What keeps me up at night is thinking about what will happen if we fail to renew Section 702 of FISA,” he said.
And Biden administration officials are preemptively pushing back on likely proposals from privacy advocates who want to change the program. One area that is already coming under early reform chatter is so-called “backdoor” searches, when government agencies sift through already acquired data for information that was “incidentally” collected on Americans. A senior administration official argued that banning or trying to restrict searches involving U.S. persons “would either ban or restrict the government from accessing in a timely way potentially critical information.”
The administration does have its congressional allies, particularly among Senate leadership and members of both the House and Senate Intelligence Committees. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, as well as the Intelligence panel’s bipartisan leaders, all voted to reauthorize the program in 2018. Of the 65 lawmakers who previously voted to reauthorize 702, roughly 20 have left the Senate — meaning supporters will need to pick up new allies.
And in a nod to the difficult debate ahead, Reps. Darin LaHood (R-Ill.), Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) and Chris Stewart (R-Utah) have been quietly working on the reauthorization effort since last year. The three Republicans, each on their chamber’s Intelligence Committee, want to reauthorize the program, though they are expected to pair that with broader FISA reforms — including in how judges are assigned to surveillance applications.
Rep. Mike Turner (R-Ohio), who chairs the House Intelligence Committee and who tapped the trio to take the lead, echoed their general direction, saying FISA is a “critical tool in our national security arsenal” and that he supports extending it but “with reforms that will protect American’s civil liberties.”
But privacy advocates believe they are at a point of maximum leverage. Unlike in 2020 when a congressional stalemate — and mixed signals between then-President Trump and Attorney General Bill Barr — led to three unrelated surveillance powers lapsing, critics of Section 702 believe the administration views the program as so critical that they will agree to sweeping changes that might have once been off the table.
The administration is urging lawmakers to stay narrowly focused on Section 702, but officials admit that’s unlikely. That’s in part because of a high-profile series of reports from DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz that found “widespread” non-compliance by the department when it came to a key step in FBI procedure that was designed as a guardrail for ensuring accuracy in surveillance applications.
We are “aware that there are those who want to talk about reforms or changes,” said a senior administration official, granted anonymity to speak candidly. “And in the months to come, of course, we anticipate hearing what it is that others who want to have those conversations have in mind.”
John Sakellariadis and Alexander Ward contributed to this report.
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( With inputs from : www.politico.com )
Washington: US President Joe Biden spoke to his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan and reaffirmed the US’ readiness to provide “any and all” needed assistance to Turkey in the wake of devastating earthquakes.
In a statement, the White House said Biden “noted that US teams are deploying quickly to support Turkish search and rescue efforts and co-ordinate other assistance that may be required by people affected by the earthquakes, including health services or basic relief items”.
President Biden also expressed condolences on behalf of the American people to those who were injured or lost loved ones in the earthquakes.
