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Retired Army major general: The Russian military invasion has peaked

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Retired Army major general: The Russian military invasion has peaked

In interviews Thursday and Friday, the previous commander of the US Particular Operations Command in Europe, retired US Military Main Basic Mike Repass, gave his well-informed view of the warfare in Ukraine. For the previous six years, he has suggested the Ukrainian navy on a US authorities contract.

Whereas the Russians could also be slowed down, Repass says, the Ukrainian facet can be beneath nice stress. He stated that the Ukrainian counterattacks in current days could also be much less efficient than the media protection has prompt. And he says it is also not clear what number of casualties the Ukrainians have incurred, which makes any form of correct evaluation of how they’re faring troublesome to do.

Repass additionally contends that the Ukrainians want extra S-300 missiles able to bringing down mid-to-high-altitude jets and ballistic missiles, which might fall beneath the brink of instituting a proper no-fly zone requested by the Ukrainians, which the US has rejected. And Repass says that he believes that Putin’s “must-haves” within the battle are securing a land bridge connecting Russia to Crimea on the Black Sea and pushing out the boundaries across the two Russian-proclaimed “republics” of Luhansk and Donetsk within the Donbas area of jap Ukraine.

Disclosure: Repass is on the advisory council of the International Particular Operations Basis, the place I’m the chairman of the board. Our dialog was edited for readability and size.

Mike Repass: The Russians culminated about 5 days in the past. Within the navy vernacular, “end result” means you now not have ample fight energy to proceed to advance within the offense. I imagine that the Ukrainians sensed that and began conducting native counterattacks, notably to the north and west of Kyiv. Additionally they began counterattacks within the east not too long ago. The Ukrainians went on the counteroffensive, however in a restricted approach. They took the city of Irpin to the west of Kyiv and another cities, however the information protection of the counterattacks has, I believe, surpassed the precise results of these operations on the bottom.

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I am involved that it is not a big counterattack as a result of maybe the Ukrainians do not have sufficient forces to launch one. So, if they cannot muster a bigger counterattack round Kyiv, they could have a tough time gathering sufficient forces to push the Russians again within the east close to Donbas.

We actually do not know what is going on on, on the bottom, in granular element, so it is laborious to guage the Ukrainian ways and capabilities, and — that is extra vital — we do not know what the Ukrainian losses have been up to now. If this devolves right into a battle of attrition between each side and we do not know what the prices to the Ukrainians have been, our evaluation about what’s going on might be considerably shallow, fairly frankly.

BERGEN: What do you make of the peace talks?

REPASS: I believe it is a Russian delaying tactic as a result of they haven’t established passable info on the bottom. They are not able to cease combating as a result of they do not have what they want or need. Sadly, I believe there might be far more struggling and destruction in Ukraine earlier than there’s a ceasefire or peace settlement.

BERGEN: There seems to have been an assault on a gas depot in Russia on Friday, which the Kremlin has blamed on the Ukrainians. What do make of this?

REPASS: The Belgorod strike is extraordinary for my part. Assuming that it was carried out by the Ukrainians, the operation put Russia on discover that their earlier sanctuary within the homeland is now doubtlessly in danger. (Ukraine’s Safety Council Secretary denied duty for the assault hours after the Ukrainian protection ministry spokesperson stated he would neither affirm nor deny Ukraine’s function.) They’ll now not have freedom of unrestricted motion in what was beforehand thought-about secure rear areas. Russia should divert navy belongings which might be presently employed in Ukraine to safe their crucial belongings and capabilities on Russian soil. Additional, the assault destroyed critically wanted gas and different assets wanted for the Russians’ faltering struggle in Ukraine, which will definitely amplify their logistics challenges. Psychologically, it’s one other blow to Russia’s sense of invincibility.

BERGEN: Is there something that shocked you within the final month?

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REPASS: Sadly, the largest shock is the willingness of Russia to destroy all the things. Russia is utilizing unrestricted warfare, wanting nuclear warfare, and we have not seen this in Europe through the trendy period. The one different locations that we have seen it’s Russia’s warfare in Grozny after which the Russians repeated it in Homs and Aleppo in Syria. Each of these cities are historical and have archeological significance, and the Russians destroyed each. And Putin did it with out penalty or repercussions for his unrestricted use of power to destroy whole cities, together with landmarks of cultural and historic significance. Now, he is destroying Mariupol. He is after Kharkiv, and he’ll do the identical there and with the opposite cities that he is encircled, if he is given an opportunity.

So the unrestricted brutality that Russia is prepared to make use of in Ukraine has shocked me, given the prewar Russian rhetoric of “We’re brothers,” “We’re cousins,” “We’re one individuals.” Nevertheless it’s clear to me that what Putin’s going for — the annihilation of the indigenous inhabitants — is as a result of he does not need any potential resistance actions in these cities. Mariupol particularly could possibly be a base for resistance within the midst of his try to safe a land bridge from Donbas right down to Crimea.

BERGEN: As the previous commander of US Particular Operations in Europe, how would you fee the Ukrainian Particular Forces?

REPASS: They’ve 5 regiments of Ukrainian Particular Operations Forces, they usually have been in various levels of readiness and functionality previous to the warfare. There are some that have been NATO-interoperable and a few that have been lower than these requirements. There are different Particular Operations Forces items as nicely, such because the SBU-Alpha troops from the Safety Service of Ukraine, which might be fairly darn good. Additionally they have particular forces within the State Border Guards.

The Ukrainian legislation on territorial protection, which went into impact in January, directed the Particular Operations Forces to be answerable for the nationwide resistance effort. I do know that the resistance forces and territorials have been very energetic within the Russian rear areas. They do not have the numbers or the fight functionality to go head-to-head with a Russian battalion tactical group, so they have a tendency to have interaction the rear echelons of help troops and forces.
BERGEN: There are reviews of seven Russian generals killed in Ukraine: What does that say to you, and the way uncommon is it?

REPASS: It is exceedingly uncommon within the trendy period. What it tells me is that their command and management processes are very poor. It’s also a operate of know-how and group. On the group facet, the Russians created battalion tactical teams as their main war-fighting formations with vastly totally different armaments and levels of auto mobility. To make use of their capabilities correctly, they should string them out throughout the battlefield in depth, however they do not have the know-how and procedures for arranging these forces in the way in which they should. This drawback is compounded by the poor infrastructure, which forces the armored and heavy autos to stay on the restricted and slim roads. Consequently, tactical engagements trigger site visitors jams, that are exacerbated by unhealthy radio communication techniques. Together, the scenario requires the senior leaders to go ahead to unscrew issues, which makes them susceptible to artillery and sniper hearth.

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BERGEN: Are you shocked that the Russians are typically speaking within the clear on radios or cell telephones?

REPASS: Sure, it does shock me, nevertheless it’s simply proof that their command-and-control capabilities are inadequate for the way in which they’re organized.

BERGEN: The physique baggage will begin going again to Russia and the funerals will begin occurring. Does Putin care?

REPASS: I believe the consensus amongst Russia watchers is he both does not know or does not give a rattling. He is impervious to home opinion as a result of he is so totally insulated from what is going on on domestically. He has a circle of trusted advisers and folks round him that he pays consideration to, after which he has his very tight circle of safety that ensures that he is nicely protected. Including to his isolation, Putin has stated himself that he barely makes use of the web.

He is knowledgeable by his personal state media, which has solely state-approved messages to report. He is residing in an echo chamber, they usually’re not going to report the unhealthy information.

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Once we see this current reporting by US, British and Australian channels that he did not perceive that he was utilizing conscripts, does not perceive how badly the Russian navy is performing, these reviews appear to be confirmatory proof that he is insulated from the info on the bottom at house and in Ukraine.
BERGEN: You have been part of a bunch of retired senior US navy and senior Japanese European navy leaders that launched an open letter on March 9 urging that the Ukrainians be armed with S-300 missiles. Your purpose for advocating for the S-300s is they’d be beneath the brink of organising a proper no-fly zone, but would nonetheless intercept mid-to-high-altitude jets and ballistic missiles?

REPASS: Proper. In case you have been capable of obtain a no-fly zone by your individual air protection capabilities, then maybe there would not be such a political demand from the Ukrainians — “Give us MiG fighters. Give us a no-fly zone.” So, it was considerably supportive of the administration’s place on not instituting a proper no-fly zone, whereas additionally supporting the precise necessities on the bottom in Ukraine.

BERGEN: And the Ukrainians know methods to use the S-300s?

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REPASS: Completely. They’re utilizing those that they do should good impact already.

BERGEN: On NATO, how would you fee its response?

REPASS: The reply to that is dependent upon the place you sit. In case you’re in Kyiv, you’ll be very pissed off. They’re genuinely and really appreciative of the help they’ve acquired from all of the donor nations. However they anticipated extra help from NATO. There are two various things at play right here. The group, NATO, shouldn’t be engaged in actions to immediately help Ukrainian operations. They’re rhetorically and politically supporting what particular person nations are doing to help Ukraine, however these nations are coordinating amongst one another versus coordinating help actions by the NATO alliance construction.

The Ukrainians have a number of lists of issues that they want, however they have to undergo a quite bureaucratic course of to amass them. In some instances, the donor nations are shifting on the pace of course of quite than on the pace of warfare.

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I will provide you with an instance: Stage IV physique armor is able to withstanding one or two photographs from a Soviet-type spherical. That know-how is managed by the State Division for US export. The Ukrainians will let you know, “Hey, we now have the cash to pay for these items. We’re not asking you to provide it to us. We’re asking you to promote it to us expeditiously.” Nonetheless, the availability of Stage IV physique armor is topic to a prolonged course of to get US approval for supply to Ukraine. It’s late-to-need consequently.

BERGEN: Do you might have different issues?

REPASS: What in regards to the pending humanitarian catastrophe that is going to occur in Russia with meals shortages and different points which might be arising? In all probability by June, there’s going to be a considerable humanitarian problem in Russia, and the West can be nicely served to start out speaking about this now.

They’ve stopped exporting commodities out of Russia. They’ve already began rationing some meals gadgets like sugar. If the home scenario will get significantly destabilized as a consequence of shortages of meals and important commodities, then maybe the ruling elites will grow to be unpredictable and determined to keep up their maintain on energy. That would result in considerably elevated violence in Ukraine to power a extra fast navy end result.

BERGEN: What is the Russian recreation plan now?

REPASS: Their preliminary concept of victory was to decapitate the Ukrainian authorities, safe a land bridge to Crimea after which seize as a lot land as potential. He additionally stated he was going to safe the Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts (areas). The extra land seizure was going to be issues that they have been prepared to discount away. They don’t have any intention of bargaining away the land bridge to Crimea.

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The Russian expedition to Kyiv from the north was nicely anticipated and fantastically defended towards by the Ukrainians, and the Russians realized after substantial casualties that they did not want that. The seizure of Kyiv was (and is) not important to Russia’s success, and was a want-to-have versus a must have. The land bridge to Crimea is a Russian must-have.

In 2014, when the Russians invaded, they took over Crimea, however in addition they invaded within the east and created this mythology that there was an indigenous revolution in areas of the Donbas, the 2 “republics” of Luhansk and Donetsk, which Russia acknowledged as impartial republics within the runup to the warfare that they are presently in.

That space was closely industrialized and it has mineral wealth. A variety of the trade was destroyed through the warfare in 2014, however the coal stays, which Russia is desirous about controlling. Extending the political boundaries across the states of Luhansk and Donetsk and securing the land bridge to Crimea would give Putin ample political cowl to say some type of victory. It will permit him to then search a ceasefire or peace settlement. Nonetheless, I do not see the Ukrainians agreeing to any of this.

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Trump lashes out at Apple over plan to ship US iPhones from India

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Trump lashes out at Apple over plan to ship US iPhones from India

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Donald Trump has hit out at Apple’s plans to produce more iPhones in India as a way of avoiding US tariffs on Chinese-made goods, as he continues to push the tech group to manufacture its best-selling device in America.

Speaking in Qatar on the latest leg of his Middle East tour, the US president said he had “a little problem with Tim Cook yesterday” after the Apple chief executive confirmed last week that Indian factories would supply the “majority” of iPhones sold in the US in the coming months.

The Financial Times previously reported that Apple planned to source from India all of the more than 60mn iPhones sold annually in the US by the end of next year.

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Trump criticised that idea on Thursday, saying he told Cook: “We are treating you really good, we put up with all the plants you built in China for years. We are not interested in you building in India.”

He claimed that Apple would be “upping their production in the United States” following the conversation. Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Trump’s comments are the latest sign of a cooling in the president’s relationship with Apple, one of America’s most valuable companies.

Speaking at an event in Riyadh this week after announcing a multibillion-dollar deal to sell hundreds of thousands of Nvidia processors to a new Saudi artificial intelligence project, Trump lavished praise on the chipmaker’s chief Jensen Huang from the stage, saying: “Tim Cook isn’t here but you are.”

Apple in February pledged to spend $500bn in the US during Trump’s four years in office, including producing chips and servers for AI.

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But the company faces huge challenges in replicating its vast Chinese supply chain and production facilities in the US, which rely on a skilled high-tech manufacturing workforce that is now overwhelmingly concentrated in Asia.

Analysts estimate it would cost tens of billions of dollars and take years for Apple to increase iPhone manufacturing in the US, where it at present makes only a very limited number of products.

US commerce secretary Howard Lutnick said last month that Cook had told him the US would need “robotic arms” to replicate the “scale and precision” of iPhone manufacturing in China.

“He’s going to build it here,” Lutnick told CNBC. “And Americans are going to be the technicians who drive those factories. They’re not going to be the ones screwing it in.”

Lutnick added that his previous comments that an “army of millions and millions of human beings screwing in little screws to make iPhones — that kind of thing is going to come to America” had been taken out of context.

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“Americans are going to work in factories just like this on great, high-paying jobs,” he added.

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Supreme Court’s birthright citizenship battle targets judges’ power to block policies nationwide

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Supreme Court’s birthright citizenship battle targets judges’ power to block policies nationwide

Washington — The Supreme Court on Thursday is set to consider a bid by the Trump administration to narrow three lower court orders blocking President Trump from ending birthright citizenship, in cases that test judges’ power to block a president’s policies nationwide. 

The arguments before the court, taking place in a rare May session, will be the first involving a policy rolled out by Mr. Trump in his second term. But the high court is not examining the legality of the president’s birthright citizenship executive order, which seeks to deny U.S. citizenship to children born to a mother or father who are in the U.S. unlawfully or on a temporary basis. 

Instead, the Trump administration has said district court judges overseeing three legal challenges to Mr. Trump’s policy lacked the authority to issue sweeping injunctions that extend beyond the parties involved in the litigation. The plaintiffs that brought the three lawsuits are 22 states, two organizations and seven individuals, and the Justice Department is pushing for the injunctions to apply only to them. 

A decision from the Supreme Court in favor of the administration could allow it to partially enforce the birthright citizenship measure while the litigation proceeds — but not enforce it against the plaintiffs, including residents of California, New York and 20 other states.

“This is one of a range of efforts to close the courthouse doors, to make it harder, more expensive, more complicated, slower to challenge illegal government action,” said Cody Wofsy, deputy director of the Immigrants’ Rights Project at the American Civil Liberties Union. “A case like birthright citizenship puts that in really stark relief where you have an executive order that is blatantly illegal, but the administration is asking the Supreme Court to make it harder for courts to protect people and vindicate constitutional rights.”

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The fight over nationwide, or universal, injunctions has been simmering for years, and several of the justices themselves have indicated that the Supreme Court would have to clarify their legality.

“Universal injunctions are legally and historically dubious,” Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in a concurring opinion to the Supreme Court’s 2018 decision upholding the travel ban Mr. Trump put in place during his first term. “If federal courts continue to issue them, this court is dutybound to adjudicate their authority to do so.”

But criticisms of these broad orders reached a fever pitch this year, as the Trump administration fends off more than 200 legal challenges targeting nearly every aspect of the president’s second-term agenda, and courts around the country issue injunctions that stop his policies from taking effect.

Most of these decisions have been appealed, and the Trump administration has sought emergency relief from the Supreme Court in more than a dozen cases, including over his birthright citizenship executive order. The high court left the lower court injunctions preventing implementation of the birthright citizenship policy in place for now.

Among the president’s other plans that have been blocked were his transgender military ban, which the Supreme Court then allowed to take effect; his effort to restrict federal funding to medical institutions that provide gender-affirming care for young people; and cuts to certain federal funds.

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“The pace of universal injunctions has gotten to the point where it really is an urgent issue for the court to resolve, not just because it has meant the thwarting of the president’s ability to implement the policies for which he was elected, but also because it has led to an inundation of emergency petitions to the Supreme Court as a result of these universal injunctions,” said Joel Alicea, a law professor at the Catholic University of America.

These sweeping orders have frustrated not just Mr. Trump and his agenda, but also his predecessors. A study from the Harvard Law Review published in April 2024 found that at least 127 nationwide injunctions were issued from 1963 through 2023, though most of those, 96, were entered from 2001 through 2023.

In March, the Congressional Research Service identified 86 nationwide injunctions that were issued under Mr. Trump’s first four years in office and 28 during former President Joe Biden’s term. But the report warned that it is “not possible to provide a single definitive count of nationwide injunctions.”

As to Mr. Trump’s second term, the Congressional Research Service identified 17 nationwide injunctions issued during his first two months back in office. The Trump administration estimates there have been at least 28 of these orders entered against it by judges.

“What universal injunction practice effectively means is that a single district court judge has a veto over the president’s national policy and because there are 94 district courts in the country, that means that you have 94 opportunities in theory to shut down any given national policy,” Alicea said. “That is a recipe for genuine paralysis in terms of national policy-making and in a way that subverts the separation of powers because single district court judges were never supposed to have this kind of authority to stop national policy in its tracks.”

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Mr. Trump and his allies have attacked by name the judges issuing these decisions, and his administration has extended that battle to the relief they are granting. In a filing in one of the birthright citizenship cases, the Justice Department said universal injunctions have reached “epidemic” proportions since Mr. Trump returned to the White House in January.

“Those injunctions thwart the executive branch’s crucial policies on matters ranging from border security, to international relations, to national security, to military readiness,” Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote. “They repeatedly disrupt the operations of the Executive Branch up to the Cabinet level.”

Republicans in Congress have also taken up the cause against universal injunctions. The GOP-controlled House in April passed a bill that would restrict district court judges from issuing broad injunctive relief. It’s unclear whether the measure will pass the Republican-led Senate, where 60 votes are needed for legislation to advance.

But Wofsy, of the ACLU, said the number of lawsuits and injunctions stems from the volume of executive actions taken by the president in the opening months of his second term.

“The administration has been subject to so many nationwide injunctions and injunctions more generally because it’s doing an incredible volume of illegal things, and that is not a reason to take away a tool that the judiciary has to check executive authority. It’s the opposite,” he said. “Now more than ever it is vital that the judiciary is a strong and robust check against illegal executive actions.”

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The Supreme Court may not stop universal injunctions altogether but could curtail them, as there are instances where relief naturally extends beyond the parties involved in a case. Take, for example, a landowner who sues a factory for polluting a river. In that instance, an injunction that orders the factory to stop would benefit all who live along it, not just the single plaintiff.

“The basic principle here is courts may only issue injunctions that are as broad as necessary to remedy the plaintiff’s asserted harm,” Alicea said. “Sometimes that will require an injunction that gives protection even to nonparties as an incidental result of giving protection to the actual plaintiff.”

If the Supreme Court does curtail judges’ ability to enter universal injunctions, courts could still enter tailored relief. Plaintiffs seeking to represent a broader group of people could also file class-action lawsuits. In the context of the birthright citizenship case, a class-action lawsuit could be brought by affected pregnant women in the U.S. illegally and children at risk of losing their right to U.S. citizenship, the Trump administration has argued.

But Wofsy said class-action lawsuits, like nationwide injunctions, are one of many tools available to federal courts and may not be appropriate in every case.

“The existence of that tool doesn’t mean courts shouldn’t have other tools available,” he said. “The question here isn’t, ‘should nationwide injections be entered in every case?’ The question is, ‘are we going to take away the discretion that district courts have to use this as an appropriate tool to craft a remedy in a case where it’s necessary?’”

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He said birthright citizenship is an example of a situation in which the constitutional question is so clear, there is no reason the government needs to apply the policy to a single child while the legal challenges move forward.

“Citizenship really cuts through so many aspects of our society. It matters for so many educational, health, nutrition, other kinds of programs,” Wofsy said. “The idea that we would have a patchwork system where people’s citizenship isn’t just a matter of whether you’re born in the United States, but who your parents are, what their status is, do you have documentation, are you a member of this organization, were you born in this state or that state invites confusion, chaos, discrimination and for no real purpose.”

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As Harvard Battles Trump, Its President Will Take a 25% Pay Cut

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As Harvard Battles Trump, Its President Will Take a 25% Pay Cut

Harvard University, which is clashing with the Trump administration over its academic independence and the withdrawal of billions of dollars in research funding, said on Wednesday that its president had chosen to cut his own pay by 25 percent starting later this year.

The university has not disclosed specifics about its compensation package for the president, Alan M. Garber, who became Harvard’s permanent leader last year. His recent predecessors were paid around $1 million a year.

Whatever it amounts to in dollar terms, though, the pay reduction is a symbolic gesture compared with the scale of the university’s fight with the federal government, which has already moved to block more than $2.6 billion in funding for Harvard.

A university spokesman, Jonathan L. Swain, said Dr. Garber’s salary would be reduced starting July 1, when Harvard’s next fiscal year begins. The university, which has already halted new hiring and suspended merit raises for many employees, said that other Harvard leaders were planning contributions to the school.

The university acknowledged Dr. Garber’s decision the day after it expanded its lawsuit against the Trump administration.

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The government made a range of intrusive demands of Harvard last month, asserting that the university had, among other things, not done enough to combat antisemitism. The university has sharply contested those accusations. Then last week, Linda McMahon, the education secretary, said that Harvard would not be eligible for any more federal grants.

Legal experts have cast doubt on the viability of Ms. McMahon’s decree, and many of them believe that Harvard has a strong legal case to reverse the cuts the Trump administration has already made. Even so, Harvard, which has routinely received hundreds of millions of dollars a year in federal research funding, is preparing for turmoil as long as President Trump remains in office.

In the first months of Mr. Trump’s second term, Harvard has already had to scale back or eliminate some research programs, including efforts to study tuberculosis, Lou Gehrig’s disease and radiation sickness, because of federal funding cuts. The university’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health, faced with some of the most significant funding losses, is eliminating desktop phones, limiting catering, reducing security and cutting back on purchases of new computers. The school has also cut back on leased office space, slots for doctoral students and a shuttle that ferries employees between offices.

The Crimson, the Harvard campus newspaper, first reported Dr. Garber’s pay decision.

A sense of campus solidarity in the funding fight extends beyond Harvard’s top ranks. Ninety tenured professors have pledged to take 10 percent pay cuts in order to help Harvard, the nation’s oldest and wealthiest university, weather the Trump administration’s onslaught. Ryan D. Enos, a professor of government and a leader of the group, said the university had expressed its gratitude.

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The group came together, Dr. Enos said, in recognition that some Harvard employees could be harder hit than others by the federal cuts.

In a statement, the professors, some of whom have not been named publicly, said their offer to work for less pay signaled “our commitment as faculty members to use means at our disposal to protect the university and, especially, staff and students who do not have the same protections.”

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