Quotulatiousness

January 13, 2026

Navies in the news

Filed under: Cancon, Military, Technology, USA — Tags: , , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

On the social media site formerly known as Twitter, John Konrad talks about the latest “OMG we’re all going to die!” pants-wetting over scary new hypersonic missiles as a threat to the navies of the west, especially the US Navy’s big carriers:

    R.C. Maxwell @RCMaxw3ll
    EXCLUSIVE: After Russia used hypersonics in western Ukraine, @RedState talked with senior executives from American startup @CastelionCorp, which is on the brink of finishing a comparable missile system that surpasses the capabilities of Russia & China.

This is insane and it’s great news for the U.S. Navy.

All the worst people keep telling me Trump-class battleships are “obsolete” because of hypersonic missiles.

Then this drops:

“Blackbeard, engineered from a clean-sheet design by former SpaceX alumni, will not only match but decisively outpace foreign systems … rapid iteration and scalable production. We’re not just going to provide a comparable missile. We’re going to provide better missiles.”

A tiny startup just told Russia and China’s entire missile-industrial complex: we can beat you.

That’s the tell.

If hypersonics were the unstoppable carrier-killers people claim, you wouldn’t see startups leapfrogging them in a garage with venture capital. You’d see locked-in monopolies and terrified Western navies.

Here’s what the hype crowd misses:

1) Future battleships won’t be naked.
They will carry layered anti-hypersonic defenses, directed-energy weapons, decoys, and interceptors specifically designed to kill these things.

2) Hitting a moving ship at hypersonic speed is brutally hard.

No nation has publicly demonstrated a successful hypersonic strike on a maneuvering warship. China hit a fake carrier sitting still in the desert. That proves almost nothing.

Think about the physics.

Flying a kamikaze plane into a carrier was hard but pilots had eyes, brains, and real-time judgment.

Now imagine doing that blind, with sensors the size of a soda can, while the target is jamming, maneuvering, spoofing, and throwing decoys.

Now imagine the Honey I Shrunk the Kids laser made you the size of an ant and you are told to steer a bullet into a weaving jet ski.

Russia can hit slow oil tankers. If they could reliably hit moving ships bringing supplies into Ukraine, they already would have.

3) Hypersonics are scarce and insanely expensive.

Even if it took 100 missiles to score a hit on a battleship, that’s 100 missiles that aren’t hitting ports, refineries, factories, air bases, and ammo depots.

Most of those targets don’t shoot back. None of them weave like a battleship.

Battleships change the economics of war.

They force the enemy to burn their most precious weapons just to try to hurt one ship.

That’s not vulnerability.
That’s deterrence.

Stop black-pilling naval power. The physics, the economics, and now the tech sector are all pointing in the same direction.

Also on naval matters, Matt Gurney at The Line talks about his unfamiliar feelings of hope that the Canadian government’s promised spending boost for the Royal Canadian Navy will not only happen, but that the RCN may generate significantly improved capabilities as a result:

Arctic Offshore Patrol Ship HMCS Harry DeWolf shortly after launch in 2018. The ship was commissioned into the Royal Canadian Navy in June, 2021.

A day or two ago, I found myself thinking about the state of the Royal Canadian Navy. Because, I mean, hey — who doesn’t?

Anyone who has paid much attention to my work will be aware that I’m not exactly bullish on our country’s ability to get much done — especially on the file of military procurement. Yet, a day or two ago, I found myself thinking about the state of the Royal Canadian Navy and feeling something almost like … hope? Is this what hope feels like?

There is a lot going on in Canadian naval news, and that fits a broader pattern. There’s a lot going on on the seas globally, and, somewhat to my surprise, Canada seems to be doing a pretty good job — could be better, but could be worse — adapting to the new reality.

[…]

So let’s talk about seapower. The U.S. has it — not as much as it wants, but it’s got it. It wants more. Even if that ends up taking some pretty weird forms. And others are racing to catch up.

Including, intriguingly, Canada.

Last week, Canadian shipyard Seaspan announced that it had signed agreements with both Finland and American shipyards to licence its design for Multi-Purpose Icebreakers to the U.S. Coast Guard’s Arctic Security Cutter Program. And while the “Elbows Up” crowd may look askance at the prevalence of the word “American” in that sentence, this is damned interesting — not only are we continuing to show interest in the Arctic, but we’re also trying to sustain real shipbuilding in this country. The situation in the White House is so bizarre these days that it’s hard to take any announcement like this to the bank, but it was notable. If nothing else, it would be nice to see more efforts like this — whether the plans work will, alas, largely be out of our hands.

In addition to that, a few more stories came to mind. The first was this announcement from a few months ago: the Irving Shipyards have begun work on the final Arctic Offshore Patrol Ship of the Harry DeWolf class. Irving is also getting started on the next generation of Canada’s main warships, the River-class destroyers. Canada is actively seeking a replacement, in far greater numbers, of its current fleet of problematic submarines. And there’s also growing talk about a new smaller, mid-range class of Canadian warship, dubbed, for now, the Continental Defence Corvette. (Which I guess rolls off the tongue better than the See, Trump, We’re Spending On the Military Now Program.)

It’s easy to be a cynic on Canadian defence procurement — I am cynical about Canadian defence procurement. But then I looked at the ships being seized by U.S. forces. At Russia cutting cables, China ringing Taiwan with missiles and the U.S. throwing fleets around like Theodore Roosevelt has something to prove. And I look at a plan to not only replace Canada’s (too small) fleet of warships, but to considerably grow it … and it’s hard not to see the bigger picture.

Reverting to a pre-1945 geopolitical reality isn’t going to be an exercise in vibes. It’s going to be an exercise in power — or at least attempts to wield power. Air forces matter, cyber matters, drones matter and Lord knows armies matter. But they matter locally. True global power, or at least the ability to give a global power some pause before they decide to whisk your el jefe off to a Manhattan courtroom in a tracksuit, requires the ability to control your coasts and all the ocean approaches to them.

November 21, 2025

The “spat” between China and Japan is far more important than western media are reporting

Filed under: China, Japan, Media, Military, Pacific, USA — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Claire Berlinsky explains why we should be paying far more attention to what our media are treating as a minor diplomatic spat as Beijing reacts furiously to the new Japanese PM’s comments:

You need to see the Chinese media today to get a feel for this. Front pages of the relevant organs are devoted to frothing in fury at Japan. They’re rectifying bad thoughts like a house on fire.

Here’s why I’m worried by this. Both the Chinese- and Japanese-language press are treating this as a major diplomatic incident. (In English, it’s mostly being described as “a row” or “spat” — then back to Trump and Epstein.) Let me walk you through what it looks from Beijing and Tokyo, with help from ChatGPT on the translations.

The trigger was a comment in by the new Japanese prime minister, Sanae Takaichi. She told a parliamentary committee that a Taiwan contingency involving the use of force might constitute a “sonritsu kiki jitai” (a “survival-threatening situation” — I think we’d use the phrase “existential threat”) for Japan under its 2015 security laws, and justify the exercise of collective self-defense, using Japan’s self-defense forces.

Beijing exploded. China summoned the Japanese ambassador in Beijing for a formal démarche, and it allowed the PRC consul general in Osaka, Xue Jian, to post a (now-deleted) tweet calling for her decapitation—”that dirty head that trespassed should be cut off, are you ready?” The Xue Jian post has, of course, become a media event of its own. Beijing issued a travel advisory urging Chinese citizens to avoid Japan, and told students to “carefully reconsider” study plans. It stepped up coast-guard activity near the Senkakus, and cancelled the Xi–Takaichi bilateral at the G20.

But this arid account doesn’t begin to convey the way the Chinese and Japanese media are talking about this. The Chinese coverage is nothing short of hysterical. To read the Party-line outlets, you’d think Takaichi had just ordered the immediate re-invasion of Manchuria. Her comment, they said, was an evidence of a “dangerous rightward turn” in Japanese politics. They’re calling it a “sky-collapsing opening“, accusing her of “reckless ranting” and tearing up the China-Japan relationship.

The headline in a widely circulated China Daily article:”If China and Japan go to war, Japan will be destroyed“. They found the inevitable panel of “peace-loving international friends” — including Okinawan peace activists and pro-PRC overseas Chinese — to denounce Takaichi as the reincarnation of “Japanese militarism”. The peace activists dutifully warned that the Japanese people would be “dragged into catastrophe” by their government. A CNR column accuses her of “brazen provocation”, and claims that “Taiwan compatriots are also outraged” at the prospect of Taiwan being turned into a battleground between China and a “militaristic” Japan.

The Party line: Taiwan is a “settled” internal issue; any talk of Japanese collective self-defense in the Strait is aggression and a “serious violation” of the post-1945 order. Takaichi represents “unrepentant militarism.” Chinese pieces quote her opponents at length to argue that “sober Japanese elites” are deploring her recklessness. Chinese-language coverage of the travel advisory is not treating it as a minor consular notice. They’re claiming it’s the first coercive step.

In Japan, this is front-page foreign policy news, not a minor gaffe. Mainichi ran an editorial saying, more or less, that Takaichi’s words were legally consistent with the 2015 security laws, but prime ministers should be more discrete about hypothetical military contingencies and show more prudence. Opposition figures are saying she “went too far” and threw the relationship into “a very grave state”. They called it “frivolous” for a commander-in-chief to talk so specifically about use-of-force scenarios.

On the other hand, there’s clearly a domestic constituency that sees this as long overdue. Some in her party see any hint of retraction as “weakness toward China”, and they’re praising her for drawing a firm line on Taiwan. (The coverage about whether to expel Xue Jian is divided: His post was a death threat, obviously, but the Foreign Ministry seems reluctant to escalate this further.)

TV explainers are reminding viewers that the 2015 security legislation already contemplated a Taiwan contingency — what’s new is that the prime minister has now said this out loud. And a prime minister with an openly revisionist profile — that’s definitely new.

So there’s a lot of signaling going on. Beijing is signaling to its own public: “We’ll never again let Japanese militarism threaten China. The Party is the bulwark against a repeat of the 1930s.” To Tokyo: “We’ll punish any step toward military involvement in the Strait, first with economic coercion — then worse. We are not kidding about this.” To the wider region and Washington: “Japan is a destabilizer — this woman isn’t right in the head. If things go wrong in the Taiwan Strait, blame Tokyo. Remember Pearl Harbor.”

Update, 23 November: Welcome, Instapundit readers! Please do have a look around at some of my other posts you may find of interest. I send out a daily summary of posts here through my Substack – https://substack.com/@nicholasrusson that you can subscribe to if you’d like to be informed of new posts in the future.

September 17, 2025

“It would be a grave error to scrap NORAD”

Filed under: Cancon, Media, Military, Politics, USA — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

J.L. Granatstein makes the case that abandoning NORAD in a fit of pique over the antics of the Bad Orange Man would be worse for Canadian national defence interests and might not even be noticed in Washington DC:

There are beginning murmurings that Canada should get out of the North American Aerospace Defence agreement (NORAD). Given the Trump administration’s hostile tone — its 51st state suggestions, its tariffs, and its growing concerns with Arctic defence — the United States has become a difficult partner and a threat to Canadian sovereignty. But would this be a sensible decision for Ottawa to make?

Not at all. In the first place, NORAD is a joint alliance to defend North America against Russian, Chinese, or other potential attackers. Canada provides aircraft, radars, personnel, and expertise to this role that serves our national interests. It would be a grave error to scrap NORAD and to take on the role of defending our part of North America on our own. It would also be hugely expensive.

The problem, however, is that the Trump administration is right: Canada is, in fact, not doing enough today to defend our portion of North America and protect our sovereignty in the region.

The Royal Canadian Air Force has 1980s vintage CF-18s flying patrols and occasional larger surveillance aircraft monitoring traffic in Arctic waters; there are snowmobile and ATV patrols of Canadian Rangers armed with rifles; and a few army exercises in the north each year. The Royal Canadian Navy has a half dozen new Arctic Offshore Patrol Vessels that have limited utility in Arctic waters and are very lightly armed, and the Canadian Coast Guard (CCG) has only one 66-year-old icebreaker capable of clearing thick ice. The CCG is now under the authority of the Department of National Defence, but its members, unlike those in the Canadian Armed Forces, are unionized, and its vessels are unarmed. This could be a problem in a conflict.

Yes, Ottawa has promised to do more. The Trudeau government agreed to the $38.6 billion NORAD Modernization Plan, which includes the new Northern Approaches Surveillance System featuring the Arctic Over-the-Horizon Radar and a Polar Over-the-Horizon Radar, enhancing early warning and threat tracking from the North for air and maritime threats. These systems will not be fully operational until the 2040s.

There’s more, but it’s behind the paywall.

June 15, 2025

Militarizing the Canadian Coast Guard (or not?)

Filed under: Cancon, Government, Military — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Noah tries to get some solid information on the recent announcement by the Prime Minister that as part of changes to bring Canada into line with our decade-old NATO commitments, the Canadian Coast Guard would be moved from the civilian oversight of the Ministry of Fisheries and Oceans to the military oversight of the Ministry of National Defence. Oddly, the government seems to have been caught rather flat-footed by the PM’s announcement:

When Monday came I was invited to take part in a Media Briefing before [the PM] took questions. My immediate goal was to bring this topic up and get some sort of official words on what these plans were, especially after it wasn’t mentioned in [Carney’s] speech beforehand.

[…]

What we were told was that no such move was taking place, nor plans to arm the Coast Guard and that the current plan was to focus on augmenting their capabilities through new sensors and further collaboration with the RCN.

It was a definitive statement, one that we all agreed was cut and dry. I even reached out to other journalists before adding it to the livethread to make sure we were on [the same] page.

So imagine my surprise when Steven at the G&M came out blazing with a straight no, the plan is to move them. He even came backed up with a statement from the PMO, and credit to Steven, he was quick on this:

Credit to Steven Chase at the Globe & Mail

So as you can imagine my new goal was to figure out what exactly the hell was happening to the Coast Guard, with multiple competing statements on the subject. I made it my mission to have a definitive answer.

So it was back to asking, and emailing, everyone, from the DND to the PMO, CCG to the DFO. I got in contact, I dug into sources, even went as far as to ask people in industry if they had heard anything.

What I got for the first few days was chaos. Multiple statements saying that info wasn’t available, more time was needed. I got outright denial from the DND, only to be told they would email me back with info (they never did)

The PMO also told me info would be available when they had it. Evidently as of the time of this writing they have not responded. The only one to stay in contact and provide an answer to my question:

So as far as I was concerned this was a deal closer. The Coast Guard will be moving under the leadership of the Minister of National Defence. What will this look like? We don’t know. I had hit a dead end at this point, where sadly my reach was no longer wide enough for info.

Thankfully, there were others also keen on this, and wanting to get to the bottom of this, and they got farther than me. I will highly recommend my boy Stuart’s article on this as he got farther than me.

What has become evidently clear is:

  1. The Coast Guard is moving
  2. The idea is facing stiff resistance

This isn’t a shock at all. The DFO folks I talked to felt very caught off guard by everything, and the general reaction I have talking around was that this was a bit unexpected.

If accurate, then it is clear that this is the choice of the Prime Minister. He is the one who wants this, and so is making the final push. That isn’t to say he is the only one, but this has his backing and he will push that through.

June 10, 2025

Mark Carney’s big defence spending announcement

Filed under: Cancon, Government, Military — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

On Monday Morning, Prime Minister Mark Carney was in Toronto to make a major announcement on Canada’s military spending. After being one of the worst freeloaders in the western alliance, Canada was spending far less on the Canadian Armed Forces than the 2% of GDP we’d promised our NATO partners several years ago. Of course, at the same time that Canada seems to be finally getting serious about defence priorities, the rest of our allies are talking seriously about raising the agreed-upon target to 5%:

Chris Lambie in the National Post says it’s a C$9 billion bump in direct military spending in this (unbudgeted) year:

Canada’s plan to add more than $9 billion to defence spending this year was praised by military watchers Monday, but they cautioned that the country is shooting at a moving target.

Prime Minister Mark Carney announced the country would meet its commitment in this fiscal year of hitting the two per cent of gross domestic product mark that was agreed upon by NATO countries more than a decade back.

“It’s very encouraging that the prime minister has come out this early in his mandate and made such a strong commitment to defence,” said Vincent Rigby, a former top intelligence adviser to former prime minister Justin Trudeau, who spent 14 years with Canada’s Department of National Defence.

“You’ve gone from the former prime minister talking about the two per cent as a crass mathematical calculation to the current prime minister saying, no, this is actually a serious commitment. We committed to it 10 years ago and even before that. And we have to do it because we owe it to our allies. But we also owe it to the Canadian people. He made it quite clear this is about protecting Canada, protecting our national interests and protecting our values.”

New spending could do a lot to improve crumbling military infrastructure, said Michel Maisonneuve, a retired Canadian Army lieutenant-general who has served as assistant deputy chief of defence staff, and chief of staff of NATO’s Allied Command.

“The housing on bases is horrible,” Maisonneuve said.

He’s keen on Carney’s plan to participate in the $234-billion ReArm Europe program.

“This will bolster our ability to produce stuff for ourselves” while also helping the Europeans to do the same, Maisonneuve said.

“All the tree huggers are going to hate that, but that’s where we are today in the world.”

Carney’s cash injection includes $2.6 billion to recruit and retain military personnel. The military is short about 13,000 people. It aims to boost the regular force to 71,500 and the reserves to 30,000 by the end of this decade.

“There is no way we can protect Canada and Canadians with the strength that we have now,” Maisonneuve said.

Later in the day, Matt Gurney made some preliminary comments on the social media site formerly known as Twitter (I imagine he’ll have more to say in an upcoming Line post):

I’ve had a chance to actually look at some of the details of what was announced today for Canada’s defence. Overall, I am very supportive of everything that’s been announced.

There are some caveats. Or at least notes.

1. The new spending is mostly aimed at flushing out existing capabilities, not adding new ones.

That’s fine! We need to do that, definitely. I just don’t know if the public understands how much money we could sink into the military without actually adding any new capabilities. All we would do is backfill capabilities that we currently claim to have that don’t really exist.

2. Billions of additional dollars are going toward very basic things. More money to retain existing personnel. Apparently more money to build out recruitment. Spending more money to bring equipment and facilities up to state of proper repair.

Same as above. All good! Needed. Smart.

3. Some of what’s being announced today is entirely a matter of how we’re budgeting stuff. Certain existing expenditures are being redesignated as defence expenditures.

That’s okay! Some of our allies count things toward their defence total that we don’t. Everybody cooks the books a little bit, and I have no objection to this.

4. Everything being announced today should have been done years ago.

The only note I really have to add here is how the longer [Mark Carney] is Prime Minister, the harder it gets to explain away some of the shocking inactivity of his immediate predecessor.

5. None of this is going to be enough.

Remember, all we’re doing here is building out existing capabilities so that they are actually real things, not just things that exist on paper. That’s good. But the actual work of recapitalizing, expanding and adapting the military for 21st-century conflict hasn’t really begun yet. Everything announced today is a necessary start to getting that done. But the hard work is still to come.

And so are the really eye-watering numbers.

Of course, there are definite downsides to just opening up the spending taps the way things currently are set up:

He’s not wrong.

April 12, 2025

President Trump … or any president … shouldn’t have the unilateral power to levy tariffs

Filed under: Economics, Government, Politics, USA — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Love him or hate him — and there are lots of people in both camps — President Donald Trump has the power to randomly throw spanners into the international trade arena … because Congress ceded that power to the presidency long before Trump began his political career:

In response to Donald Trump’s tariff maneuvers, Senator Rand Paul has been arguing that presidents shouldn’t have the power to raise tariffs themselves. Taxing power belongs to Congress, and that’s where tariffs should be born. Trump’s tariffs result from the use of emergency power that Congress gave to the POTUS, and we shouldn’t normalize emergency rule. You can watch him say all of that here.

Every word of that is completely right. I don’t disagree with a single breath of it. I respect Rand Paul, and I’m inordinately fond of his dad. But it misses the point about how we got here, and why, starting with the fact that Congress gave away its taxing authority.

  1. Congress delegated its authority;
  2. Donald Trump used the authority that Congress gave him;
  3. Therefore, Donald Trump is very bad, and what he’s doing is wrong.

The core sickness at the heart of the American republic is Congress, and we keep discussing that sickness by saying that Trump sucks. He’s doing what you gave him the power to do, and he’s not the first.

See also my recent post in which I described a time when Congress made something illegal, than asked the administrative agencies to explain to them what they had just banned. Congress has delegated its authority, over and over again, and the resulting political vacuum is a serious problem. But anyway, TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP.

American political discourse keeps taking a wide range of political pathologies and assigning them to the same account. Orange Man Bad, Orange Man Bad, Orange Man Bad, they explained, with drool running down their chins. Donald Trump is our deflector object, our national excuse. [Problem name here]; OH NO WHY IS TRUMP DOING THIS TO US.

The commandant of the United States Coast Guard spoke at a maritime conference, a few days ago, and he said that the organization he runs wakes up every day and tries to keep the doors from falling off: “The US Coast Guard is less ready today than any other time since World War II. We are on a readiness spiral. Today our fleet of cutters are in significant decline. We are in repair failure mode … No ship today gets underway without cannibalizing others for parts.”

See also, from one of his subordinates:

Serious question: Did all of those problems begin at noon on January 20, 2025?

July 12, 2024

New Canadian submarines and icebreakers promised at NATO Summit

Filed under: Cancon, Military — Tags: , , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

Under reportedly intense pressure from NATO allies, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau grudgingly promises to begin the (usually decades-long) process of purchasing new submarines for the Royal Canadian Navy:

HMCS Victoria
Image via Wikimedia Commons.

The Canadian government announced today it is “taking the first steps” towards buying 12 conventionally-powered, under-ice capable submarines — a massive acquisition with numerous shipbuilders from the around world already eyeing the program reported to be worth at least $60 billion Canadian dollars.

“As the country with the longest coastline in the world, Canada needs a new fleet of submarines — and today, we’ve announced that we will move forward with this acquisition,” Bill Blair, minister of national defence, said in a statement published during the NATO Summit being held this week in Washington, DC. “This new fleet will enable Canada to protect its sovereignty in a changing world, and make valuable, high-end contributions to the security of our partners and NATO allies.”

Canada has been eyeing the acquisition of a new class of submarines to replace its four aging Victoria-class boats since at least April 2023, and Blair himself was the target of criticism earlier this year after he included language about the acquisition in a major defense policy document that critics labeled as “wishy washy”.

In an op-ed for Breaking Defense published ahead of the NATO summit, Blair said that Canada was still pursing the submarine plan, and emphasized that the investment would help his nation cross the 2 percent GDP target.

The government’s press release does not include a price estimate for the program, but the Ottawa Citizen has previously reported that the Royal Canadian Navy tagged the acquisition at $60 billion Canadian dollars ($44 billion USD).

Another item from Breaking Defence details a new trilateral agreement with Finland and the United States to develop a joint design for a “fleet” of icebreakers:

Originally ordered in 2008 for delivery in 2017, the CCGS John G. Diefenbaker is now expected to enter service in 2030.
Canadian Coast Guard conceptual rendering, 2012.

The US, Canada and Finland announced today a new trilateral effort, dubbed the Icebreaker Collaboration Effort or “ICE Pact”, to work together on the production of a “fleet” of new polar icebreakers, in what a US official said was a “strategic imperative” in the race of dominance of the high north.

The initiative, to be formalized in a memorandum of understanding by the end of the year, calls for better information sharing on ship production, collaboration on work force development — including better allowing workers and experts to train at each other’s yards — and an “invitation” to other allies and partners to buy icebreakers from ICE Pact members.

“Due to the capital intensity of shipbuilding, long-term, multi-ship orderbooks are essential to the success of a shipyard,” the White House said in its announcement. “The governments of the United States, Canada, and Finland intend to leverage shipyards in the United States, Canada, and Finland to build polar icebreakers for their own use, as well as to work closely with likeminded allies and partners to build and export polar icebreakers for their needs at speed and affordable cost.”

Ahead of the announcement, White House Deputy National Security Advisor for International Economics Daleep Singh framed the partnership as a commercial and industrial boon, but also one with national security implications: It is, in part, a message to Russia and China that the US and its partners “intend … to project power into the polar regions to enforce international norms and treaties that promote peace and prosperity in the arctic and Antarctic.”

January 7, 2024

“Of course, you know that you Eeenglish invented modern people smuggling?”

Filed under: Britain, Europe, History, Military, WW2 — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

In The Critic, Peter Caddick-Adams talks about the huge problems faced by European nations in combatting people smuggling:

Title page of a book covering the trial of seven smugglers for the murder of two revenue officers. In the preface the author says “I do assure the Public that I took down the facts in writing from the mouths of the witnesses, that I frequently conversed with the prisoners, both before and after condemnation; by which I had an opportunity of procuring those letters which are herein after inserted, and other intelligence of some secret transactions among them, which were never communicated to any other person.”
W.J. Smith, Smuggling and Smugglers in Sussex, 1749, via Wikimedia Commons.

The Prime Minister has nailed his colours to his mast and decided we should “stop the boats”. The slogan is everywhere. What Mr Sunak means is the vessels crossing the Channel laden with bedraggled folk seeking succour on the shores of Albion. I attended a conference recently to see how this was to be done. As the perpetrators are highly organised transnational criminals, the response must be a multi-national one. Delegates were given some historical context. Ours is not a unique era. Since pre-recorded history, mankind has been inclined to see the grass as always greener on the other side of the fence. Hollow out a log to cross a river, invade an island, a coastline, Troy, the Euphrates, the Tigris, the Nile. Anywhere, for trade, for adventure, for sanctuary. Leap the Channel by longship to escape overcrowding, poor crops, for plunder, to claim a crown.

However, we were reminded — for the conference was hosted by several coastal nations studying security and crime — that most of Europe’s maritime problems with criminality and smuggling, be it booze, tobacco, narcotics, fake branded goods, or people, involve rivers, not the open sea. An old friend from the Gendarmerie Maritime observed that the great rivers of the world are not only frontiers, but also highways; earlier versions of today’s motorways, as logistically familiar to the Romans as to our own times. Those long gaggles of barges which still shuffle along the Rhine or Danube are a happenstance of trade we Brits tend to overlook, as our canals and rivers have long been consigned to pleasure-boating.

Based in Messina, the gendarme’s opposite number from the Servizio navale of the Italian Carabinieri, wearing the most resplendent braid-laden uniform of anyone at our gathering, then fixed me with his gimlet eye. “Of course, you know that you Eeenglish invented modern people smuggling?” By this he went on to explain that many of the tricks of shifting people covertly through the Mediterranean, along the Dalmatian coast, by patrol boat about the Baltic, trawler braving the North Sea, MTB across the Channel, caïque over the Aegean, among the Ionian islands, and along the Adriatic, were devised by Britain’s Special Operation’s Executive (SOE) during the Second World War.

My Belgian and French friends observed that such smuggling had honourable roots. From 1789 and post-1917, many nations had aided middle class and aristocratic refugees to flee Revolutionary France and Russia. Subsequently, their descendants helped Jewish families quit the Third Reich. Others aided the British to move vast numbers of manpower by small boat in 1940 from Dunkirk, which emboldened fishermen to repeat the manoeuvre on a smaller scale to confound their German foes. Female Greek, Turkish and Croatian officers chipped in with their knowledge of various rat-lines established during World War Two to support partisans with personnel and weapons, and extract downed airmen, spies and important scientists. Post-war, as a Spanish policeman I knew from my days in Gibraltar observed, the same systems exported Nazi war criminals, and imported drugs and guns.

The modus operandi created in those heady days of derring-do were continued for spies during the Cold War, often by the same families, using the same craft. This applied as much to jaunts and japes up and down the Danube, Rhine, Meuse and Elbe waterways as it did to the open seas. Our Danish representative observed that “boat people” were a distraction. Their numbers were vastly overshadowed by far greater numbers of religious refugees and assorted shady characters, then and now, who used stolen genuine, or expertly forged papers; another legacy from the even more distant times that preceded World War Two. The man from Interpol revealed that today’s Italian and Albanian crime families have such advanced facilities for reproducing many of the world’s passports, ID cards, work permits and driving licences, that they will pass muster even at most European electronic frontier posts and airport controls. Our Albanian colonel shifted uncomfortably.

With the fall of the Iron Curtain, espionage went out of business and, casting about for new business, these latter-day privateers and licenced black marketeers started smuggling industrial quantities of things and people, to replace the nocturnal movement of atomic secrets by night over water. A dinghy full of people in mid-Ocean is merely the tip of a giant iceberg of organisation and logistics that started on 22 July 1940 by direct order of Winston Churchill, but has continued in various legal, semi-legal and illegal forms ever since.

February 14, 2023

China’s awkward actions on the world stage do not charm the neighbours

Filed under: Asia, China, India, Military, Pacific — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

CDR Salamander explains why the BRIC (Brazil-Russia-India-China) “coalition” is as unlikely to occur in the real world as any other opium pipe-dream:

Yes, the USA and Canada had our Balloons of February, but in the last year or so, what has China been doing to seem like a pleasant alternative to the United States to the rest of the world?

Her largest neighbor? They get sticks:

    The root cause is an ill-defined, 3,440km (2,100-mile)-long disputed border.

    Rivers, lakes and snowcaps along the frontier mean the line can shift, bringing soldiers face to face at many points, sparking a confrontation.

    The two nations are also competing to build infrastructure along the border, which is also known as the Line of Actual Control. India’s construction of a new road to a high-altitude air base is seen as one of the main triggers for a deadly 2020 clash with Chinese troops.

    How bad is the situation?

    Despite military-level talks, tensions continue. In December 2022 troops clashed for the first time in more than a year.

    It happened near the Tawang sector of Arunachal Pradesh state, the eastern tip of India. Some soldiers suffered minor injuries.

    De-escalation work has taken place since a major clash in June 2020. The Galwan Valley battle — fought with sticks and clubs, not guns — was the first fatal confrontation between the two sides since 1975.

    At least 20 Indian and four Chinese soldiers died.

    Another face-off in January 2021 left troops on both sides injured. It took place near India’s Sikkim state, between Bhutan and Nepal.

The “I” and “C” in the B.R.I.C. are not going to be close friends, ever — one of the reasons I roll my eyes at those who propose the BRIC nations as some kind of power block — something only slightly sillier than the Cold War “Non Aligned Movement.”

With the “B” being the basket case Brazil (always the nation of the future, and always will be), and the “R” being Russia, I mean, child please.

Another nation that if the PRC was just slightly more subtle and less arrogant they might have a chance to make things more difficult for the USA-Japan-Australia defense concerns is The Philippines. They had a window in the last couple of decades, but … if they’re doing this;

The PRC Wolf Warrior Lack of Charm Campaign perhaps may play well internally — and that may be all they care about — but there was a window not long ago that the PRC was playing smart on the world stage — making significant impact in Australia and having the USA happy to let them set up Confucius Institutes at our major universities, etc … but the last decade or so they somehow decided to play a different game.

June 6, 2022

How Rescue Flotilla One saved more than 400 men on D-Day

Filed under: France, History, Military, USA, WW2 — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

The History Guy: History Deserves to Be Remembered
Published 2 Jun 2018

The History Guy remembers the heroic service of Rescue Flotilla 1 of the United States Coast Guard during D-Day. It is history that deserves to be remembered.

The History Guy uses images that are in the Public Domain. As photos of actual events are sometimes not available, I will often use photographs of similar events and objects for illustration.

Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/TheHistoryGuy

The History Guy: Five Minutes of History is the place to find short snippets of forgotten history from five to fifteen minutes long. If you like history too, this is the channel for you.

Awesome The History Guy merchandise is available at:
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The episode is intended for educational purposes. All events are presented in historical context.

#ushistory #militaryhistory #thehistoryguy

May 9, 2022

Military Civics: The Many Armies of the United States

Filed under: History, Law, Military, USA — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

The Chieftain
Published 19 Dec 2020

There are just shy of a hundred official land component military organizations in the United States of America, each with their own unique legal structure and chain of command. In this video, I try to break down the details for you. It also seems to have taken several days for someone to observe I have the branches in the wrong sequence, Marines go before Navy.

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March 26, 2022

Long-delayed pair of Canadian Coast Guard icebreakers now expected to cost C$7.25 billion

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Cancon, Government — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

It’s not just the Canadian Armed Forces that suffer from galloping cost increases for their equipment, as the Canadian Coast Guard’s original (2008) $720 million budget for a new icebreaker to be called CCGS John G. Diefenbaker is a dim distant memory:

Originally ordered in 2008 for delivery in 2017, the CCGS John G. Diefenbaker is now expected to enter service in 2030.
Canadian Coast Guard conceptual rendering, 2012.

Canada could face problems buying the specialized steel needed for its new $7-billion polar icebreakers, further driving up costs for taxpayers.

The polar-class icebreaker project was originally supposed to cost $1.3 billion for the construction of one vessel. Two icebreakers will now be built, but the cost has skyrocketed to an estimated $7.25 billion.

One of the top problems now facing shipbuilders is obtaining the special hardened steel needed for the icebreakers. In a response to questions from the House of Commons, the Canadian Coast Guard outlined the top 10 risks associated with the icebreaker project. Number one was listed as “Challenges sourcing specialized EH50 steel, which may impact cost, schedule and scope” of the project.

Other issues involved the type of helicopter that would operate from the vessels, the capacity of shipyards to do the work and potential design changes. All could contribute to boosting the project’s cost even further.

[…]

In 2021, the Liberal government decided to purchase two polar-class icebreakers, one to be built at Seaspan and the other at Davie in Quebec. Last year, Parliamentary Budget Officer Yves Giroux produced a report warning the cost of the two new ships was now estimated at $7.25 billion.

The CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent retires from service in 2030.

The construction of the two icebreakers will be done simultaneously at Seaspan and Davie. “In order to maximize vessel similarities across the two ships, the two yards will be encouraged to establish a strong relationship both between themselves and with firms that are engaged in the ship design phase to help ensure commonality,” parliamentarians were told by the coast guard in its response to questions. Such co-operation could prevent the project from slipping behind schedule, it added.

November 23, 2021

Conquering the Arctic: HMCS Labrador and her air wing, the Piasecki HUP-3 Retriever and Bell HTL-4

Filed under: Cancon, History, Military — Tags: , , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Polyus Studios
Published 10 Nov 2021

Support me on Patreon – https://www.patreon.com/polyusstudios

In 1954 the Canadian military deployed its first and only icebreaker. With it they would help to secure sovereignty over the Arctic and map the fabled Northwest passage. It was the first deep-draught ship to transit the Northwest Passage and the second vessel ever to accomplish the feat in one season.

HMCS Labrador‘s contributions to opening up sea navigation in Canada’s Arctic were monumental. In four years of operating in dangerous and uncharted waters she never ran aground or was seriously damaged in any way. She explored and charted thousands of kilometres of coastline in some of the least hospitable places in the world. Its faithful helicopters pushed the limits of what was possible with a ship at sea.

While almost forgotten today, HMCS Labrador and her Peasecki HUP-3, and Bell HTL-4 helicopters helped to shape Canadian sovereignty to this day.

0:00 Introduction
0:31 Quest to secure Canadian arctic sovereignty
3:05 HMCS Labrador is built to assert sovereignty over the Arctic
5:19 Bell HTL-4
5:58 Piasecki HUP-3 Retriever
7:12 Deployment history
12:59 HMCS Labrador retired from RCN
13:57 Retirement of HUPs and other uses
14:51 Retirement of HLTs, and other uses
15:17 Conclusion

Music:
Denmark – Portland Cello Project

Research Sources:

Footage Sources:
BOLD JOURNEY ROYAL CANADIAN NAVY LABRADOR THROUGH NW PASSAGE – https://youtu.be/B7wOv5s0-F4

#Arctic #CanadianAerospace #PolyusStudios

July 3, 2021

Taiwan, 2021

Filed under: China, Economics, Military, Pacific, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Admiral Gary Roughead considers the regional situation of Taiwan in 2021:

Taiwan relief map.
Library of Congress Geography & Map Division via Wikimedia Commons.

There has been a spate of recent articles proffering when the People’s Republic of China (PRC) will likely be capable of invading Taiwan. The prognostications are interesting but unhelpful as they distract from the reality of the range of coercive actions the PRC may impose on Taiwan and what could happen now as a result of the PRC increasing pressure and a related military accident or misstep in the vicinity of Taiwan.

The current American penchant to jump to military options to address thorny global problems often casts the Taiwan dilemma in a superficial bilateral or trilateral military context. That aperture must be opened more fully to consider the realities, attributes, and interests of Taiwan, and how those factors will influence the methods and timing of Beijing’s reunification objective. Moreover, those realities, some inconvenient, must underpin new and broader thinking about how to ensure Taiwan’s existence as a vibrant democracy.

[…]

Changing defense strategy to adjust to new circumstances can’t simply discount the realities of today. The interaction of the Air Forces of Taiwan and the PRC in 2020 was extraordinarily high and costly for Taiwan, and maritime and naval considerations will also continue to loom large for Taiwan’s security.

PRC naval force structure both in terms of capacity (numbers) and capability (effectiveness and quality) has grown impressively in the past two decades and some comparisons are worth noting. There are over 330 ships in the PLA Navy and construction continues at an impressive pace. The Chinese Coast Guard numbers 255 ships. The PLA Navy, except for short episodic out of area deployments of small numbers of ships, is concentrated within the First Island Chain. Taiwan’s navy has 86 ships in service, more than half are coastal patrol craft. Its small Coast Guard of 23 ships is not close to being on par in numbers, ship size, or capability as that of the PRC. The U.S Navy stands at 296 ships. The American fleet enjoys a qualitative advantage, but only approximately 60 percent of the U.S. Fleet is assigned to the Pacific, with 11 of those forward deployed to Japan. The remainder are thousands of miles away.

PLA Air Force and Taiwan Air Force aircraft inventories are similarly imbalanced with fighter numbers 600 (Eastern Theater) and 400 respectively. The PLA Air Force’s fighter total is 1,500 and would inevitably backfill shortages and combat losses. The U.S. Air Force combat coded fighters number 1,011. The PRC’s Air Force and Navy regional concentration is reinforced by a Rocket Force of nearly 1,000 intermediate and lesser range ballistic missiles and 300 ground launched cruise missiles.

China’s focus on “informationized” warfare integrates cyber operations into the PRC’s anti-access area denial strategy and architecture. The BeiDou satellite network enables full autonomy in positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) information for PLA ground, sea, and air forces and is the essential factor in precision weapon employment. Another contributor to precision engagements and overall situational awareness is China’s 120 reconnaissance and remote sensing satellites. A robust People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia also provides close-in maritime locating information and has and will interfere with U.S., Taiwanese, and other nations’ naval and maritime operations.

May 6, 2021

The Royal Canadian Navy – Sinking you, but politely

Filed under: Britain, Cancon, History, Military, WW1, WW2 — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Drachinifel
Published 27 Jan 2021

A brief history of the Royal Canadian Navy from its origins to the end of WW2.

Sources:
https://archive.org/details/seaisatourgatesh00germ
https://www.canada.ca/en/navy/services/history/naval-service-1910-2010.html
Legion Magazine – “Over The Side: The Courageous Boarding Of U-94”
www.amazon.co.uk/No-Higher-Purpose-Operational-1939-1943/dp/1551250616
www.amazon.co.uk/Canadas-Navy-Century-General-Interest/dp/0802042813/

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