Today In Issues:
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The Must-Reads
UN nuclear watchdog chief presses for more access in Iran Saudi warns Iran-backed rebels using bomb-laden boats in Red Sea JPost’s Seth J. Frantzman: Iran wants to invest in Kurdish region to counter 'Zionists' WINEP's Farzin Nadimi: A close encounter of the propaganda kind in the Gulf Taliban sends hundreds of fighters to eastern Afghanistan to wage war against Islamic State 12 attorneys general call on Ben & Jerry’s to reverse Israel Boycott China is expanding its effort to launch weapons from hypersonic missiles Russia rebuts growing U.S. warnings of attack on Ukraine U.S. imposes further sanctions in connection with Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline Dartmouth's Ezzedine C. Fishere: Egypt’s dictatorship is squandering the country’s remaining assets Space Force general warns US hypersonic technology 'not as advanced as the Chinese or the Russians'In The News
Iran
The head of the United Nations’ atomic watchdog met Tuesday with Iranian officials to press for greater access in the Islamic Republic on the eve of diplomatic talks restarting over Tehran’s tattered nuclear deal with world powers. – Associated Press
A Saudi-led military coalition said Iran-backed fighters were using booby-trapped boats in the southern Red Sea and that it was working to neutralize the threat to global shipping. – Bloomberg
Iranian state media on Monday published photographs of the trial investigating the shootdown of a Ukrainian passenger jet in 2020 by the country’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, trying to tamp down criticism of the largely closed-door proceeding. – Associated Press
A group of Republican attorneys general and staffers from 11 states met in Washington, D.C., in early November to discuss strategies for keeping pressure on Iran, if the Biden administration reenters in the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action or eases sanctions against the Islamic regime. – Jewish Insider
Israel will continue to maintain its freedom to act against Iran even if the US returns to the 2015 Iran deal, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said on Tuesday. – Jerusalem Post
Iran Foreign Ministry spokesperson Saeed Khatibzadeh has been quoted in Iranian media as saying Iran should begin to “stay on track” for technical cooperation with the IAEA and praised regional successes that Iran believes may transpire as a result. The quotes appeared in Tasnim News report and were based on a weekly press conference. – Jerusalem Post
President Isaac Herzog on Monday urged a group of 100 British lawmakers to make sure their government remains tough on Iran as world powers prepare to restart negotiations in Vienna next week aimed at reviving the multilateral nuclear accord between them. – Times of Israel
Bahrain Foreign Minister Dr. Abdullatif bin Rashid Alzayani told i24NEWS he was “concerned” about Iran getting nuclear weapons. – Arutz Sheva
Defense Minister Benny Gantz said on Tuesday that Iran had attempted to fly an explosive-laden drone from Syria to terror groups in the West Bank, but that Israel had intercepted the aircraft over Israeli territory. – Haaretz
The US special envoy on Iran Robert Malley thinks that there is only one way to solve the global stand-off with Iran: ending Tehran’s exclusion and boosting its economy, which should incentivise the Islamic regime to stay in the nuclear deal. Malley’s plan, however, is riddled with loopholes that make his diplomacy look more like ideology. – The Arab Weekly
Republican foreign policy leaders in Congress are asking the Biden administration to turn over information about any steps it has taken to hold the Iranian regime accountable for human rights abuses, according to a letter sent late last week to the White House. – Washington Free Bacon
Iran’s new Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi is wanted by Interpol for murdering 85 people in the 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish community center in Buenos Aires. However, now the minister wants to devote his discussion to the support he will provide the Kurdish region in Iran. He claimed that the Kurdistan region needs prosperity and security and that Kurds had rejected attempts by foreign regimes to undermine Iran’s role in its northwest, where Kurds live. – Jerusalem Post
Prime Minister Naftali Bennett signalled readiness on Tuesday to step up Israel’s confrontation with Iran and reiterated that his country would not be bound by any new Iranian nuclear deal with world powers. – Reuters
Farzin Nadimi writes: Finally, as the United States continues its customary assertion of freedom of navigation through the Strait of Hormuz as an international waterway, Tehran should be pressed to clarify its past legislation pertaining to the strait and the wider Persian Gulf. Of particular importance are those instances where Iranian laws conflict with international maritime rules such as the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. – Washington Institute
Afghanistan
The Taliban has expanded its shadowy war against the Islamic State branch in Afghanistan, deploying hundreds more fighters to this eastern province in an increasingly violent fight and critical test of the group’s counterterrorism abilities after the U.S. troop withdrawal. – Washington Post
Afghan women, who had received the right to work and access to education during the time the U.S. military was in Afghanistan, have concerns, some of which have already played out, that the withdrawal of those troops and the Taliban’s rise to power caused a rollback of those rights for women. – Washington Examiner
GOP Rep. Andy Biggs is pushing the Biden administration for answers about the U.S withdrawal from Afghanistan , the Taliban’s subsequent takeover, and conditions in the country since then. – Washington Examiner
The head of U.S. Special Operations Command said he doesn’t believe the United States can rely on Afghanistan’s newly installed Taliban government in the fight against the threat from the Islamic State. – Washington Examiner
Israel
One of former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s closest advisers testified against him Monday in a long-running corruption case that could decide the political fate of Israel’s longest-serving leader. – Wall Street Journal
A Palestinian man opened fire on a group of Israelis near a holy site in Jerusalem’s Old City on Sunday, killing one and injuring four, according to Israeli security forces. Police said they shot the assailant to death within a minute of the attack, the second in the area in a week. – Washington Post
After years in Israel’s political wilderness, small dovish parties that support Palestinian statehood and oppose Jewish settlements are back in government. But they are finding their influence is limited, with pro-settler coalition partners showing little appetite for compromise and the country’s decades-long occupation churning on. – Associated Press
The chief legal officers of 12 states are urging Ben & Jerry’s to reverse its boycott of Israel in the disputed territories, calling the ice cream company’s move “economic warfare.” – New York Post
Israeli security forces arrested dozens of members of a Hamas cell that was in the advanced stages of planning major terror attacks in the West Bank and Israel, the Shin Bet security service said Monday. – Times of Israel
Sheikh Fadi Abu Shkhaydam, the terrorist who shot one Israeli dead and wounded four others in a November 21, 2021 terrorist attack near the Western Wall in Jerusalem, was a member of Hamas. […]It should be noted that Abu Shkhaydam, a preacher and schoolteacher, was active on social media and posted his sermons on his various accounts. An examination of his Facebook account reveals that he admired ‘Abdallah ‘Azzam, a Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood member who is known as the spiritual father of the global jihad movement and of Osama Bin Laden. – Middle East Media Research Institute
Israel has reached the final stage of severing the West Bank from Jerusalem, European Union Representative to the Palestinian Authority Sven Kuhn von Burgsdorff warned on Sunday. – Jerusalem Post
David Singer writes: The United Nations (UN) needs to end its ongoing deceptive misrepresentation of the Arab-Jewish conflict in former Palestine – as it once again prepares to celebrate its self-proclaimed International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People – but not the Jewish People – on 29 November. […]The UN’s continuing failure to recognise the Jewish People’s legal entitlement to settle in Judea and Samaria (“West Bank”) disqualifies the UN and its agencies from having any role in ending the Arab-Jewish conflict. – Arutz Sheva
Emily Schrader writes: With every perceived injustice that occurs to anyone, particularly in the West, not far behind are the anti-Israel activists standing by, ready to hijack any and every cause to make it about themselves. […]The cynical attempts to hijack causes and make them about Palestinians is simply tragedy tourism on the part of anti-Israel activists, not to mention it is disrespectful to the causes they are hijacking. There’s a difference between showing solidarity and using the publicity of another cause to promote your own propaganda. – Jerusalem Post
Arabian Peninsula
The Saudi-led coalition in Yemen said on Tuesday it is launching air raids on “legitimate” Houthi military targets in the highly condensed capital Sanaa, and asked civilians not to gather around or approach potential targets, Saudi state TV reported. – Reuters
A Hamas official said on Monday that Qatar will start sending Gaza up to $10 million worth of Egyptian fuel a month under a plan to fund civil service pay in the impoverished Palestinian enclave ruled by the Islamist group. – Reuters
Bahrain security forces arrested a number of suspected militants ahead of a planned attack and confiscated weapons and explosives that had come from Iran, the interior ministry said on its official Twitter on Monday. – Reuters
Al Arabiya has exclusively obtained videos showing the Iran-backed Houthi militia using Sanaa International Airport as a military base to conduct experiments and tests of air defense systems. – Al Arabiya
On the outskirts of Riyadh, officials show visitors around one of the latest investments by the sovereign wealth fund at the forefront of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s plans to modernise the economy of the Gulf state: a defence electronics factory. – Financial Times
Middle East & North Africa
Israel, Jordan, the United Arab Emirates and the U.S. have signed a memorandum of understanding for cross-border water and solar energy transactions. – Bloomberg
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Russia’s Special Presidential Envoy for Syria, Alexander Lavrentyev, and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister, Sergey Vershinin, have spoken about humanitarian aid for Syria in a meeting, Russia’s Tass state media said. Syria wants Russia and its friends to mobilize “comprehensive humanitarian assistance,” the report said. – Jerusalem Post
Foreign Minister Yair Lapid on Monday demanded Turkey shut down the offices of the Hamas terror group operating in the country after Israel announced the arrests of a sophisticated 50-member West Bank cell being directed from Istanbul. – Times of Israel
Defence Minister Benny Gantz headed on Tuesday to Morocco on a visit that will “formalize” cooperation between the two countries, at a time when Rabat is embroiled in a standoff over Western Sahara. The two-day trip comes less than a year after Morocco normalized ties with Israel in a deal brokered by former U.S. president Donald Trump’s administration. – Agence France-Presse
Russia has sent Lebanon the satellite images it has for Beirut’s port before and after a huge explosion rocked it last year, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said after talks with his Lebanese counterpart in Moscow on Monday. – Reuters
Ezzedine C. Fishere writes: For Egypt to one day break away from this infernal cycle, or to even have a chance in the future as a functioning state, its dictator’s assault on its human capital and on the independence of its institutions has to be restrained. The Biden administration, which has just subsidized Egypt’s dictatorship by more than $1 billion, has the responsibility to push back on such brazen, destructive attacks. Though the administration is prioritizing its immediate regional security concerns over human rights, it should also take steps to ensure that it doesn’t finance the erosion of Egypt’s chances for future recovery. – Washington Post
China
China is expanding its capacity to develop weapons that can be fired from hypersonic missiles, suggesting a test this summer that surprised U.S. military officials with its technological accomplishment is part of a program to create new threats for U.S. missile defenses. – Wall Street Journal
China’s policy regarding data transfer and localisation are causing companies to cancel projects due to fears of compliance issues, according to a report from the British Chamber of Commerce in China published on Tuesday. – Reuters
China has warned Taiwanese firms against supporting the island’s independence, hours after state media said a Taiwanese conglomerate was fined by mainland regulators as tensions flare between Taipei and Beijing. – Agence France-Presse
Chinese regulators have intensified a crackdown on celebrities and their fan groups on the grounds that online hoards create “chaos” and promote “extravagant pleasure”. The Cyberspace Administration of China on Tuesday released a new set of rules to regulate celebrities, their advertising and fan groups, as part of President Xi Jinping’s drive to reform social values in the country. – Financial Times
Raffaello Pantucci writes: China is Afghanistan’s most powerful and influential neighbor, which partly explains the growing attention toward its role in the country. Beijing is increasingly seen as the Taliban’s great supporter on the international stage. In assuming this role, China runs the risk of being seen as filing the vacuum the United States left in Afghanistan—something Beijing is keen to avoid. The reality, however, is that it is already getting sucked in. The Islamic State-Khorasan’s attack in Kunduz merely highlighted how far down this path Beijing has already gone. – Foreign Policy
South Asia
Rights groups including the United Nations have criticised the arrest of a prominent activist in Indian-administered Kashmir on terror funding charges. – Reuters
India and the United States agreed to look for ways to resolve differences on issues such as market access and digital trade at the start of a two-day visit by U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai, officials said. – Reuters
Myanmar’s junta leader Min Aung Hlaing is not attending a virtual China-ASEAN leaders’ summit on Monday, according to two sources with knowledge of the meeting. – Reuters
A Sri Lankan court on Tuesday began the trial of 25 men accused of plotting the Easter Sunday bombings that killed nearly 270 people in 2019, as lawyers warned of a protracted and complicated legal battle ahead. – Reuters
A shadow government in Myanmar said it has raised $6.3 million on the opening day of its inaugural bonds sale, in its biggest move yet to generate funds for its “revolution” to topple the ruling military junta. – Reuters
Michael Rubin writes: It is time for the White House and State Department to recognize the obvious: To Pakistani authorities, the fate of the murderers of Americans in Mumbai, Karachi, or Kabul is a barometer of American credibility. That they remain free suggests weakness. If Islamabad is to understand the depth of American anger and resolve, the targets of the over-the-horizon strategy should be those terrorists who believe their Pakistani residence or citizenship makes them immune from consequence. – Washington Examiner
Asia
A U.S. warship again sailed through the sensitive Taiwan Strait on Tuesday, part of what the U.S. military calls routine activity but which always riles China whose government believes Washington is trying to stir regional tensions. – Reuters
Relatives of people killed in the Philippines’ war on drugs have accused the government of attempting to evade accountability by asking the International Criminal Court (ICC) to defer its investigation. – Reuters
Armenia says one of its soldiers was killed by Azerbaijani shelling on Monday amid simmering tensions on the border between the two ex-Soviet neighbors. – Associated Press
Taiwan will respect the outcome of the Honduras election but the country should be aware of getting sucked in by China’s “false” promises, the foreign ministry said on Tuesday ahead of a vote which could see Taipei lose a steadfast ally to Beijing. – Reuters
Andrew Latham writes: Does this mean that the PRC will “liberate” Taiwan anytime soon? Probably not. The PLA is not yet ready to launch a full-scale amphibious assault and will likely not be ready for a few years. But it does mean that Washington cannot count on the policies and platitudes of the past to deter Beijing for much longer. It means that when it comes to Taiwan, the United States must decide: take steps now to restore deterrence or prepare to see Taiwan “liberated” in the not too distant future. – The Hill
Russia
The Kremlin denied that a buildup of Russian military forces near Ukraine was a prelude to invasion, and accused Washington of destabilizing the region. U.S. officials over the past week have given European allies new information that Washington says shows Russia building up forces and military assets that could be used to attack Ukraine, two senior European diplomats said Monday. – Wall Street Journal
Russian prosecutors are moving to liquidate the archive and human rights center of Memorial International, the country’s most prominent human rights organization, which is dedicated to the remembrance of those who were persecuted by the Soviet Union’s often-brutal regime. – New York Times
The United States on Monday imposed further sanctions in connection with the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement, targeting Russia-linked Transadria Ltd. and its vessel. – Reuters
The Kremlin on Monday strongly rejected the U.S. claims of a Russian troop buildup near Ukraine, saying it could be a ruse intended to cover up what it described as Ukrainian leadership’s aggressive intentions. – Associated Press
Russia sees a decided risk of “possible armed conflicts” with NATO member states in Europe, according to one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s security advisers. Still, senior trans-Atlantic officials think the Kremlin might be targeting a smaller dictatorship. – Washington Examiner
A retired Russian admiral has alleged that the 2000 Kursk submarine disaster was caused by a collision with a NATO sub, an unproven claim that defies the official conclusion that the country’s worst post-Soviet naval catastrophe was triggered by a faulty torpedo. – Associated Press
Russian officials in recent days have issued an unusual number of claims of what they consider fearsome provocations from neighboring Ukraine, mirroring the spurious expressions of concern that have previously served as a pretext to military deployments under the auspices of self defense. – U.S. News & World Report
Kadri Liik writes: If you looked at Russia’s behavior in recent months, you’d think the country’s leaders were out to disrupt the West. […]Misreadings are dangerous. Though far from the height of 2014-16, when relations between the West and Russia were particularly perilous, tensions remain. Disinformation, cyberwarfare and electoral interference have contributed to an atmosphere of mounting suspicion. And with Ukraine, about which the Kremlin has high emotions, unrealistic expectations and irrational fears, there is genuine cause for alarm. – New York Times
John R. Deni writes: Russian military forces have massed on the border with Ukraine as well as in Russian-occupied Crimea. […]If Russia invades, the Western response should unfold along economic, diplomatic and military lines, including cutting Russian access to international finance, tapping strategic petroleum reserves to reduce demand for Russian energy supplies and opening the spigot on Western arms transfers to Ukraine. In the military realm, NATO ought to consider whether it will employ its most effective military tool for responding to just this kind of security crisis — the NATO Response Force, or NRF. – Defense News
Europe
Since July, activity on Facebook in Arabic and Kurdish related to migration to the E.U. through Belarus has been “skyrocketing,” said Monika Richter, head of research and analysis for Semantic Visions, an intelligence firm that tracked social media activity related to the crisis. – New York Times
German Chancellor Angela Merkel talked on the phone with Belarusian opposition leader in exile Svetlana Tikhanouskaya about the political crisis in Belarus and the “difficult situation” at the border with the European Union, a government spokesperson said on Monday. – Reuters
Europe must not be blackmailed into accepting thousands of migrants stranded on its border with Belarus, Austria said, after Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko pressed the bloc to let them in after months of growing tension. – Reuters
The United States has expressed deep concern over comments by Bulgarian President Rumen Radev that the Crimean Peninsula annexed by Russia from Ukraine in 2014 is “Russian”, the U.S. embassy in Sofia said on Monday. – Reuters
France and the European Commission are determined to ensure that Britain respects its post-Brexit arrangements and agreements on fishing licences following the UK’s departure from the European Union, said France’s prime minister on Monday. – Reuters
The European Union’s top diplomat on Monday urged Afghanistan’s northern neighbours to help prevent what he described as the abuse of migrants for political goals by the Belarusian authorities. – Reuters
The authoritarian leader of Belarus on Monday sharply criticized the European Union for its refusal to hold talks on the influx of migrants on the country’s border with Poland. – Associated Press
Chinese officials downgraded their relations with Lithuania and threatened further diplomatic and economic punishments in a dispute over the Baltic state’s relations with Taiwan that could shape trans-Atlantic attitudes toward Beijing. – Washington Examiner
Ukraine conducted fresh military exercises outside the capital, Kiev, on Monday as thousands of Russian troops remain massed along the border between the two countries — and the head of Ukraine’s defense intelligence agency warned an invasion could come early next year. – New York Post
The IMF’s executive board approved a long-delayed $700m disbursement to Ukraine on Monday, propping up the war-torn country amid fears that Russia was plotting a deeper invasion. – Financial Times
France and Italy were at such odds two years ago that Paris recalled its ambassador and a spat between leaders descended into name-calling — but a Franco-Italian “friendship treaty” thats President Emmanuel Macron will sign in Rome this week shows how the mood has changed. – Financial Times
Two refitted former U.S. Coast Guard patrol boats intended to bolster the Ukrainian navy have arrived at the Ukrainian Black Sea port of Odessa, the Ukrainian navy said on Tuesday. – Reuters
Gideon Rachman writes: Previously it has always been assumed that power struggles between Brussels and member states would generally be resolved in favour of Brussels. “Ever closer union” seemed inevitable. The strategic and economic arguments for deeper European integration remain powerful. But the politics look less and less favourable. Eurosceptic revolts in Britain and Poland are one thing. But when Barnier, the epitome of the “good European”, turns into a nationalist the political ground is clearly shifting. The next constitutional settlement in the EU may favour nations, not Brussels. – Financial Times
Africa
Ethiopian Prime Minister and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Abiy Ahmed pledged Monday to lead government soldiers from the front line in a fierce war with advancing rebels, raising the stakes in a year-long conflict that some experts already fear could tear the country apart. – Washington Post
Sudan’s reinstated prime minister said in an interview that aired Monday that he will have the authority to form his own independent government, according to the agreement he signed a day earlier with the country’s top generals who overthrew him in a coup last month. – Associated Press
U.S. Special Envoy for the Horn of Africa Jeffrey Feltman returned from Ethiopia over the weekend following meetings with senior Ethiopian government officials and African Union representatives, the U.S. State Department said on Monday. – Reuters
Uganda said on Monday that seven suspects had been killed and 106 people detained during operations by the security services linked to three suicide bombings in the capital Kampala last week. – Reuters
Traveling across Africa, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken saw firsthand the limits of America’s influence abroad. Blinken confronted authoritarianism, growing threats from newly energized extremists, and persistent challenges posed by COVID-19 and climate change, all of which have stubbornly resisted various U.S. interventions. – Associated Press
Militiamen targeting a camp for displaced people in Congo’s east have killed at least a dozen people in attacks on two village in the Ituri province, the army said Monday. – Associated Press
Sudanese authorities have released several civilian leaders detained since last month’s military coup, a former captive said Monday, amid efforts to restore a fragile transition process towards full democracy – Agence France-Presse
Latin America
The ruling Socialist government in Venezuela early Monday claimed sweeping victory in local and state elections that for the first time in four years included the participation of most of the country’s beleaguered, U.S.-backed opposition movement. – Wall Street Journal
After years of protests and political upheaval that seemed certain to shift Chile’s politics sharply to the left, voters in the first round of a presidential election largely backed candidates who support the country’s free-market economy, providing a boost to local financial markets on Monday. – Wall Street Journal
Relations between El Salvador and the United States are temporarily on hold due to the Salvadoran government’s apparent lack of interest in dialogue, the senior U.S. official in the Central American country said on Monday. – Reuters
Editorial: Elections alone do not a democracy make, as the results of Venezuela’s less-than-free balloting on Sunday show. […]Venezuela’s was this month’s second pseudo-democratic exercise in Latin America, the first being Daniel Ortega’s repression-marred reelection in Nicaragua. […] As in nearby Peru, where a presidential election’s first round produced similar divisions earlier this year, Chile’s centrist parties, and their voters, now hold the balance of power in the runoff. Their influence on the eventual winner may help determine the future course of democracy in Chile and, by extension, Latin America as a whole. – Washington Post
Christopher J. Hunter writes: In order for China to achieve its goal of global hegemony, it must increase the cost to the United States of countering China. Creating a sphere of influence in central America that gradually allows China to project force not far from the United States’ southern border advances that goal. […]Considering China’s duplicity in Khalifa and alignment with corrupt autocracies in Central America, Xi’s call at the virtual summit for mutual respect should be dismissed. And in Central America at least, hard red lines should be drawn and communicated both to deter China and its nascent client states and to avoid escalation due to surprise. Meanwhile, enforcement contingencies should be planned. – Military Times
United States
The United States for the first time was added to a list of “backsliding democracies” in a report released Monday by the Stockholm-based International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance. – Washington Post
U.S. President Joe Biden intends to run for re-election in 2024, White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters on Monday. – Reuters
The tiny Arab nation of Qatar has for years employed a former CIA officer to help spy on soccer officials as part of a no-expense-spared effort to win and hold on to the 2022 World Cup tournament, an investigation by The Associated Press has found. It’s part of a trend of former U.S. intelligence officers going to work for foreign governments with questionable human rights records that is worrying officials in Washington and prompting calls from some members of Congress for greater scrutiny of an opaque and lucrative market. – Associated Press
Nicolas Chaillan writes: Reports claiming the US has as much as 10 years to take meaningful action in AI are just wrong. Analysts forget that AI innovation progresses exponentially, based on the speed of deployment and the volume of data available to train its models. Since China has more experts engaged in this field, and more data, the US is already at a disadvantage. By this time next year, it will be too late to catch up. – Financial Times
Cybersecurity
The FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) on Monday warned organizations to be on guard against cyber threats, particularly ransomware attacks, over the Thanksgiving holiday. – The Hill
A trio of Democrats in Congress are pushing Facebook to address accusations that the company misled lawmakers and the public about its new policy banning advertisers from targeting young users on the platform. – The Hill
Hackers with suspected links to the Pyongyang dictatorship have been going after Chinese security researchers in an apparent attempt to steal their hacking techniques and use them as their own, according to CrowdStrike research shared exclusively with The Daily Beast. – The Daily Beast
Defense
A top general provided a bleak warning about the state of U.S. hypersonic technology compared to Russia and China , both of which recently demonstrated developments in their own arsenals. Gen. David Thompson, vice chief of space operations, said the United States has some “catching up to do very quickly” to match the growth from adversaries. – Washington Examiner
If Congress is going to pass the annual defense authorization bill for a 61st consecutive year — and that’s a big if — it’s going to take a tremendous amount of work in public and behind closed doors over the next few weeks. On Friday, the Senate left town for Thanksgiving break without finalizing its draft of the sweeping $740 billion military policy measure, but with plans to do so in the last few days of November. – Defense News
Israel has named a type of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) that has been used by Iranian-backed groups in Yemen and Iraq to carry out attacks as the KAS-04 made by Iran’s Kimia Part Sivan Company (KIPAS). In a letter to the UN Security Council that was released on 17 November, Israeli Ambassador to the United States Gilad Erdan identified a KAS-04 as the UAV that intruded into Israeli airspace on 18 May. – Janes
Australia signed the agreement to share nuclear propulsion information with the United States and the United Kingdom on Monday, marking the initial steps towards the construction of a nuclear-powered submarine fleet with the assistance of the U.K. and U.S. – USNI News
The next U.S. nuclear attack submarine must require less maintenance, be fast, quiet and packed with torpedoes, the service’s director of undersea warfare said on Thursday. The SSN(X) nuclear attack boat will be more focused on the war in blue water than the multi-mission Virginia-class submarines, which are designed to operate closer to shore for missions like signals intelligence and special operation missions. – USNI News
China’s push to harness “quality data” for military use has put Beijing “way ahead of us” in this area of high technology, but the Pentagon remains the leader in domain expertise like anti-submarine warfare and artificial intelligence, a former vice chief of naval operations said last week. – USNI News