Fdd's overnight brief

Russia

Explosions continued to rock the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, in the early hours of Thursday, with the night sky lit up by a large blast in what appeared to be the city’s outskirts. Air raid sirens sounded through the night as Russian strikes bombarded the capital and other fierce battles played out across Ukraine. – Washington Post 

In one week of war, life within the boundaries of Ukraine has been upended, but the brutal assault Russian President Vladimir Putin launched last Thursday has also reverberated around the globe, steering history in a new direction and switching up 75 years of relations among some of the world’s most powerful and wealthy countries. – Washington Post 

As more and more people are injured or killed in Russia’s war against Ukraine, Moscow faces mounting allegations that it has used cluster and vacuum weapons, which can put civilians at increased risk, particularly when used in urban areas. – Washington Post 

After capturing the strategic city of Kherson, Russian forces pushed west on Thursday, bearing down on another important port city, Mykolaiev, the city’s mayor, Oleksandr Senkevych, said in an interview. Mr. Senkevych said roughly 800 Russian vehicles, including a column of rocket launchers, was headed toward Mykolaiev from the north, east and south. – New York Times 

The Justice Department announced on Wednesday the creation of a task force to go after billionaire oligarchs who have aided President Vladimir V. Putin in his invasion of Ukraine, part of an effort by the United States to seize and freeze the assets of those who have violated sanctions. – New York Times 

Russian forces pounded Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, with airstrikes in a bid to break the will of the country’s resistance as Moscow’s offensive toward Kyiv stalled amid fierce Ukrainian counterattacks and logistics mishaps. – Wall Street Journal 

Hours after a Russian missile Tuesday struck the TV tower in Kyiv’s Babyn Yar area, the site of one of the worst massacres during the Holocaust, Vitali Senchenko phoned his cousin in Israel, trying to get his family out of the city. – Wall Street Journal 

The U.N. General Assembly voted at an emergency session Wednesday to demand an immediate halt to Moscow’s attack on Ukraine and the withdrawal of all Russian troops, with sustained applause breaking out after a formidable show of support among the 193 member nations against the invasion. – Associated Press  

Dozens of anti-war demonstrators were detained in Moscow and Saint Petersburg Wednesday after jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny called on Russians to protest President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. – Agence France-Presse  

Russian shelling and attacks on civilian populations killed 34 civilians in Ukraine’s eastern Kharkiv region in the past 24 hours between March 2-3, the emergency services said on Thursday. – Reuters 

The European Union, the U.S., and a handful of America’s allies in Asia have responded to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine with financial sanctions unprecedented for a target Russia’s size. The steps taken to isolate it within the global financial system are aimed at punishing President Vladimir Putin by sowing chaos in his country’s economy. – Bloomberg 

The steady drumbeat of retaliatory actions against Russia for its invasion of Ukraine comes with some U.S. signaling that it doesn’t want the crisis to spiral out of control. – Bloomberg  

Ever since western leaders began to threaten Vladimir Putin with sweeping sanctions over Ukraine they have been clear any such measures would seek to avoid disrupting energy supplies — the lifeblood of the western economy as much as of Russia’s. But as the brutality of Moscow’s invasion has intensified, the idea of targeting oil and gas exports for sanctions is no longer off the table — even if it damages western economies in the process. – Financial Times 

The World Bank announced on Wednesday it was ending all programs in Russia and Belarus, citing “hostilities against the people of Ukraine.” – The Hill 

Defense officials from Europe claim that the Russians have placed inside the very center of Ukraine, with emphasis on Kyiv, fighters from the “Spetsnaz,” an umbrella term for Russian special forces, with the notable “Zaslon” unit. It is a unit defined as the assignation arm for covert missions of the Russian Intelligence and the “alpha unit”, that specializes in the war against terrorism in extreme conditions, but also operates far from the Russian borders. – Jerusalem Post 

Editorial: After Echo of Moscow went silent on Tuesday evening, the station’s vital YouTube channel also went dark. When we asked why, YouTube said it was being restored. But overall, the outlook for the Russian news media is bleak. They have been ordered not to use the word “war” in their reports, but instead “special military operation in Ukraine.” Dozhd chief editor Tikhon Dzyadko said he left Russia, fearing for his safety. – Washington Post 

Editorial: The most neutral way social media sites could craft such a rule, as the Stanford Internet Observatory’s Alex Stamos points out, would be to block state-run media from any country that blocks them. To do otherwise hands a megaphone to authoritarians abroad even as they prevent their citizens from hearing anyone except them speak at home. Or the companies could simply stand, as many in other industries are doing, with Ukraine — and skip the pretense of neutrality in a conflict where it’s clear who is in the right and who is so dangerously in the wrong. – Washington Post 

Editorial: Mr. Putin’s nuclear sabre-rattling is designed to make Mr. Biden and other Western leaders leave Ukraine to fight alone, even if he goes full Grozny. But the same risks existed throughout the Cold War, and the two sides avoided a direct confrontation despite much covert warfare. The U.S. doesn’t want to fight the Russian army and air force, but the moral and political price will be high if it watches from the sidelines as Ukrainians die by the thousands. – Wall Street Journal 

Jack Devine writes: China may provide economic assistance, but Beijing’s help won’t be cost-free and will be inadequate to fill the shortfall from cash outflows. And as Mr. Putin’s star begins to fade, the Chinese will cut their losses and distance themselves from him. Chinese state banks have already begun limiting the financing on Russian commodities. The end date of the Putin age is still uncertain, but against the unified resistance of the free world, his hubris and disdain for the will of his people will bring him down. His position of strength will transform to a place of historical ignominy. – Wall Street Journal 

Tom Rogan writes: Putin lacks the military and financial capacity to conduct a long-lasting operation at that scale. If the West supported a Ukrainian insurgency, the costs of any occupation would grow exponentially. Put another way, Putin is now caught between his own destiny-driven ambitions and the cold reality of a free Ukraine. – Washington Examiner 

Lt. Col. Robert Maginnis writes: At this point Mr. Biden must accept the hand Putin has dealt.  Take him seriously and put our nuclear forces on alert. President Biden, with the backing of NATO, you must make it very clear to Putin that ANY use of nuclear weapons will trigger a horrific US response, especially a strike on a NATO country, regardless of the size of the strike. – Fox News 

Desmond Lachman writes: All of this suggests that whatever foreign policy objectives Russian President Vladimir Putin might achieve by his Ukraine invasion, they will come at a very heavy economic cost for the average Russian household. It is far from clear that the Russian citizenry will think that Putin’s war was worth their having to pay those economic costs. – The Hill 

Afghanistan

Trucks with heavy machine guns stopped at street corners, unloading men in camouflage carrying radios and assault rifles. Going door to door, they barged into homes, tossed open drawers and pored through cellphones — looking for any connection to an armed insurgency. – New York Times 

Humanitarian agencies may have distributed enough aid in Afghanistan to avert famine and large-scale starvation, but the country’s economic collapse is “approaching a point of irreversibility,” the U.N. envoy to Kabul said on Wednesday. – Reuters  

Sean Hannity criticized President Biden on Wednesday, saying he didn’t pay enough homage to the 13 U.S. service members killed in Afghanistan during the annual State of the Union address. – Fox News 

Lebanon

Lebanese Hezbollah goes to great lengths to publicize its overt, social, and political activities and to conceal its covert terrorist, militant, and criminal pursuits. In the words of one operative, Hezbollah’s “Golden Rule” is this: The Less You Know, the Better. – Washington Institute 

A U.S. Treasury delegation urged Lebanese authorities to mount investigations into what it described as abuses within the Lebanese banking system by members of the political and economic elite, the U.S. Treasury said on Wednesday. – Reuters 

An International Monetary Fund delegation could visit Lebanon in the second half of March to continue discussions on an aid programme supported by reforms, Lebanon’s Deputy Prime Minister Saade Chami said in a statement on Wednesday. – Reuters 

China

China’s strategic partnership with Russia has the potential to be a lifeline for a Russian economy foundering under crippling Western sanctions, but Beijing appears to be holding back over practical constraints and fears of secondary sanctions on Chinese institutions. – Washington Post 

A Western intelligence report said senior Chinese officials told senior Russian officials in early February not to invade Ukraine before the end of the Winter Olympics in Beijing, according to senior Biden administration officials and a European official. – New York Times 

China’s embassy in the United States has warned its citizens in the country to pay close attention to their personal safety, citing a “worrying” security situation there. – Reuters 

A sobering realization is setting in as American policymakers begin to assess the new, harsher international environment. Officials in Washington are recognizing that ties between Russia and China, long discounted—or even dismissed—as a “marriage of convenience,” have the potential to reshape global politics. – Bloomberg 

Mark Gongloff writes: But Xi might already be wondering if Putin is in fact a Bad Autocrat Friend (not to be confused with a Bad Art Friend). When Putin attacked Ukraine just after the Beijing Olympics ended, it was easy to suspect Russia had coordinated the move with China. But evidence is piling up that Xi might not have thought Putin would actually go through with this cockamamie invasion, writes Matthew Brooker. – Bloomberg 

Zachary Faria writes: You cannot show that you stand for peace and human rights by opposing Russia while simultaneously pandering to China. These companies had no excuse for their attitude toward China before, and they certainly don’t have one now that they have shown they are at least in some circumstances willing to condemn and take action against another dangerous regime. – Washington Examiner 

John Lee writes: China seeks a so-called Community with a Shared Future for Mankind under its leadership. Beijing’s insincerity, indecisiveness and irresponsibility over the past three weeks have rendered that an even more unattractive prospect for the rest of the world. – New York Post 

Dan McKivergan writes: The day after his meeting with Putin, Xi led a toast at the welcoming banquet for the Olympic Games where he expressed the need for nations to “work together to build an international family of harmony and cooperation.” Seventeen days later, Putin launched a full-scale attack on Ukraine. In the end, Xi will likely make more tactical adjustments to distance China from Putin’s war crimes, but it’s not likely he’ll make a strategic break with Moscow. Continued autocratic rule in Russia is important to Beijing, whether Putin or someone else rules the Kremlin. – The Dispatch 

Asia

While most American allies in the region have fallen in line, authoritarian governments and those with weaker ties to the West have been more reluctant to act on the conflict in Ukraine. Across the Asia-Pacific, only Japan, Singapore, South Korea and Australia have agreed to international sanctions against Moscow. Taiwan, the self-governed territory that China claims as its own, has also agreed to sanctions and voiced support for Ukraine. – New York Times 

Japan is ready to take in Ukrainians fleeing Russia’s invasion, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said on Wednesday, adding that he had made the pledge during a phone conversation with his Polish counterpart Mateusz Morawiecki. – Reuters 

Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen bestowed a presidential honour on former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Thursday for his contribution to boosting relations with the island, as China’s top newspaper lambasted him again as a “liar”. – Reuters 

Leaders of the Quad group of countries – the United States, Japan, Australia and India – will hold a previously unannounced online meeting on Thursday, India and Australia said. – Reuters 

As it overturned precedent to follow the U.S. and Europe in imposing harsh sanctions to punish Russia for invading Ukraine, Japan said it scrambled fighter jets to intercept a helicopter — thought to be Russian — that entered its airspace. That fueled more sniping between Japan and Russia, which have been at odds over four small islands that lie between them since the end of World War II, preventing them from formally ending hostilities. The outbreak of war in Europe has turned rising tensions into downright antagonism, probably ending chances of a settlement for the time being. – Bloomberg 

The Russian Embassy in Canberra was evacuated on Thursday after a suspicious package containing a white powder was delivered to the site, according to Sky News Australia. – Jerusalem Post 

A People’s Liberation Army Navy Air Force’s (PLANAF’s) Harbin Aircraft Industry Group (HAIG) Z-9C anti-submarine warfare (ASW) helicopters have entered Taiwan’s southwestern air-defense identification zone (ADIZ) for the first time , according to data provided by the Ministry of National Defense (MND) in Taipei. – Janes 

Africa

U.S. officials are increasingly concerned that Sudan’s military junta will allow Russia to build a naval base on the country’s strategic Red Sea coast. – Wall Street Journal 

The Islamist militants who have rampaged through the heart of West Africa in recent years are now spreading toward the Gulf of Guinea coast, including some of the continent’s most stable and prosperous countries, according to African and U.S. officials. – Wall Street Journal 

The U.N. refugee agency has urged authorities in countries neighbouring Ukraine to open their borders to African citizens fleeing the conflict there amid reports that some were being denied access to safety, UNHCR said on Wednesday. – Reuters 

The U.N. Human Rights Council has picked the former chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court to lead a panel investigating violations of human rights in the conflict in northern Ethiopia, the council said on Wednesday. – Reuters 

Cybersecurity

A besieged Ukraine has adopted a gruesome tactic in hopes of stoking anti-government rage inside Russia: posting photos and videos of captured and killed Russian soldiers on the Web for anyone to see. – Washington Post 

The Senate passed legislation Tuesday evening requiring critical infrastructure owners to report to the feds when they suffer a major cyberattack or make a ransomware payment — shaking loose a bill that got stuck in the chamber last year. – Cyberscoop 

An army of volunteer hackers is rising up in cyberspace to defend Ukraine, though internet specialists are calling on geeks and other “hacktivists” to stay out of a potentially very dangerous computer war. – Agence France-Presse 

Twitter will comply with European Union sanctions on Russian state-controlled media, meaning content from such publishers will be withheld for users in EU member states, a Twitter spokesperson said Wednesday. – The Hill