Today’s D Brief: Trump takes Putin’s offer; ‘Dogfighting in space’; DOD’s personnel bottleneck; PLAN drones, on video; And a bit more.
‘Movement to peace’ in Ukraine U.S. President Donald Trump accepted Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s counteroffer on Ukraine after the two men spoke by phone Tuesday. Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymir Zelenskyy, had been seeking a comprehensive, 30-day ceasefire to begin moving Putin’s Ukraine invasion toward some kind of more peaceful state. But Russia is not eager to halt its invasion or attacks on Ukraine just yet. Putin would only agree to pause attacks against Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, which Russia has often targeted over winter months to increase the misery of not just the military but the wider Ukrainian population. There are only two days left in winter. Ukraine must also cease targeting Russian energy infrastructure under the 30-day agreement, though observers noted the precise terms of the selective truce remain a mystery. Accounts differ: “It is unclear which targets are explicitly prohibited under the 30-day moratorium given the difference in language between the two readouts of the call,” analysts at the Institute for the Study of War noted in their Tuesday assessment. (AP posted the text from both countries’ readouts, here.) The White House celebrated the Trump-Putin deal as “movement to peace,” more than three years into Russia’s full-scale invasion. The White House also said that “technical negotiations on implementation of a maritime ceasefire in the Black Sea” would be coming soon in negotiations somewhere in the Middle East. But “shortly after the [Putin-Trump phone] call ended, air raid alerts sounded in Kyiv, followed by explosions in the city,” the Associated Press reports. Russia, too, claimed to have been attacked by Ukrainian drones after the phone call. “Kyiv's air force said it destroyed 72 of 145 drones launched by Russia overnight, while Russia's defence ministry said its units downed 57 Ukrainian drones,” Reuters reports. Expert reax: Putin didn’t concede much of anything in the talks with Trump, the ISW analysts wrote. “Putin demanded on March 18 that Ukraine stop mobilizing (i.e. recruiting and training) forces during a potential temporary ceasefire,” and he “called for a halt to all foreign military aid and intelligence sharing with Ukraine but did not discuss Russia's military support from North Korea, the People's Republic of China (PRC), and Iran,” ISW writes. ISW’s bottom line: “The persistence of Putin's demands for Ukraine's capitulation demonstrates that Putin is not interested in good-faith negotiations to pursue Trump's stated goal of achieving a lasting peace in Ukraine.” Welcome to this Wednesday edition of The D Brief, a newsletter dedicated to developments affecting the future of U.S. national security, brought to you by Bradley Peniston with Ben Watson. Share your tips and feedback here. And if you’re not already subscribed, you can do that here. On this day in 1991 began the invasion of Iraq dubbed Operation Desert Storm. Around the Defense Department China is practicing ‘dogfighting’ in space, top Space Force official says. Chinese satellites have conducted coordinated maneuvers with “synchrony” and “control,” Vice Chief of Space Operations Gen. Michael Guetlein revealed Tuesday. “With our commercial assets, we have observed five different objects in space maneuvering in and out and around each other in synchrony and in control. That's what we call dogfighting in space. They are practicing tactics, techniques, and procedures to do on-orbit space operations from one satellite to another,” he Guetlein said at the annual McAleese conference. D1’s Audrey Decker has more, including the specific Chinese satellites. Pentagon’s personnel bottleneck. On Feb. 28, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered his department to stop hiring new civilian employees and to halt transfers and promotions of existing employees. Hegseth, who oversees a civilian workforce of about 760,000 people, said he was the only person who could approve exceptions to the order, which went into effect on March 2. Now two people can review requests for exceptions—but no one knows how to submit them. On Friday, Hegseth signed a new order that allows one other person to review exemptions: the defense undersecretary for personnel and readiness. (Service secretaries may “approve” exemptions only after the undersecretary’s “review.”) “This authority may not be further delegated," Hegseth’s March 14 memo says. The memo says guidance on how to apply is forthcoming, but a Defense official who spoke to reporters on background Tuesday would not say when. The freeze means “some civilians are living in hotels with their families, as their cars and household goods make their way to other countries, waiting for word on when they can rebook canceled flights to their new duty stations.” D1’s Meghann Myers reports. Around the world Germany sets stage for big defense bump. On Tuesday, German lawmakers amended the country’s constitution “to relax strict limits on debt that
U.S. President Donald Trump accepted Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s counteroffer on Ukraine after the two men spoke by phone Tuesday. Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymir Zelenskyy, had been seeking a comprehensive, 30-day ceasefire to begin moving Putin’s Ukraine invasion toward some kind of more peaceful state. But Russia is not eager to halt its invasion or attacks on Ukraine just yet.
Putin would only agree to pause attacks against Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, which Russia has often targeted over winter months to increase the misery of not just the military but the wider Ukrainian population. There are only two days left in winter. Ukraine must also cease targeting Russian energy infrastructure under the 30-day agreement, though observers noted the precise terms of the selective truce remain a mystery.
Accounts differ: “It is unclear which targets are explicitly prohibited under the 30-day moratorium given the difference in language between the two readouts of the call,” analysts at the Institute for the Study of War noted in their Tuesday assessment. (AP posted the text from both countries’ readouts, here.)
The White House celebrated the Trump-Putin deal as “movement to peace,” more than three years into Russia’s full-scale invasion. The White House also said that “technical negotiations on implementation of a maritime ceasefire in the Black Sea” would be coming soon in negotiations somewhere in the Middle East.
But “shortly after the [Putin-Trump phone] call ended, air raid alerts sounded in Kyiv, followed by explosions in the city,” the Associated Press reports. Russia, too, claimed to have been attacked by Ukrainian drones after the phone call. “Kyiv's air force said it destroyed 72 of 145 drones launched by Russia overnight, while Russia's defence ministry said its units downed 57 Ukrainian drones,” Reuters reports.
Expert reax: Putin didn’t concede much of anything in the talks with Trump, the ISW analysts wrote. “Putin demanded on March 18 that Ukraine stop mobilizing (i.e. recruiting and training) forces during a potential temporary ceasefire,” and he “called for a halt to all foreign military aid and intelligence sharing with Ukraine but did not discuss Russia's military support from North Korea, the People's Republic of China (PRC), and Iran,” ISW writes.
ISW’s bottom line: “The persistence of Putin's demands for Ukraine's capitulation demonstrates that Putin is not interested in good-faith negotiations to pursue Trump's stated goal of achieving a lasting peace in Ukraine.”
Welcome to this Wednesday edition of The D Brief, a newsletter dedicated to developments affecting the future of U.S. national security, brought to you by Bradley Peniston with Ben Watson. Share your tips and feedback here. And if you’re not already subscribed, you can do that here. On this day in 1991 began the invasion of Iraq dubbed Operation Desert Storm.
Around the Defense Department
China is practicing ‘dogfighting’ in space, top Space Force official says.
Chinese satellites have conducted coordinated maneuvers with “synchrony” and “control,” Vice Chief of Space Operations Gen. Michael Guetlein revealed Tuesday. “With our commercial assets, we have observed five different objects in space maneuvering in and out and around each other in synchrony and in control. That's what we call dogfighting in space. They are practicing tactics, techniques, and procedures to do on-orbit space operations from one satellite to another,” he Guetlein said at the annual McAleese conference. D1’s Audrey Decker has more, including the specific Chinese satellites.
Pentagon’s personnel bottleneck. On Feb. 28, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered his department to stop hiring new civilian employees and to halt transfers and promotions of existing employees. Hegseth, who oversees a civilian workforce of about 760,000 people, said he was the only person who could approve exceptions to the order, which went into effect on March 2.
Now two people can review requests for exceptions—but no one knows how to submit them. On Friday, Hegseth signed a new order that allows one other person to review exemptions: the defense undersecretary for personnel and readiness. (Service secretaries may “approve” exemptions only after the undersecretary’s “review.”) “This authority may not be further delegated," Hegseth’s March 14 memo says.
The memo says guidance on how to apply is forthcoming, but a Defense official who spoke to reporters on background Tuesday would not say when.
The freeze means “some civilians are living in hotels with their families, as their cars and household goods make their way to other countries, waiting for word on when they can rebook canceled flights to their new duty stations.” D1’s Meghann Myers reports.
Around the world
Germany sets stage for big defense bump. On Tuesday, German lawmakers amended the country’s constitution “to relax strict limits on debt that have long constrained German spending, as European countries, questioning the reliability of U.S. commitments under President Donald Trump, rush to strengthen their defenses. It’s part of a push to rearm across the continent, where leaders are seeking to prepare for Russian threats and American unpredictability,” the Washington Post reported.
Watch: rare video of Chinese military drones and ships, released on Tuesday by Taiwan’s defense ministry. The jerky, 73-second clip shows brief glimpses of the People Liberation Army Navy’s Jingzhou 532, Wenzhou frigate 526, type 056A corvette 616, and type 052D Guilin 164, AP reports.
Trump 2.0
Judge orders halt to gutting of USAID. Elon Musk’s dismantling of the congressionally mandated U.S. Agency for International Development likely violated the Constitution, Judge Theodore D. Chuang of the U.S. District Court in Maryland ruled on Tuesday. GovExec’s Eric Katz reports, here.
Judge blocks Trump’s trans ban. “A federal judge blocked the Trump administration on Tuesday from banning transgender people from serving in the military, the New York Times reported on Tuesday. “The government had argued that courts must defer to military judgment, but in a 79-page opinion, the judge said the government had thrown together a ban based on next-to-no evidence and that “the law does not demand that the Court rubber-stamp illogical judgments based on conjecture.”
About 4,200 current service members, or about 0.2 percent of the military, are transgender, according to Pentagon figures. “Despite their relatively small numbers, they have been a disproportionate focus of the Trump administration,” NYT wrote. ]]>
