I previously posted an article in which I asked ChatGPT a number of questions on Russia’s war in Ukraine. It wasn’t immediately clear that ChatGPT had a cut off date in 2021. Yet despite the fact that it had a cut off date before the start of the 2022 escalation of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine I was able to probe the logic of ChatGPT on complex issues pertaining to war and peace, diplomacy and related concepts. The answers were in many ways contradictory and dissatisfying.

Russia’s continued war in Ukraine has led to persistent calls for a diplomatic settlement from various corners of the policy community, academia, and the extremes of the political spectrum. These calls are each rooted in a limited or constrained understanding of the conflict, the provision of funding and resources, and the logics of peace and war. Calls for peace absent the agency of the Ukrainian people and their government amount to an imperial imposition of outcomes that would likely be neither permanent nor just. Understanding the context of the conflict from the Ukrainian perspective contextualizes the calls for an imperially imposed peace from without.

Many authoritarian governments, such as those in Iran, Myanmar, Venezuela, Zimbabwe, now have the capability to surveil their own citizens with technical tools. Many of them were enabled by Chinese technology companies, such as Huawei, Hikvision, Dahua and ZTE, as well as U.S. and Israeli companies that have exported artificial intelligence surveillance technology to these countries.

Technology facilitates the communication and spread of information in ways that can result in public benefit. In particular, information communications technologies, such as social media, can serve as a powerful tool for information dissemination. In fact, they often serve as a platform for governments to communicate with their constituents. However, the information environment is much broader than governments, and many non-state actors also play large roles in the ways information and disinformation can be spread. Understanding the effects of circulating disinformation provides insight into the complex dynamics of an evolving information environment. The focus of this blog post is on the dynamics of COVID-19 disinformation within ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) countries. Our research finds that the influence of disinformation, from both foreign and domestic sources, is continuing to grow, requiring adjustment to domestic goals and hindering public health in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic.

United States intelligence agencies have been issuing dire warnings of an impending war between the Russian Federation and Ukraine. Estimates of upwards of 175,000 soldiers massing at multiple points on the Ukraine-Russian frontier are ominous, yet any battle over Ukraine is likely to include an increasingly potent electronic warfare (EW) dimension that would be unlike any prior conflict to date. Over the last 7 years, the Russian Federation has been strategically positioning and testing a number of different technical assets. These assets comprise a suite of mobile tactical intelligence collection and offensive EW tools that extend the contact lines well beyond the trenches of the existing ATO.

Technology facilitates the communication and spread of information in ways that can result in public benefit. In particular, information communications technologies, such as social media, can serve as a powerful tool for information dissemination. In fact, they often serve as a platform for governments to communicate with their constituents. However, the information environment is much broader than governments, and many non-state actors also play a large role in the way information and disinformation can be spread. Understanding the effects of circulating disinformation provides insight into the complex dynamics of an evolving information environment. The focus of this blog post is on the dynamics of COVID-19 disinformation within ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) countries. Our research finds that the influence of disinformation, from both foreign and domestic sources, is continuing to grow, requiring adjustment to domestic goals and hindering public health in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic.