Dr Charles Knight

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Dr Charles Knight

Dr Charles Knight

@ChasAHKnight

Researching capabilities for urban ops & asymmetric war. PhD in repressive COIN. Schooled in then-defensive 🇬🇧 army, 🇴🇲 & Cold War. Critiques to refine.

Australian Capital Territory Katılım Ekim 2018
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Dr Charles Knight
Dr Charles Knight@ChasAHKnight·
How do militaries avoid future urban war repeating the strategic disaster of 1st Fallujah? Pleased our monograph analysing media reporting of 6 battles, with recommendations, published by EuroISME today. Research at Macquarie & Charles Sturt Universities. euroisme.eu/images/Documen…
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Dr Charles Knight
Dr Charles Knight@ChasAHKnight·
@MorEdge_Insight @TheMossadIL I fear your advice to "just effing do it" might as well apply to Iran striking desalination and LNG processing plants (not just oils & gas but loss of urea, helium, etc.) If so, "the economic and humanitarian disaster is Israel's doing", will be an evident truth, not a libel.
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Mor Edge Insight
Mor Edge Insight@MorEdge_Insight·
The President of the US may think he can decide when and how this war will end, but it simply doesn’t work like that. The Islamic regime have lost a lot of credibility with the Arab world, and a lot of face with Iranians, however much they will try to claim otherwise. They won’t allow this war to end without hurting both the US and Israel as badly as possible. It isn’t about them wanting to ensure a war never happens again like they say, because it’s this Islamic regime that starts most conflicts in the region as it is. They have their power by instilling fear in their neighbors and their population. That facade and perception is broken now. They will die and wither away if it ended tomorrow. So they will keep it going and escalate it regardless of the sacrifice they need to make for that to happen. I expect over the next day or two for the regime to lash out in new ways with something that may surprise many. They need that one huge moment, that proverbial uppercut or right hook that will make the US and Israel bleed so that they can show the whole world that the US is beatable and bleeds. This is the mindset of jihadists. It’s why Hamas did October 7. It wasn’t about winning a war for Hamas. It was about making Israel bleed and be seen as able to be defeated in the eyes of the Islamic world. Then they spent the next two years focused solely on turning the world, or the crowd in this analogy, against Israel. They achieved that. This is exactly why it’s so important to shut out the noise and the hostility of the crowd and focus on crushing the regime so badly that they simply won’t get up. Ever. Same with Hamas and Hezbollah and all of them. We need to stop trying to make this a spectacle and a show and focus on ending them in a way that they can never recover. Total submission and total humiliation. Of all the wars Israel has fought, the one that hit the Arabs hardest psychologically, as well as their Soviet allies at the time, was the Six Day War. We didn’t drag it out. We went straight for the kill, took everything out, liberated the absolute prize in Jerusalem, and finished them off in just six short days that they begged and pleaded for a ceasefire in total humiliation. That’s the way to really defeat them. You don’t dance around the ring and show off what you can do. You go in and fucking knock them out in the first 20 seconds of the first round. No frills. No fuss. Just fuck them up beyond all recognition. Not just FAFO, but FUBAR FAFO. Trump and Netanyahu need to stop talking and telegraphing everything. JFDI
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Handre
Handre@Handre·
The Hanseatic League solved commercial disputes for 400 years without a single government court, police force, or regulatory agency—and they did it better than any modern state system. From 1159 to 1669, German merchants spanning from London to Novgorod created the most sophisticated private arbitration network in history. When a Hamburg trader accused a Lübeck merchant of breach of contract, they didn't petition some distant king or wait months for bureaucratic tribunals. They brought their dispute before merchant courts staffed by actual businessmen who understood trade, contracts, and reputation. These arbitrators rendered decisions within days, not years. The enforcement mechanism? Pure market discipline. The League maintained detailed records of every merchant's behavior and shared this information across all member cities. Cross a Hanseatic trader in Bergen, and you'd find yourself blacklisted from Riga to Bruges within weeks. No bailiffs, no jackbooted enforcers, no violence—just the inexorable power of reputation and voluntary association. And it worked spectacularly. The League dominated Northern European commerce for half a millennium precisely because merchants trusted their dispute resolution more than royal courts. But here's what modern lawyers and judges will never tell you: the Hanseatic system resolved disputes faster, cheaper, and more accurately than contemporary government courts. Why? Because the arbitrators actually understood commerce and faced real consequences for bad decisions. Screw up a ruling as a Hanseatic arbitrator, and merchants would stop using your services. Screw up as a federal judge today, and you get lifetime tenure. The League died when centralized nation-states crushed private governance with military force, not because their system failed. Every blockchain arbitration platform and private dispute resolution service today merely rediscovers what German merchants perfected 800 years ago.
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Dr Charles Knight
Dr Charles Knight@ChasAHKnight·
@SpencerGuard John, I differ from your optimistic assessments, but you are on the money as you highlight the fog of war here. Might it help your readers to discern futures by 'red teaming' resistance options for Iranians as loyal to the Islamic Republic as you are to the US Constitution?
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John Spencer
John Spencer@SpencerGuard·
So, since we, unlike Iranians under a regime that enforces strict internet blackouts and information control, live in free societies with open press and access to diverse experts, we should actively discuss what we know. We can and should consult credible military analysts, think tanks, defense officials, and any on-the-ground reporting to understand the conflict's progress, requirements, and challenges. But even with all this transparency, we must acknowledge what we don't know and definitely question anyone who speaks with absolute certainty, as if the fog has fully lifted.
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John Spencer
John Spencer@SpencerGuard·
What don't people know about the war in Iran? 🧵
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Dr Charles Knight
Dr Charles Knight@ChasAHKnight·
@BIWinCA @SpencerGuard Think radically. President Trump coerces Israel to offer a Shia Ayatollah guardianship of Al-Aqsa (assume access to other people of the book) & have him announce he will recruit guardians from amongst Karraar (those of proven courage) in Iran and Lebanon. Then, seek volunteers.
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BIW
BIW@BIWinCA·
@SpencerGuard In discussing all these aspects, one isn't discussed. Is there any kind of incentive, e. g. clemency, financial, moderate mullahs' appeal, etc., that could give a pathway for IRGC defection?
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Yo אני 🇮🇱
Yo אני 🇮🇱@rochfarot·
@SpencerGuard @nypost Idiots are now protesting leadership targeting. They surely prefer untargeted attacks over general population, decimated cities, long and expensive wars, civilian recruit, etc. Great article by @SpencerGuard x.com/SpencerGuard/s…
John Spencer@SpencerGuard

“Leadership targeting has existed throughout history. What is new is simultaneity and precision. Entire layers of political and military leadership can now be targeted nearly at once.“ my latest @nypost nypost.com/2026/03/22/opi…

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John Spencer
John Spencer@SpencerGuard·
“Leadership targeting has existed throughout history. What is new is simultaneity and precision. Entire layers of political and military leadership can now be targeted nearly at once.“ my latest @nypost nypost.com/2026/03/22/opi…
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Dr Charles Knight
Dr Charles Knight@ChasAHKnight·
@PeterMilani1 @SpencerGuard Good point - though given the norms of contemporary party politics in Westminster systems, our only hope in crises may be an emerging Sir Humphrey?
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John Spencer
John Spencer@SpencerGuard·
Israel is eliminating regime leaders, IRGC commanders, and Basij figures at a historically rare pace in state-on-state war, enabled by deep intelligence penetration and precision strike capabilities. This is not just striking targets. It is systematically degrading the regime’s leadership and internal control mechanisms in real time.
Israel Defense Forces@IDF

🔴ELIMINATED: Mehdi Rastami Sh'mastan, a key commander in the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence. Sh'mastan was a key figure in promoting terrorist activities and attacks against Israeli and Jewish civilians around the world. The Ministry of Intelligence is the Iranian terror regime’s primary intelligence organization and serves as one of the regime’s central mechanisms of oppression and terror.

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Dr Charles Knight
Dr Charles Knight@ChasAHKnight·
@Dr_M_Davis Kharg Island, maybe. Seizing which bit of ~14,000 sq km of coastline key terrain? Check Google Earth 3d. Clearing all concealed waterline installations & possible obsv. post locations on the rugged ground inland to the crests appears a multi Div task even w/o enemy action.
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Dr. Malcolm Davis 🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦
A second US Navy ARG is on its way to the Persian Gulf. There's no way this is being done without the intention to put boots on the ground - be it Kharg Island or to seize the Iranian coast along the Straits of Hormuz. But even with two ARGs that still may be insufficient and the risk of an open-ended commitment of ground forces would grow.
OSINTdefender@sentdefender

The Boxer Amphibious Ready Group (ARG), comprised of the USS Boxer (LHD-4), USS Comstock (LSD-45), and the USS Portland (LPD-27) with the embarked 11th Marine Expeditionary Group (MEU), is on its way to the Middle East after departing the U.S. west coast for deployment.

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Dr Charles Knight
Dr Charles Knight@ChasAHKnight·
@SpencerGuard Fascinating. Previous decapitation campaigns led to younger, more risk tolerant leaders. Will tempo alter this? Also, the last time opposing 'kings' were both on the battlefield was 1690. Has Ai FPV-like tech put Western leaders back in the firing line & is that destabilising?
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Dr Charles Knight
Dr Charles Knight@ChasAHKnight·
@Dr_M_Davis @garland_paige As I understand, the Strait is only closed to the US & its allies. It seems that the Iranians will let traffic through for Europe if the latter do not allow onward transfer to the US, Israel, or countries still allied with the US. OK, for those who opposed the war, tricky for 🇭🇲.
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Dr. Malcolm Davis 🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦
If Trump wants international assistance to keep the Strait of Hormuz open, then the US and Israel need to destroy Iran's ability to threaten shipping entering the Strait first. That means going after shore-based anti-ship missile and drone launching systems, rocket delivered mines, and IRGC Navy small craft that can launch missiles and deploy mines, as well as USVs loaded with explosives. Not even the US Navy is prepared to risk entering the Strait with Iranian forces still intact. That would be a quick path to losing ships and people. Destroy Iran's ability to keep the Strait closed first - and then the US should lead any effort to deploy inside the Strait, and at that point, yes, the international community should IMO deploy naval forces to ensure maritime security and keep the oil from the GCC states flowing. Not before...
Open Source Intel@Osint613

JUST IN 🔴 President Trump is preparing a major operation to secure the Strait of Hormuz that could last several weeks, an Israeli source told Kan News. Israel is expected to increase activity in the area as well. This might get interesting.

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Dr Charles Knight
Dr Charles Knight@ChasAHKnight·
@shanaka86 @HALLONSA I'm curious that nobody amongst the varied and often emotive responses to this post has explored the 'von Staffenberg' question: "When is a war so unjust that it justifies treason?" If there is no point at which this is true, are you not saying: 'mein ehre heisst treue?'
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Shanaka Anslem Perera ⚡
JUST IN: The US Navy is investigating whether sailors aboard the USS Gerald R. Ford deliberately set fire to their own ship to end the deployment. That is the sentence. Read it again. The $13 billion carrier, the most expensive warship ever built, is now diverting to Souda Naval Base in Crete next week for refueling, repairs, and a formal investigation into the March 12 fire that damaged sections of the vessel and left more than 600 crew without proper sleeping quarters. Kathimerini, one of Greece’s most established daily newspapers, reported the details citing sources with direct knowledge of the planned port call. The investigation explicitly includes the possibility of deliberate sabotage by crewmembers. The Ford has been at sea since June 2025. Vice Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Jim Kilby told the Senate Armed Services Committee the deployment will run approximately 11 months, with return to Norfolk not expected until at least May. The crew was told they would be home months ago. They were extended. Then extended again. Then redirected into the largest Middle East military operation since 2003. And now some among them may have decided that fire was the only exit. If confirmed, this would be one of the most serious internal discipline events in the modern US Navy. A crew sabotaging its own vessel in a war zone does not happen because of poor food or bad weather. It happens when the institution has pushed human endurance past the point where the mission feels survivable. Eleven months at sea. Iranian drones striking Gulf airports daily. Eleven Reapers shot down in seventeen days. Gulf states pressing Washington not to stop but to escalate. No rotation ship. No relief force. No ceasefire on any horizon. And the carrier that embodies forward American naval power is pulling into a Greek port because 600 of its sailors have nowhere to sleep. The Crete diversion is the signal the market should be reading. The Ford is the only US carrier in the Gulf theatre. When it pulls into Souda, the sustained naval posture that was supposed to backstop convoy escorts, deter Iranian mining operations, and project power through the spring planting season temporarily loses its centrepiece. Repairs take days at minimum. Investigation takes longer. Every day the Ford sits in Crete is a day the Hormuz permissioned chokepoint operates without the threat of carrier-based air power overhead. After Crete, the Ford is expected to return to Gulf waters. The 11-month deployment timeline holds. But the sabotage investigation tells you something that no deployment order can override: the human beings inside the machine are breaking. The Mosaic Doctrine does not break. Provincial commanders do not file for shore leave. Standing orders do not need sleeping quarters. Mines do not experience morale collapse. The cheapest blockade in modern history runs on sealed packets and radio handsets while the most expensive warship in human history diverts to port because its own crew may have tried to burn their way home. The fertiliser trapped behind the permissioned strait does not care whether the Ford is in the Gulf or in Crete. The planting calendar does not pause for a sabotage investigation. And the 31 autonomous IRGC commands running the chokepoint do not need a $13 billion aircraft carrier to feel tired before they do. They were designed never to feel anything at all. Full analysis: open.substack.com/pub/shanakaans…
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Shanaka Anslem Perera ⚡@shanaka86

The USS Gerald R. Ford has been at sea for 241 days. Her deployment has been extended twice. She is now heading back toward the Middle East for a third time, and the Wall Street Journal just published what the Pentagon does not want you to read. Sailors are missing funerals. Missing births. Missing their children’s first steps. The ship’s sewage system is failing, requiring maintenance calls every single day and acid flushes costing $400,000 each. Crew members are telling reporters they want to quit the Navy. Morale is described in terms that defense journalists have not used since Vietnam-era reporting. This deployment is on track to reach 11 months. The post-Vietnam record is 294 days, set by the USS Abraham Lincoln during COVID in 2020. The Ford will break it. And she is not coming home. Here is what the human toll tells you about the strike calculus that no OSINT flight tracker can. The United States Navy operates 11 aircraft carriers. The Ford carries approximately 5,000 sailors and over 75 aircraft. Extending her deployment twice, at enormous cost to crew retention, family stability, and mechanical readiness, is not something the Navy does for leverage. The Navy fights extensions. Carrier strike group commanders fight extensions. The families lobby Congress against extensions. Extensions happen over institutional resistance when the mission authority, in this case the Commander in Chief, has determined that the asset cannot leave theater. The Ford cannot leave theater because nothing has replaced her and the mission she was sent to support has not been completed or cancelled. Think about what “extended twice” means operationally. The first extension signals that the original timeline was optimistic. The second extension signals that the mission itself has changed. You do not burn through crew morale, defer scheduled maintenance, and risk retention crises across your most advanced warship for a contingency. You do it for a commitment. Now connect the dots. The Ford crossed into the Mediterranean on February 20, adding her air wing to the 500-plus aircraft already in theater. Nine C-17s carrying 700 tonnes of munitions are en route. Hundreds of personnel evacuated from Al Udeid. A P-8A is mapping the Strait of Hormuz. The IRGC is massing at the Iraqi border. Khamenei has activated shadow government protocols. Graham is lobbying for strikes. Trump’s deadline expires in days. And Witkoff just told Fox that Iran is one week from bomb-making material. The Ford’s sailors are paying the human cost of a decision that has already been made in everything but name. You do not break a post-Vietnam deployment record, destroy your crew’s families, and risk the readiness of your most expensive warship to park it in the Mediterranean as a prop. The $13.3 billion ship is not a negotiating tactic. She is a weapons delivery platform. And she has been held in place, at extraordinary cost, because someone in the chain of command has determined she will be needed. Sailors do not miss their children’s births for bluffs. The stage is not being set. The stage was set weeks ago. What you are watching now is the cost of holding the curtain.

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Dr Charles Knight
Dr Charles Knight@ChasAHKnight·
@OMGTheMess Not necessarily. If the Iranians are using Chinese satellite imagery, that is unlikely to be available in real time, so getting an aim point for where a manouvering carrier will be in the future is almost impossible. Iranian sources claim to have tried anyway. That's possible.
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Old Soldier
Old Soldier@OMGTheMess·
There’s some discussion about Iran and hypersonic missiles If they had them, they should have used them to take out an aircraft carrier or two by now. So, they either never had them, or they are destroyed.
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Judean Prophet
Judean Prophet@JudeanProphet·
@johnkonrad Why this need for large destroyers? The Israeli navy uses corvettes. The latest sa’ar 6 can knock anything out of the sky or water. Don’t know about mines. But the point is to patrol and escort the strait. One can refuel in the UAE or Qatar as needed. Why the need for heavies?
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John Ʌ Konrad V
John Ʌ Konrad V@johnkonrad·
Not saying I agree with this but I did explain yesterday why it’s one of the few remaining solutions. To recap: Escorts are the best solution. Our destroyers are excellent. You need at least a dozen. We have 74 BUT 1/3 are in maintenance and 1/3 are between deployments and 1/2 the remainder are needed as carrier escorts Math doesn’t compute So we need allies. All of Europe combined couldn’t send more than three warships at a time to the Red Sea… and mostly smaller frigates Japan and South Korea have enough high quality warships to fill the gap. We don’t need China’s help! BUT Japan and South Korea need to stay home to counterbalance China’s fleet So if China doesn’t send warships to the Middle East… Japan and South Korea won’t either. So we don’t really need China’s help with Iran but we do need them to deploy in order to recruit 🇯🇵 & 🇰🇷 who we very much need. P.S. Australia could provide a little help but Canada and New Zealand are 💯 useless.
Gunther Eagleman™@GuntherEagleman

🚨 BREAKING: President Trump confirms he’s asking CHINA to help secure the Strait of Hormuz!! “They should come in, in my opinion! China gets most of their oil through the Strait.”

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Dr Charles Knight
Dr Charles Knight@ChasAHKnight·
@Dr_M_Davis @Australian_Navy @JAParker29 Perhaps we need to reconsider economic self-sufficiency & some level of reindustrialisation? Your larger ADF needs that to deliver capability - and rebuilding industry is an easier sell.
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Dr. Malcolm Davis 🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦
The 2024 Fleet Review is a good step forward for @Australian_Navy but given the emerging strategic risks, I think we need to go further, and aim for a larger and even more powerful navy. @JAParker29 is spot on in highlighting our key risks - its not 'invasion' - the least likely scenario. Its an adversary like #China deliberately and ruthlessly interdicting our vital sea lanes of communication to coerce Australia into submitting to their interests. The easiest way to do that is from the sea, against our trade routes, and striking our vital northern base facilities to deny us the means to defend ourselves. A larger, and more powerful Navy - possibly going beyond the 2024 Fleet Review ambitions, supported by advanced long-range airpower through emerging autonomous systems, plus enhanced Army littoral operations, and exploiting and controlling the space and cyber domains, is the best path forward for @DefenceAust to take the ADF in coming years. But money matters - if we want to be secure, we need to invest more in our defence, and work with allies and partners within our region to be better placed to project forward power and presence to deter through denial.
Jennifer Parker@JAParker29

🇦🇺 is panicking about fuel disruptions as a result of attacks in the Strait of Hormuz. Now imagine sustained interception of our fuel, fertiliser, ammunition & other elements of critical seaborne supply. That is our real vulnerability. We cannot wish away maritime dependence — even if continental defence feels like the easier argument.

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Alexander Dugin
Alexander Dugin@AGDugin·
IDF spokeswoman Anna Ukolova threatens on Russian RBC radio Russian authorities to be killed if they take anti-Israel position in the war. She said that Israel controls all web-cameras in Russia and could hit easily whoever it wants including Putin.
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Dr Charles Knight
Dr Charles Knight@ChasAHKnight·
@Behroozhei @fpleitgenCNN The guy was there. He's a reporter telling you what was. However, if your question is serious, carrier operations in congested lanes are problematic because of practical considerations like sailing into the wind and not manouevring during the launch and recovery of aircraft.
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Frederik Pleitgen
Frederik Pleitgen@fpleitgenCNN·
With all the talk about warships escorting tankers through the Strait of Hormuz: I was aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln when it sailed through the Strait in 2012 as a show of force. What stood out was how close the ship got to the Iranian coast. We could easily see both the Iranian and UAE shorelines and little merchant boats crossed the carrier‘s path constantly. The crew had to secure all the aircraft because take off‘s and landings are impossible in the narrow waterway. Any ships, even warships going through there would seem to be pretty vulnerable. Report from 2012 attached: cnn.com/videos/world/2… @CNN
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Dr Charles Knight
Dr Charles Knight@ChasAHKnight·
@SpencerGuard Huge agree John. Watch Pakistan. These ISI guys are masters at playing both sides. They quietly creamed off up to 60% of US funding for the mujaheddin (back in the day when Islamists were good guys fighting godless communist secularists - & doing bad stuff like educating women).
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