Summary of Jim Sciutto's The Shadow War

By IRB Media

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#1 My source told me that Western intelligence agencies had concluded that Putin had ordered and directed the poisoning of the former KGB agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, in Salisbury, England. The attempted murder with the powerful Russian-made nerve agent Novichok had shocked the UK and Europe.

#2 The poisoning of Sergei Skripal was similar to the assassination of Alexander Litvinenko, who was a former agent of the FSB. He had been expelled from the FSB in 1998 after making public allegations of illegal activity by the Russian intelligence services.

#3 Litvinenko, a Russian dissident, fled to Britain in 2000. In 2006, he was poisoned at the Millennium Hotel just a half block from the American embassy in London. His wife and son were also contaminated by coming into direct contact with him.

#4 The Litvinenko case and the Skripal case show two consistent patterns: growing Russian aggression and Western delusions about Russian intentions. The same can be said about China, which was launching its own battles in a Shadow War on the United States.

• Language: English
• Publisher: IRB Media
• Release date: May 11, 2022
• ISBN: 9798822511811

IRB Media

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Insights on Jim Sciutto's The Shadow War

Contents

Insights from Chapter 1

Insights from Chapter 2

Insights from Chapter 3

Insights from Chapter 4

Insights from Chapter 5

Insights from Chapter 6

Insights from Chapter 7

Insights from Chapter 8

Insights from Chapter 9

Insights from Chapter 1

#1

My source told me that Western intelligence agencies had concluded that Putin had ordered and directed the poisoning of the former KGB agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, in Salisbury, England. The attempted murder with the powerful Russian-made nerve agent Novichok had shocked the UK and Europe.

#2

The poisoning of Sergei Skripal was similar to the assassination of Alexander Litvinenko, who was a former agent of the FSB. He had been expelled from the FSB in 1998 after making public allegations of illegal activity by the Russian intelligence services.

#3

Litvinenko, a Russian dissident, fled to Britain in 2000. In 2006, he was poisoned at the Millennium Hotel just a half block from the American embassy in London. His wife and son were also contaminated by coming into direct contact with him.

#4

The Litvinenko case and the Skripal case show two consistent patterns: growing Russian aggression and Western delusions about Russian intentions. The same can be said about China, which was launching its own battles in a Shadow War on the United States.

#5

China, America’s other major competitor, was also aggressively stealing American technology and state secrets. Obama continued to believe that he could get the Russia relationship right, where his predecessors had failed.

#6

The Obama administration’s dismissive view of Russia would continue almost to the end of his presidency. In 2014, Obama relegated Russia to regional power status, saying that its territorial ambitions belonged in the nineteenth century.

#7

Hybrid warfare is a strategy of attacking an adversary while remaining just below the threshold of conventional war, using a range of hard- and soft-power tactics. It is warfare conducted in the shadows.

#8

The United States must develop a new strategy for dealing