Off Leash Intel · loading
5 direct mentions across 5 briefings, with 6 linked developments.
Latest linked intelligence
Wirescreen as finding that the PLA repeatedly attempted to purchase advanced Nvidia AI chips between 2019 and 2025. The report could not confirm whether the PLA received or uses the chips.
Unverified development · updated through
Wirescreen as finding that the PLA repeatedly attempted to purchase advanced Nvidia AI chips between 2019 and 2025. The report could not confirm whether the PLA received or uses the chips.
Open source reportGeography
Marker precision is disclosed on selection. Country and regional centroids show geographic scope, not an exact incident site.
Nvidia dossier
4 mapped developments across 2 map positions. Centroid markers show geographic scope, not an exact incident site.
China
China’s markets regulator ruled that Nvidia’s 2020 acquisition of Mellanox Technologies violated antitrust laws. Speculation that the ruling could be retaliation for U.S. tariff pressure related to China’s purchases of Russian oil.
Approximate map position: country centroid. The extracted place did not have provider-resolved coordinates.
Chronology
Off Leash update 2 June 2026 LEBANON AND IRAN •After a call with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, Pres. Trump said Israel and Hezbollah had agreed to pause strikes and work towards a longer-term ceasefire. •Netanyahu portrayed it slightly differently: without admitting that he'd agreed to Pres. Trump's request to observe a ceasefire with Hezbollah, Netanyahu said that if Hezbollah resumes strikes, then Israel will, too. He added that the Israeli military "will continue to operate as planned in southern Lebanon" - i.e., it will only scale back its strikes around Beirut. •Several media reports suggested that Trump was motivated to intervene with Netanyahu by an ultimatum from Iran, which threatened to abandon indirect talks with the U.S. over ending the Iran war if Israel continued to strike its proxies in Lebanon. •Separately, the NYT reported that Israel didn't anticipate Hezbollah's use of first-person view drones to target its troops, and has had to re-think its strategy in southern Lebanon to account for the drone threat: "It is now a kind of deadlock in which Hezbollah suddenly looks more capable than it did when the war began and the soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces can look startlingly helpless." CHINA •According to a new report by Wirescreen, China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) repeatedly tried to buy Nvidia's cutting-edge AI chips from at least 2019 to 2025 - even after the U.S. restricted chip sales to foreign rivals like China. [Wirescreen wasn't able to confirm whether the PLA actually received or is using any Nvidia chips.] •Nvidia has long downplayed concerns about the PLA - or China's surveillance state - relying on its chips, and a spokesman reiterated that sentiment in reaction to the latest report: "China has more than enough domestic chips for all of its military applications, with millions to spare. Just like it would be nonsensical for the American military to use Chinese technology, it makes no sense for the Chinese military to depend on American technology.” UKRAINE •Russia launched one of its biggest recent assaults on Ukraine overnight, targeting several cities and killing at least 17. More are likely trapped under rubble. •The Kremlin had warned of an impending barrage for over a week before it finally launched the attack. Some analysts think the early warnings were intended to inflict a psychological toll on Ukrainians who have spent recent days on high alert, with many sleeping in subway stations or parking lots for safety. •The Economist explained why Russia has turned to targeting Ukrainian cities: "Struggling to advance on the front line, Russia has in recent months stepped up its attacks on civilian areas." RUSSIA •Bloomberg reported that senior Russian Finance Ministry officials have raised rising alarm over the unsustainable pace of defense spending, and proposed military cuts to freeze the yawning government fiscal deficit. •Defense Ministry officials vehemently oppose the idea of cutting war spending, and are even asking for more military funding. According to Bloomberg, some argue that so many Russian businesses rely on defense contracts that cuts would harm the economy. •Several officials said Pres. Putin has asked the Finance Ministry to find cuts in other parts of the budget before resorting to defense cuts, but sanctions and four years of war have already weighed heavily on government spending and there's not much fat left to trim.
Open source reportOff Leash update 10 Dec VENEZUELA •Nobel Peace Prize laureate Maria Corina Machado was expected to accept her award in person in Norway yesterday, but she never showed up. •A Nobel official told media that Machado was "unfortunately not in Norway." That would seem to suggest she's still in Venezuela, since the hardest part of her trip would've been escaping the authoritarian regime that has banned her from traveling abroad for the past 10 years. •Separately, two U.S. F/A-18 fighter jets circled the Gulf of Venezuela for about 40 minutes yesterday, marking the closest that U.S. military aircraft have come to Venezuelan airspace since Operation Southern Sentinel began in September. •A U.S. military official said the flights were not intended to be provocative, but Nicolas Maduro's government will surely feel threatened by the proximity of U.S. jets to Venezuela's richest oil regions. DRC •Rwanda-backed (and Rwanda-armed) M23 rebels advanced toward Uvira, which is the last major city in eastern DRC that's still under Kinshasa's control. •Around 200,000 civilians have already fled the latest round of fighting - most of which has taken place after DRC and Rwanda signed a U.S.-brokered ceasefire at the White House. •DRC's Pres. Tshisekedi explicitly blamed his Rwandan counterpart, Pres. Kagame, for the ongoing conflict: "This is a proxy war aimed at challenging our sovereignty over a highly strategic area, rich in critical minerals and economic potential that is crucial to the future of our nation." •Rwanda counter-accused DRC and Burundi of violating the truce, too, but DRC and Burundi are not sending troops SAM systems, laser guided anti tank weapons, EW jamming systems and armed drones into Rwanda like Rwanda is into DRC. •Separately, Glencore became the first company to export cobalt from DRC under the country's new quota framework. •Glencore has only exported a small test batch of cobalt and is still sitting on a massive stockpile of cobalt that it mined as a byproduct of copper extraction during the export ban and as it deciphered the new, post-ban rules. •Its cautious small test shipment - and the fact that other miners continue to stockpile instead of even testing exporting - suggests the new rules remain opaque and hard to comply with. THAILAND AND CAMBODIA •Thai and Cambodian troops continued to clash along their shared border, sending hundreds of thousands of civilians fleeing to shelters they hadn't bothered to deconstruct after the last bout of skirmishes subsided in July (which perhaps offers some insight into the low confidence the local population placed in that truce's staying power). •Both sides continue to blame the other and insist they're only acting in self defense against the other's aggressions. •So far, the casualty count has remained fairly low compared to the escalating rhetoric: Cambodia says intruding Thai soldiers have killed just six civilians this week. •Pres. Trump - who was present when Thailand and Cambodia formalized their truce in October - said he'd "have to make a phone call" today to try to revive the ceasefire. CHINA •Pres. Trump said he would allow semiconductor giant Nvidia to export its H200 chips to "approved customers" in China who will use them to develop artificial intelligence models. •The H200 is a generation behind Nvidia's latest chips, which is probably part of why Trump felt comfortable sharing it with China. (China hawks have successfully lobbied to bar Chinese companies from using the latest U.S. chip tech.) •Another factor behind Trump's decision could be the 25% royalty the U.S. government will reportedly collect on H200 sales to Chinese customers. 1/2
Open source reportOff Leash update 19 Sept UKRAINE •Pres. Zelensky said his armed forces had reclaimed 160 sq km (62 sq mi) of territory in Donetsk from Russian forces in a counteroffensive that Zelensky called an "important success." •Ukraine has also recently been targeting oil infrastructure far from the front lines, including Russia's largest refinery in Ufa - which is about 1,400 km (870 mi) from Ukraine - and its largest Baltic Sea oil terminal at Primorsk. Some analysts suggest the latest strikes are beginning to hinder Russian oil production - and thus constrict the Kremlin's top source of war funding. •Kyiv's recent successes are particularly impressive given new Ukrainian military intelligence that Russia has thousands of foreign mercenaries fighting on its side. The new intelligence report noted that Cuba is "at the very top" of countries sending hired guns to fight for Moscow, with at least 20,000 Cuban citizens recruited so far. AFGHANISTAN •Pres. Trump floated the idea of reestablishing a U.S. military base at Bagram in Afghanistan as part of an effort to counter China's growing influence in the region. Trump has mentioned a return to Bagram before, but it's not clear whether the Pentagon is actively planning for it yet. •Afghanistan's Taliban government was quick to reject the idea hours after Trump mentioned it yesterday. A foreign ministry spokesman said it was against the U.S. having "any military presence" in Afghanistan, but was open to "political and economic relations based on mutual respect and shared interests." IRAN •It sounds like Iran and the European signatories of the 2015 JCPOA nuclear deal have made little progress on negotiations to avoid the imminent "snapback" of sanctions over Iran's noncompliance with the deal's terms. •That means the UN Security Council could vote to reinstate sanctions on Iran as early as next week. •Iran has threatened to walk away from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) if sanctions are reimposed, but most analysts believe Tehran still hopes to negotiate a better outcome and won't blow up talks by withdrawing from the NPT. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI) •China's DeepSeek - which stunned the AI world in January by introducing a stellar open-source reasoning model that it developed faster and cheaper than proprietary Western rival models - published a new, peer-reviewed study proving its claims that its groundbreaking R1 model didn't rely on rivals for training and cost just $294k to create. By comparison, OpenAI's GPT-4 cost over $63 million just to train. •Separately, AI chipmaking giant Nvidia announced plans to invest $5 billion in its older rival, Intel, which has struggled to keep up with advancements in chipmaking. The news sent share prices higher across the chipmaking sector. RANDOM •Ig Nobel winners were announced yesterday. •This year's mock awards - which recognize "achievements that first make people laugh and then make them think" - celebrated research showing that painting cows like zebras deterred insects from biting them, giving Germans vodka shots slightly improved their ability to speak Dutch, and rainbow lizards at a resort in Togo preferred four-cheese pizza over other topping choices.
Open source reportOff Leash update 16 Sept VENEZUELA •The U.S. Navy targeted another drug boat near Venezuela, killing three people who Pres. Trump said were "positively identified, extraordinarily violent drug trafficking cartels and narcoterrorists" heading to the U.S. with "big bags of cocaine and fentanyl." •Some legal experts have criticized these extra judicial strikes on alleged drug boats as excessive, pointing out that even convicted drug traffickers don't face the death penalty. These accused traffickers are being executed without a trial. [Trump argues that drug cartels should be treated as foreign terrorist organizations and have forfeited their right to stand trial.] •Before the new U.S. strike was announced yesterday, Venezuela's dictator, Nicolas Maduro, called the first U.S. strike of this campaign - which occurred Sep. 2 - a "heinous crime" and "a military attack on civilians who were not at war and were not militarily threatening any country." •Maduro insists that the U.S. is trying to goad Venezuela into a "major war" with the goal of "regime change for oil." Few in the Trump administration would be sad to see Maduro's regime fall, but this naval operation seems like a roundabout way to launch a "major war." ISRAEL AND GAZA •Israel began the "main phase" of its ground offensive on Gaza City this morning, rolling tanks into Gaza's largest population center - which Israel believes to be Hamas's last major stronghold. •U.S. SecState Rubio just paid a visit to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, and offered Netanyahu full U.S. support for his offensive against Hamas. Rubio also conceded that a Gaza peace deal may be out of reach at this stage. •Both Rubio and Netanyahu dodged questions about whether Israel told Pres. Trump it planned to target Hamas leaders in Qatar in advance of the strike. Israeli officials maintain that Trump did indeed have advance warning; the White House claims he only found out after missiles were in the air. Either way, it seems clear Trump didn't have enough advance warning to object to the strike or warn Qatar about it. •On the other side, Arab states met yesterday in Doha to rally behind Qatar in unanimous objection to Israel's strike. •Iran's Pres. Pezeshkian was one of the most vocal attendees denouncing the strike; he complained that "Israel strikes wherever it wants and does whatever it wants," and proposed an "Islamic NATO" to deter future Israeli fire. That's ironic, given that Iran carried out its own ballistic missile strikes on Qatar just three months ago. SYRIA •I missed a key event in my weekly outlook: Syria's new government began a one-week process to choose its new legislature yesterday. •Interim President Ahmed al Sharaa will appoint 70 of its 210 members, while local committees will pick the rest. •As The Economist noted: "Popular democracy this is not, but it is certainly more unpredictable than elections for the old parliament, in which only Bashar al-Assad’s toadies were allowed to run." CHINA •U.S. Treasury Secretary Bessent announced an eleventh-hour agreement to allow TikTok to continue operating in the U.S. under U.S.-controlled owners ahead of tomorrow's extended deadline. Presidents Trump and Xi will "complete" the deal Friday. •Separately, China's markets regulator ruled that chipmaking giant Nvidia's 2020 acquisition of Mellanox Technologies violated antitrust laws. That's going to make ongoing U.S.-China trade talks in Madrid awkward. Some observers suggested the ruling may be China's revenge for Pres. Trump's pressure on U.S. allies to raise tariffs on China over China's purchases of Russian oil.
Open source reportOff Leash update 16 July WEST BANK •Senior Christian Palestinian leaders blamed Israeli authorities for allowing and encouraging radical settlers responsible for recent violent attacks against Muslims and Christians in the West Bank, including fires that damaged a Christian church and cemetery in Taybeh last week. •The priests said Israeli police ignored their emergency calls during the attacks, and have done nothing to address "an intensifying trend of systemic and targeted attacks" against local Christians. •Instead, Israeli authorities continue to approve new Jewish settlements. At least 22 new settlements - including some that were completely new and others that already existed as outposts - were built without authorization in recent months, and subsequently legalized by government approval under what the BBC called "the largest expansion in decades." Most experts consider new settlements illegal under international law. CHINA •Chipmaker Nvidia - which recently became the first company to reach a $4 trillion market cap - said the U.S. government had reversed course and approved sales of its H20 artificial intelligence (AI) chips to Chinese companies following Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang's meeting with Pres. Trump last week. •Huang probably communicated the steps Nvidia has taken to prevent China from acquiring its most advanced chips, as well as Nvidia's significant investment in the substantially-restricted H20, which was developed specifically to comply with congressional concerns about selling more advanced chips than the H20 to China. •Some China hawks will still worry about Chinese tech companies buying the weaker H20, which is still a great chip for AI - even if it's not the best Nvidia makes. •Meanwhile, China steered in the opposite direction and announced new restrictions on exporting eight electric vehicle (EV) battery technologies that give its cheap EVs a price edge over foreign rivals. That will protect Chinese EV makers' technical edge, but make it harder for them to set up manufacturing plants in the EU or U.S. AFGHANISTAN •The UK belatedly admitted that it accidentally exposed personally identifiable information for 18-19,000 Afghans who worked with its military during the war and then applied for resettlement in the UK in a 2022 data leak. •To prevent the Taliban from carrying out targeted reprisals against countrymen who worked for the other side, the then-Conservative government successfully obtained a High Court "super injunction" as soon as it found out about the leak - which was 18 months after it happened - and then spirited around 4,500 Afghans (~900 applicants and ~3,600 of their family members) away to the UK. •The secret-until-now Afghan Relocation Route program aims to relocate another ~6,900 Afghans - including 600 Afghan soldiers whose data was disclosed in the leak - before it closes, at a total cost of about £850 million ($1.1 billion). IRAN •U.S. SecState Rubio said that he and his British, French, and German counterparts agreed in a phone call yesterday to set a deadline of Aug. 31 for reaching a new nuclear deal with Iran. •If a deal isn't finalized by then, a "snapback" mechanism would automatically reimpose the UN Security Council sanctions that were in place before the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) lifted them in exchange for Iran's agreement to new restrictions on its nuclear programs. •Separately, the U.S. FBI added three Iranian officials - including Iran's current Ambassador to Pakistan - to its "Most Wanted List" for their involvement in the 2007 disappearance and subsequent murder of FBI agent Robert Levinson in Iranian custody. VENEZUELA •Amnesty International published a new report (https://t.co/VgaYavuD3q) accusing Venezuela's leadership of crimes against humanity for using "enforced disappearances as part of a widespread and systematic attack against the civilian population, particularly those they consider dissidents." 1/2
Open source report