Chinese missile attacks on Air Force runways at bases in the Indo-Pacific region would severely limit U.S. military power in a future regional conflict, according to a report by military researchers made public Thursday.

Key U.S. air bases in Japan and elsewhere in the region until recently were safe havens from enemy attack and provided rapid power projection with airstrikes for more than three decades, the report by the Stimson Center said.

National Security Correspondent Bill Gertz examines the report’s assertions that “that sanctuary age has now ended” in the Indo-Pacific, where “China has invested heavily in building a large and sophisticated arsenal of ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles that can reach U.S. bases across the region.”

Embattled South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol delivered a passionate televised defense Thursday of his shock declaration of martial law last week. The country’s National Assembly overturned the martial law order within just three hours. Still, public fury lingers, and his self-justification might not save him when lawmakers convene Saturday to vote again on his impeachment.

Washington Times Asia Editor Andrew Salmon reports from Seoul on Mr. Yoon’s assertion that South Korea’s opposition is obstructing his government’s attempt to take action against Chinese espionage, North Korean electoral interference and organized crime and drug trafficking.

The South Korean president specifically claims that Chinese nationals have spied on military facilities and that the opposition has blocked attempts to amend current laws to punish espionage by foreigners. Mr. Yoon has also revealed that North Korea hacked various South Korean systems, including electoral computers, last fall but said the National Electoral Commission, led by senior justices, has resisted in-depth investigations into the incident.

As the date of President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the White House grows closer and speculation mounts over negotiations for a peace deal, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s government has launched an all-out assault to gain as much territory inside Ukraine as possible to strengthen its bargaining position.

Threat Status Special Correspondent Guillaume Ptak offers a lengthy analysis from Kyiv, noting that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Mr. Trump spoke privately in Paris last week in a meeting arranged by French President Emmanuel Macron. Mr. Zelenskyy has warned his Western backers that Mr. Putin is “not interested in holding negotiations to end the war,” but is hoping instead “to put an end to his international isolation.”

Many Western and Ukrainian sources echo that sentiment and are unanimous in their assessment that nothing short of Ukraine’s total capitulation will satisfy the Kremlin. With that as a backdrop, both Ukraine and Russia are now turning to greater foreign support nearly three years into a draining war. The main difference, according to military analyst Oleksandr Kovalenko, is that Moscow’s partners have proved to be much more reliable and aggressive. A huge question mark hangs over the United States, Kyiv’s indispensable supplier in the conflict.

Retired CIA officer and Threat Status contributor Daniel N. Hoffman praises Mr. Trump’s selection of Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg as special envoy to the Russia-Ukraine war, writing that Gen. Kellogg will navigate Russian military, intelligence and diplomatic officials operating under strict orders from Mr. Putin, with no room whatsoever for independent initiative.

“Mr. Putin has ruthlessly ruled the Kremlin for a quarter century with a level of repression and military aggression not seen since the Soviet ‘evil empire,’” writes Mr. Hoffman. “Adding to the challenge, Mr. Putin’s formative experience was in the KGB, where he served for 16 years before resigning in 1991 as a lieutenant colonel, and later as director of the Federal Security Service.”

“Gen. Kellogg would do well to involve our NATO partners in negotiations because they will need to be engaged diplomatically, economically and militarily in postwar Ukraine,” Mr. Hoffman writes. “He knows from experience that wars end when both sides are too exhausted to fight any longer or when one side defeats the other.”

Ronald Kessler takes stock of the vow by Mr. Trump’s FBI Director nominee Kash Patel to turn the bureau’s headquarters into a “museum of the ‘deep state.’” 

“The headquarters has kept us safe from a successful foreign terrorist attack since 9/11,” writes Mr. Kessler, a former Washington Post and Wall Street Journal investigative reporter who is the author of “The Secrets of the FBI.”

“Contrary to claims that the bureau is politicized against Republicans, the FBI during the Biden administration has helped to bring criminal prosecutions of 11 major Republicans and 12 major Democrats, including Hunter Biden, former Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey and New York Mayor Eric Adams,” Mr. Kessler writes. “This is not to downplay the corruption of the FBI under then-FBI Director James Comey, launching investigations of Mr. Trump and his campaign based on no evidence whatsoever. But the fact is that all those FBI officials who outrageously abused their positions to get Mr. Trump are long gone from the bureau.”

• Dec. 16 — North Africa’s Renewable Energy Landscape: A Comparative Analysis, Middle East Institute

• Dec. 16 — Sea-based Leg of the U.S. Strategic Nuclear Deterrent, Advanced Nuclear Weapons Alliance Deterrence Center

• Dec. 17 — Report Launch: The Reluctant Consensus: War and Russia’s Public Opinion, Atlantic Council

• Dec. 17 — Homeland Security and the China Challenge: A Conversation with Congressman Mark Green, Hudson Institute

• Dec. 17 — Celebrating the U.S. Space Force and Charting its Future, Center for Strategic and International Studies

• Dec. 18 — The NATO Perspective: Strengthening Resilience within the Alliance, Atlantic Council