Five Things to Know, Sept. 9, 2024

1.   Passage of a six-month temporary spending bill would have widespread and devastating effects on the Defense Department, Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin said in a letter to key members of Congress on Sunday. Austin said that passing a continuing resolution that caps spending at 2024 levels, rather than taking action on the proposed 2025 budget will hurt thousands of defense programs, and damage military recruiting just as it is beginning to recover after the COVID-19 pandemic. “Asking the department to compete with (China), let alone manage conflicts in Europe and the Middle East, while under a lengthy CR, ties our hands behind our back while expecting us to be agile and to accelerate progress,” said Austin in the letter to leaders of the House and Senate appropriations committees.

2.   Japan lodged another protest with China last week, its third in less than two weeks, after it said Chinese coast guard vessels entered waters around Japanese islets in the East China Sea. Four vessels crossed the 12-mile territorial limit claimed by Japan around the Senkaku Islands between 4 p.m. and 4:06 p.m. Friday, according to a Japan coast guard news release that day. Japan’s Foreign Affairs Ministry then lodged complaints with the Chinese Embassy in Japan and with the Chinese government in Beijing, a ministry spokesman told Stars and Stripes by phone Monday. Some government officials in Japan are required to speak to the media only on condition of anonymity.

3.   The number of people killed in overnight Israeli strikes in Syria has risen to 14 with more than 40 wounded, Syrian state media said Monday morning. Israeli strikes hit several areas in central Syria late Sunday, damaging a highway in Hama province and sparking fires, Syrian state news agency SANA said. The initial death count reported by the Masyaf National Hospital in western Hama province was four. SANA, citing hospital head Faysal Haydar, said 14 were killed and 43 wounded. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a U.K.-based war monitor, said at least four of those killed were civilians.

4.   Two NATO members said Sunday that Russian drones have violated their airspace, as one reportedly flew into Romania during nighttime attacks on neighboring Ukraine while another crashed in eastern Latvia the previous day. A drone entered Romanian territory early on Sunday as Moscow struck “civilian targets and port infrastructure” across the Danube in Ukraine, Romania's Ministry of National Defense reported. It added Bucharest had deployed F-16 warplanes to monitor its airspace and issued text alerts to residents of two eastern regions.

5.   Yemen’s Houthi rebels claimed early Sunday they shot down another American-made MQ-9 drone flying over the country, marking potentially the latest downing of the multimillion-dollar surveillance aircraft. The U.S. launched airstrikes over Houthi-controlled territory afterward, the rebels said. The U.S. military told The Associated Press it was aware of the claim but has “received no reports” of American military drones being downed over Yemen. The rebels offered no pictures or video to support the claim as they have in the past, though such material can appear in propaganda footage days later.