𧡠THREAD: Shashank Joshi, a foreign think tank careerist, has a 16-year record of attacking US foreign policy... and now he's lecturing our military leadership on how to take the oath. Why does he still have a work visa?
He's an Indian national who arrived in April and is already the loudest critic of the Pentagon on social media.
The Economist's new Washington Bureau Chief β an Indian national on a visa who just arrived in April β went on a Canadian national security podcast literally titled "The Problem of America" and said this about US military operations:
"They have attacked scores of small boats in the Pacific and the Caribbean. They've killed dozens of people in a campaign that is, by most accounts, quite illegal and contrary to international law."
That's Shashank Joshi, @shashj . Defence editor turned bureau chief. Two months in the country and he's already built a 16-year paper trail calling American power "malevolent," "predatory," and "quite illegal" β while sitting on the advisory board of a UK think tank funded by the European Commission, BAE Systems, and the US State Department.
And he's now lecturing our military leadership on what it means to take the oath.
I have the receipts.
As always, patience as I pull together the thread. π
He's an Indian national who arrived in April and is already the loudest critic of the Pentagon on social media.
The Economist's new Washington Bureau Chief β an Indian national on a visa who just arrived in April β went on a Canadian national security podcast literally titled "The Problem of America" and said this about US military operations:
"They have attacked scores of small boats in the Pacific and the Caribbean. They've killed dozens of people in a campaign that is, by most accounts, quite illegal and contrary to international law."
That's Shashank Joshi, @shashj . Defence editor turned bureau chief. Two months in the country and he's already built a 16-year paper trail calling American power "malevolent," "predatory," and "quite illegal" β while sitting on the advisory board of a UK think tank funded by the European Commission, BAE Systems, and the US State Department.
And he's now lecturing our military leadership on what it means to take the oath.
I have the receipts.
As always, patience as I pull together the thread. π
Shashank Joshi has been in DC for two months, and is already lecturing our military officials on what their oaths mean⦠even though his entire record is criticizing the US military.
Who is he, exactly?
Who is he, exactly?
https://x.com/shashj/status/2062117128321319393
He's an Indian national. Cambridge. Enrolled in a Harvard PhD program... but his public profiles list no doctorate, suggesting he dropped out. Senior Research Fellow at RUSI, the world's oldest defence think tank. Then a stint at the Tony Blair Institute. The Economist hired him as Defence Editor in 2018. Promoted to Washington Bureau Chief, April 2026.
This isn't new. The record goes back 16 years.
2010, RUSI: "Drones make it easier for the US to violate sovereignty by assassinating across international borders."
2011, BBC World: "The simply impotence the US has in this matter."
2017, CNN: scenario-planning a post-NATO Europe β two weeks into Trump's first term.
Same direction. Every time.
2010, RUSI: "Drones make it easier for the US to violate sovereignty by assassinating across international borders."
2011, BBC World: "The simply impotence the US has in this matter."
2017, CNN: scenario-planning a post-NATO Europe β two weeks into Trump's first term.
Same direction. Every time.
It escalates. Every few years, the language gets harder.
2022: "I cannot recall any period in my lifetime where the United States had so many simultaneous concurrent profound and difficult challenges... your budget is large but it's flatlining and you don't have the capability to take on these challenges at once."
2022: "I cannot recall any period in my lifetime where the United States had so many simultaneous concurrent profound and difficult challenges... your budget is large but it's flatlining and you don't have the capability to take on these challenges at once."
2024. CNAS β the biggest national security think tank in Washington. Joshi tells the room:
"I think it's increasingly clear that the way we trained and prepared the Ukrainian Force for the counter offensive that began in June was deeply problematic for the conditions that they faced."
An Indian national with no military background, telling an American defence audience that America's training of Ukraine failed.
"I think it's increasingly clear that the way we trained and prepared the Ukrainian Force for the counter offensive that began in June was deeply problematic for the conditions that they faced."
An Indian national with no military background, telling an American defence audience that America's training of Ukraine failed.
December 2025. "The Problem of America" β a Canadian national security podcast. The title is his framing. In it, Joshi calls the shifts in our military "malevolent" and "predatory."
Same podcast. On the US intelligence community:
"This kind of complete collapse of norms, standards, and professionalization inside the US intelligence community."
"This kind of complete collapse of norms, standards, and professionalization inside the US intelligence community."
On US governance:
"I don't think this administration has the discipline, the coherence, the judgment to avoid that kind of misstep at all."
This from a man who just moved here on a visa.
"I don't think this administration has the discipline, the coherence, the judgment to avoid that kind of misstep at all."
This from a man who just moved here on a visa.
When Joshi talks about British military failures, the language changes completely. "Mismanaged." "In a bad place."
Sympathetic. Structural. Budgetary. No moral indictment. No "malevolent." No "predatory." No "quite illegal."
Sympathetic. Structural. Budgetary. No moral indictment. No "malevolent." No "predatory." No "quite illegal."
Despite Joshi being an Indian national, when he's addressing European audiences about America, he says : "We Europeans."
An Indian national saying "we Europeans" β in context after context where the subject is American foreign policy β to position himself inside the community he's telling to fear the United States.
An Indian national saying "we Europeans" β in context after context where the subject is American foreign policy β to position himself inside the community he's telling to fear the United States.
It gets better. When France conducts military signaling AGAINST the United States near Greenland β a NATO ally running operations aimed at America β Joshi calls it admirable:
"France has chosen to conduct military diplomacy that is directed in part at a European partner against the United States."
"France has chosen to conduct military diplomacy that is directed in part at a European partner against the United States."
Joshi deleted Tweets, but I found them in Wayback machine. He called the leadership of the Department of Defense an "utter disgrace." He said JD Vance "doesn't have the slightest clue."
CONCLUSION:
So let's put the full picture together.
The Economist's new Washington Bureau Chief:
- 16-year record of escalating anti-American military commentary
- Calls US operations "malevolent," "predatory," "quite illegal and contrary to international law"
- Calls himself "we Europeans" β as an Indian national β consistently when criticizing America
- RUSI advisory board (EU Commission, State Dept, BAE funding) β no COI disclosure identified in any reviewed publication
- Two months in the country on a visa
Again, why do we allow people like him to stay here on a work visa?
THREAD END.
So let's put the full picture together.
The Economist's new Washington Bureau Chief:
- 16-year record of escalating anti-American military commentary
- Calls US operations "malevolent," "predatory," "quite illegal and contrary to international law"
- Calls himself "we Europeans" β as an Indian national β consistently when criticizing America
- RUSI advisory board (EU Commission, State Dept, BAE funding) β no COI disclosure identified in any reviewed publication
- Two months in the country on a visa
Again, why do we allow people like him to stay here on a work visa?
THREAD END.
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