Foreign Policy Blogs

Defense & Security

Obama’s Strategy, ISIS’s Coercive Diplomacy, and Escalation Dominance

Obama’s Strategy, ISIS’s Coercive Diplomacy, and Escalation Dominance

Deterrence theory may help explain ISIS’s change of strategy and also how to address it.

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More Violence in Xinjiang

More Violence in Xinjiang

The latest attack in a long series of aggressions left more than 50 people dead and dozens wounded.

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The Iran Deal: Not Trusting, Verifying

The Iran Deal: Not Trusting, Verifying

There has been considerable opposition to the Iran Deal. One of the most curious assertions being made, however, is that we cannot negotiate with the Iranians because they cannot be trusted. This simply defies logic. If we trusted them, we would not need to negotiate an agreement.

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The Iran Deal: Three Unfounded Lines of Attack

The Iran Deal: Three Unfounded Lines of Attack

A great deal has been written about the agreement negotiated between Iran and the P5+1 countries. A lot of the commentary has been nonsense. Here I would like to address three unfounded lines of attack.

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Netanyahu’s Problematic Remarks on the Iran Deal

Netanyahu’s Problematic Remarks on the Iran Deal

The main conclusion to be drawn from Bibi’s address to the American Jewish community is he needs new talking points.

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GailForce: Economics and National Security

GailForce:  Economics and National Security

Each year, the intelligence community presents an annual threat assessment to Congress. They publish an unclassified version that I and many other national security geeks read very closely.

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Worse than a Defeat

Worse than a Defeat

Was the British Army an effective force in bringing stability and order to Iraq’s Shiite heartland in Basra? Were British troops efficient and effective in confronting the insurgencies they faced in Afghanistan and Iraq? And, as a major Western military power, did they study their enemy?

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An Effective U.S. Airpower Strategy against the Islamic State

An Effective U.S. Airpower Strategy against the Islamic State

American airpower employed against IS lines of communication can be effective at halting its momentum and supporting Iraqi forces in driving it back, but only if the Obama administration couples airstrikes with a strategy to undermine the Islamic State’s strongholds in Syria.

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Chinese Cyber-Attacks: Will the United States Step Up Its Active Cyber Defense Posture?

Chinese Cyber-Attacks: Will the United States Step Up Its Active Cyber Defense Posture?

  The indictment of five Chinese military hackers by a grand jury in the Western District of Pennsylvania illustrates the increasing importance of cyberspace in the great power relationship between the United States and China. It also shows that four years of talking about cyber-espionage, including at the presidential level, have lead to nowhere. All […]

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Why El Chapo Owns Chicago

Why El Chapo Owns Chicago

Chicago is the murder capital of America. Why? Because in Chicago, drugs rule. Which is the same thing as saying Joachim “El Chapo” Guzman rules. Is this news? NPR seems to think so — in a recent interview, NPR’s Steve Inskeep asks Bloomberg reporter John Lippert if “El Chapo” Guzman, the leader of Mexico’s Sinaloa […]

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Beyond Air and Missile Defense: Modernization of the Polish Armed Forces

Beyond Air and Missile Defense: Modernization of the Polish Armed Forces

Executive Summary
Poland has developed an ambitious plan to modernize its armed forces over the next decade. The air and missile defense initiative has certainly become a flagship project of the effort, but the modernization agenda is much broader and should be put into a clear strategic, military, economic, as well as industrial perspective. The modernization process will also not be taking place in a strategic vacuum, and will therefore lead to the creation of a new Polish strategic narrative both in NATO and the EU.

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A Candid Discussion with Ron Deibert

A Candid Discussion with Ron Deibert

Ronald J. Deibert, is Professor of Political Science, and Director of the Canada Center for Global Security Studies and the Citizen Lab at the Munk School of Global Affairs,at the University of Toronto. Dr. Deibert is also a co-founder and a principal investigator of the OpenNet Initiative and Information Warfare Monitor. Considered one of the world’s leading experts on cyber […]

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Syria or the Symbolic Graveyard of the West

Syria or the Symbolic Graveyard of the West

The last plan to solve the Syrian war could certainly lead to a positive outcome – as diplomacy is always better than force – but raises serious problems: does the Euro-Atlantic community have any idea of what it want to accomplish in Syria? What is the end game in Syria? Does the West want to […]

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Would the 9/11 Hijackers’ Money Trail Raise Red Flags in Today’s System?

Would the 9/11 Hijackers’ Money Trail Raise Red Flags in Today’s System?

  If terrorists entered the U.S. today to conduct a 9/11-scale attack and used the same money-movement methods employed by the hijackers in 2001, it is “possible, but not probable” that their financial activities would bring them to the attention of intelligence and law-enforcement officials. That’s the assessment of Dennis M. Lormel, who led the […]

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The Shadow of Iraq?

The Shadow of Iraq?

  After one week of progressive securitization of the Syrian problem by the US, Britain and France, it appears that the members of the Euro-Atlantic community were getting ready to build a coalition of the willing in order to punish Bashar al-Assad for using chemical weapons against Syrian civilians. The United Nations recently sent UN […]

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