The first requirement for developing a strategy is to have an objective. In regard to Pakistan, the United States would like to see a stable, prosperous, and democratic Pakistan governed by the rule of law, a nation where a good education was available to everyone,...
IntroductionAl-Shabaab (aka the Harakat Shabaab al-Mujahidin, al-Shabab, Shabaab, the Youth, Mujahidin al-Shabaab Movement, Mujahideen Youth Movement, Mujahidin Youth Movement), is an Islamic organization that controls much of southern Somalia, excluding the capital, Mogadishu. It has waged an insurgency against Somalia's transitional government and its Ethiopian...
For the very few - not more than a handful, I am sure - who don't routinely follow the Washington Jewish Week, here is my latest piece, published in today's issue. In part, this article was an outlet to channel my outrage at Elliott Abrams'...
Read all of "Mitchell vs. Abrams: Can-do vs. Can't-do on Middle East Peace" »
Introduction: "Tough Choices"On the campaign trail, President Barack Obama made repeated vows to overhaul the Pentagon budget process (PDF). And despite inheriting a defense establishment embroiled in two wars and still fielding major weapons systems developed decades ago to fight the Soviet Union, most analysts...
IntroductionThe Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is an alliance promoting economic and political cooperation by fostering dialogueamong its ten members: Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. Now experts say the group may pursue a bigger role in the...
Read all of "ASEAN: The Association of Southeast Asian Nations" »
IntroductionTransportation experts view the call for dramatic federal government action in response to the economic crisis as an opportunity to overhaul the U.S. system of highways, bridges, railways, and mass transit. A series of sobering report cards from the American Society of Civil Engineers documents...
Read all of "Transportation Infrastructure: Moving America" »
IntroductionTransportation experts view the call for dramatic federal government action in response to the economic crisis as an opportunity to overhaul the U.S. system of highways, bridges, railways, and mass transit. A series of sobering report cards from the American Society of Civil Engineers documents...
Read all of "Moving America: Transport Infrastructure at a Crossroads" »
After a month of political back-and-forth, President Barack Obama's plans to address the most daunting U.S. economic crisis in 80 years are coming into focus. Speaking to a joint session of Congress on February 24, Obama outlined his strategy to rescue the struggling financial sector while simultaneously...
Very few people in Israel posses more influence and have a broader global strategic perspective than Major General (res.) Amos Gilad, director of the Defense Ministry's Diplomatic-Security bureau. Gilad enjoys so much clout and influence that last December he was depicted by Israel's leading Haaretz...
Read all of "Israel's Lieberman: Regional fear-factor by Ori Nir" »
No one expects the secretary of state to play the leading role in U.S. policy toward the global economic crisis. For Hillary Clinton, on her first extended overseas tour as America's top diplomat, this poses something of a dilemma. The economy ranks second to none...
The nation faces a wide variety of external threats. Many of them have the potential to cause some serious damage; some of them even have the potential to destroy the nation. Thankfully, such latter threats as asteroid impacts and comprehensive nuclear strikes have very low...
President Obama's decision to send 17,000 more troops to Afghanistan to bolster a deteriorating security situation and provide some breathing space to launch a more effective reconstruction and stabilization strategy will face multiple challenges. The first of those may be trying to find 87,000 weapons...
After seven years of urging coalition countries to beef up troop commitments in Afghanistan, Washington appears to have concluded the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) cannot be relied upon to provide the "hard power" needed to counter Taliban gains. As a result, the United States...
More than 40 million people joined the ranks of the undernourished in 2008, increasing the number of very hungry to nearly one billion. Feeding them has become harder in the midst of a global financial crisis, with economic bailouts dominating the agenda of the rich...
The Obama administration hopes money spent to stimulate the economy out of recession can do double duty by advancing its green agenda. Along with congressional Democrats, the administration infused the stimulus bill with initiatives meant to create "green jobs" that President Obama says will include...
IntroductionFor the past four years, significant U.S. attention has been devoted to the crisis in Sudan's Darfur region, in which roughly two hundred thousand have died and more than two million have been displaced. A hybrid African Union/United Nations peacekeeping force remains only partially deployed,...
IntroductionFor almost thirty years, the Sri Lankan government has been engaged in a bloody civil war with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). More commonly known as the Tamil Tigers, the LTTE wants an independent state for the island's Tamil minority. In February 2002,...
IntroductionOn his second full day in office, President Barack Obama signed an executive order calling for the closure of the detention camp at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba. White House officials say the move is part of an effort to repair America's image...
Ori Nir, a former Israeli journalist, is the spokesman for Americans for Peace Now. The people of Israel have spoken... with many voices. Israeli voters did not hand down a verdict yesterday. They have not given a clear mandate to any one politician or political...
Read all of "And the loser is.... Israel. Again. By Ori Nir" »
The KnessetSeats in Israel's legislative assembly, the Knesset, are assigned through a system of nationwide proportional representation: Rather than electing individual candidates, voters cast ballots for an entire party. Any party receiving more than 2 percent of the vote is assigned a proportional number of...
With a couple of hours until the polls close across Israel, this is the best analysis I have seen so far of the possible scenarios. The author is Yossi Alpher, the former director of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, and...
IntroductionThe Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), also known as the Tamil Tigers, are a separatist group in Sri Lanka. For the past thirty years, the LTTE have been agitating for a homeland for ethnic Tamils, who feel persecuted by Sri Lanka's ethnic majority, the...
Read all of "Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (aka Tamil Tigers) (Sri Lanka, separatists)" »
IntroductionIn crafting a new approach to the war in Afghanistan, U.S. military and political leaders say Iran-once dubbed a member of the "axis of evil" by former President George W. Bush-could play a key role. Despite ongoing concerns over Iran's nuclear program and allegations of...
Militancy in Pakistan has been spreading inward from the lawless tribal region along the Afghan border. The Pakistani Taliban has seized large swaths of territory (CSMonitor) in North West Frontier Province (NWFP). Militants have also increasingly mounted attacks in Peshawar, the provincial capital, as well...
Militancy in Pakistan has been spreading inward from the lawless tribal region along the Afghan border. The Pakistani Taliban has seized large swaths of territory (CSMonitor) in North West Frontier Province (NWFP). Militants have also increasingly mounted attacks in Peshawar, the provincial capital, as well...
There is an elephant in the middle of the immigration discussions -- a huge presence that is ignored by all. An inconvenient truth that is carefully not addressed: America needs an underclass. Since its earliest days, the American economy has depended on cheap labor. Initially...
Scope of the ThreatSince the 1990s, China has dramatically improved its military capabilities on land and sea, in the air, and in space. Recently, China has begun to project its military power beyond the Pacific Ocean by deploying a flotilla of small warships in December...
Implications for the RegionChina has been steadily building up its strategic and conventional capabilities since the 1990s. Eighteen years ago, experts say, China had a "bare-bones" military: basic capabilities, but nothing sophisticated or top-of-the-line. But two decades of double-digit spending increases have changed that picture....
STRATEGY: Planning the optimal application of resources to achieve major objectives [NOTE: comments are welcomed and may be incorporated with reference in future revisions.] The core objective of national strategy is to insure the survival and prosperity of the nation -- "life, liberty and the...
The Russia-Ukraine energy dispute, which halted natural gas shipments to the rest of Europe in the first weeks of 2009, highlighted multiple dilemmas confronting the European Union as it seeks to carry out ambitious new "green" energy policies. The incident demonstrates the difficulty of coordinating...
Authors
- Richard Andres
- Benjamin Bahney
- Cheryl Benard
- Bruce Bennett
- Linda Bishai
- Jonah Blank
- Tim Brown
- James Jay Carafano
- Steven R. Charbonneau
- Christopher Chivvis
- Lindsay Clutterbuck
- Sam Cohen
- James L. Cook
- Walton Cook
- Ed Corcoran
- Ralph Cossa
- Council on Foreign Relations
- Rafiq Dossanip
- Charles Dunlap
- Amitai Etzioni
- Gareth Evans
- Nikolas K. Gvosdev
- Larry Hanauer
- Scott Warren Harold
- Brian Michael Jenkins
- David Johnson
- Terrence Kelly
- Michael Krepon
- Stephen Larrabee
- Mackenzie Eaglen
- Jeffrey Martini
- Arthur G. Martirosyan
- Ralph Masi
- Ali Nader
- Aram Nerguizian
- Ori Nir
- Olga Oliker
- Jim Phillips
- Isaac R Porche
- James T. Quinlivan
- Reset Defense Bulletin
- Charles Ries
- RSIS
- Paul Saunders
- David Schenker
- Ghassan Schbley
- Mark Schneider
- Daniel Serwer
- George Smith
- Scott Snyder
- Jon Soltz
- Julie Taylor
- Alexander Thier
- Charles P. Vick
- Rosemary Freitas Williams
- Charles Wolf, Jr.
- Elizabeth Zolotukhina
