Ideas
How 'Mask Diplomacy' Rescued China's Image in Africa
While Beijing was nimbly pivoting, the U.S. continued to let its relationships wither.
Ideas
The US Talks A Lot About Strategic Complexity. Too Bad It’s Mostly Just Talk.
The pandemic sidelined a national security community that gives only lip service to a vital concept.
Ideas
Biden’s Interim National Security Guidance Is a Good, If Small, First Step
Next come the big questions: what is America’s current status, and where do we want to go?
Ideas
Five Ways to Prepare Now for the Next Pandemic
Suggestion from public-health researchers with experience in disaster response.
Ideas
With Iran, First Prevent the Nukes
If Tehran gets the Bomb, every other regional problem immediately gets a lot harder.
Ideas
Who’s Funding that Lawsuit? Implications for Lawfare
The U.S. and friendly governments must better understand the national-security risks from third-party litigation finance.
Ideas
Support for QAnon Is Hard to Measure. Polls May Overestimate It
The spread of ideas online, and people’s endorsement of them in polls, doesn’t give the whole picture.
Ideas
There’s a Better Way to Press for NATO Burden-Sharing
An assessment of alliance planning for 2014-18 shows what actually gets members to boost collective defense.
Ideas
Building a China Strategy Starts by Answering These Questions
To begin, we must question our perceptions and eliminate our biases.
Ideas
Boycott the Olympics? Cancel the Saudis? How Woke Can Biden Really Get?
Classic international relations realism and wokeness are two different things.
Ideas
Why Invest in Hypersonic Technology?
Weapons aren’t the endgame. Hypersonic aircraft are next.
Ideas
A Solid Plan to Compete with China in Artificial Intelligence
The NSCAI’s new report should also be taken as the first plank in a national technology strategy.
Ideas
A Salami Slice for Taiwan’s Security
The U.S. can put a revisionist tactic to its own use in the Western Pacific.
Ideas
Modeling Software Once Led Us to the Precipice of Nuclear War. What Will AI Do?
The Pentagon must heed the lessons of RYAN and Able Archer amid its artificial-intelligence aspirations.
Ideas
Space Force Should Embrace the Natural Inclusivity of Space Nerds
It would make the nascent service better at many things, including recruiting.
Ideas
ISIS and Al-Qaeda’s Sub-Saharan Affiliates Are Poised for Growth in 2021
A rundown on jihadi groups’ expansion in the Sahel and Nigeria, the Horn of Africa, and the continent’s southeastern Swahili coast.
Ideas
Four Ways US Naval Forces Should Be More Assertive
Non-aggressive assertiveness can achieve long-term advantages and have strategic effects.
Ideas
‘Great Power Competition’ Is a Dangerously Simple Frame
To correctly set force posture, the Pentagon needs to look more deeply at the world’s actors, their preferences, and relationships.
Ideas
What Can the Pentagon Realistically Get from Its Advisory Boards?
A former chair says the boards provide a lot, could do better — and help weed out impractical or oversold ideas.
Ideas