Ideas

The Trump administration’s lie-detector campaign is more likely to hurt than help national security

Pseudo-scientific polygraph tests may discourage internal candor and divert investigative energy while failing to stop leaks.

Ideas

How the National Guard’s domestic missions build deterrence

The Guard’s citizen-soldiers and -airmen boost American resiliency, complicating any adversary’s calculations.

Ideas

Defense reconciliation bill begins rebuild and transformation of our military

The cost of deterring war will always be dwarfed by the cost of fighting one.

Ideas

The Army’s role in the Pacific

Deterrence can’t be achieved with maritime or air systems alone.

Ideas

What the R&D budget proposal says about the future of war

The Pentagon’s research-and-development section heralds several quiet, monumental shifts.

Ideas

The Israel-Iran war may have saved both countries’ embattled leaders

External threats tend to heal internal divisions—and shatter dreams of “regime change.”

Ideas

The White House is looking for savings in the wrong place

The main acquisition challenge isn’t how the military buys weapons, but what it aims to do with them.

Ideas

For 250 years, it’s been ‘change or lose’ for our military. Here’s what needs changing now

A former commandant and a futurist take stock of Spider’s Web, Rising Lion, and more.

Ideas

Is gun violence depressing military recruiting?

Perhaps the problem is not that young people are insufficiently patriotic, but that they have been fighting a war, daily, for their entire lives. 

Ideas

The military must remain nonpartisan. America depends on it

The soldiers who cheered partisan applause lines at Fort Bragg, and their leaders, erred in a spectacular way.

Ideas

The ‘buy-American’ push is backfiring

It’s time for U.S. and European policymakers to be smarter and more cooperative.

Ideas

Russia aims to ride the BRICS to AI victory

The United States must firm up its own coalition of AI collaborators.

Ideas

Ukraine and the future of deception in war

If the U.S. military and its partners cannot master today’s emerging tools, they may fall behind in a critical field.

Ideas

The US Army is too light to win

Too much of its force is under-armored and under-gunned.

Ideas

Don’t limit defense innovation by capping small-biz awards

A proposed change to the Small Business Innovation Research program would deprive the military of some of its best problem-solvers.