Trump’s trade war with China could quickly morph into a shooting war.
US-China Trade War: Stepping Away from the Brink
read more
Security
Trump and the Rush to Deploy THAAD
The United States is pushing a hasty deployment of a missile defense system in South Korea. The backlash could be huge.
Fact Sheet: “Rebalancing our National Security: The Benefits of Implementing a Unified Security Budget”
We can save $440 billion over a 10-year period without compromising national security.
Review: Learning from the Octopus
Rafe Sagarin, the author of Learning from the Octopus, is a marine ecologist and security expert. Years of marine research provide him with a unique perspective on security issues. His new book’s conclusion: we can learn from nature about being more secure by being more adaptable. Nature, after 3.5 billion years of dealing with risk, is an experienced teacher.
Sequestering Military Spending
Even if sequestration cuts across all military programs, this sort of ham-handed approach is safely doable.
Review: America’s Challenge
The relationship between the United States and China is probably the most important current bilateral tie in the world. In his new book America’s Challenge – Engaging a Rising China in the Twenty First Century, Michael Swaine at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace interviews over 50 current and former U.S. officials in an effort to identify current problems and challenges in U.S.-China relations, evaluate policies adopted by the U.S. government, and propose ways to improve the relationship.
Review: ‘The Ultimate Weapon is No Weapon’
“Many will take offense to this book — on both the defense side and the humanitarian side,” write Mary Kaldor and Shannon D. Beebe in the concluding paragraphs of their latest book The Ultimate Weapon is No Weapon. Indeed, throughout their book Kaldor and Beebe try to find a common ground between what are often thought of as innate opposites: the military and civilian agencies. Their book is an attempt to provide a viable human security alternative to the conventional military responses to warfare.
Clapper: Managing the Intelligence Enterprise
In the two weeks since President Obama appointed Retired Air Force Lt. General James R. Clapper, to be director of national intelligence (DNI), there’s been a slew of speculation about his long record in U.S. intelligence and how it might affect his chances for confirmation.
U.S. vs. ICC?
The recent Council on Foreign Relations report “From Rome to Kampala: The U.S. Approach to the 2010 International Criminal Court Review Conference” tells one side of a complex story. The author Vijay Padmanabhan asserts that the “United States has historically been the leader in international justice efforts,” but now must oppose the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) endeavor to activate its power to prosecute crimes of aggression.
Do the Military and Development Mix?
The Obama administration’s redefined military mission in Afghanistan has dramatically increased pressure on the Afghan government to demonstrate it can provide for its citizens without U.S. assistance. Yet despite billions of dollars spent on military and civilian efforts, eight years of nation-building haven’t yielded adequate results.