Defense 360

The notion of “requirements” is deeply embedded in military jargon and decision-making processes, but it has two perverse effects, and therefore, the term should be abolished.

Ignoring the Treaty on Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) or the “Ban Treaty” is a bad idea that will exacerbate the divide between nuclear and non-nuclear states and could lead to a dangerously uneven pace of international disarmament.
 

The OCO budget has been used to skirt defense spending limits and fund base budget activities that are not war funding. However, moving all of OCO’s enduring costs into the base budget may not be politically expedient for passing a budget agreement for FY 2020 and FY 2021.

It’s bipartisan gospel that the private sector will deliver the innovation the United States needs. With technological change and global competition, however, such expectation is a bad idea without a far more strategic, centralized approach to the challenges ahead.

As U.S. sanctions are re-imposed, questions loom within and outside the United States, particularly as European allies work to preserve the JCPOA, as Hijab Shah and Melissa Dalton from CSIS International Security Program write in their commentary.

The Trump administration should work with the Afghan government and regional powers to reach a political settlement with the Taliban. But it is unclear whether the United States will succeed, as CSIS Transnational Threats Project director Seth Jones writes in his commentary.

In the months since the somewhat anti-climactic release of the “real” report, the Nuclear Posture Review has been enjoying a honeymoon of sorts, as Rebecca Hersman, CSIS director of the Project on Nuclear Issues, writes in her commentary.

The United States needs a more comprehensive counterstrategy to BRI that looks after the interests of vulnerable nations and hedges against the geopolitical advantages China is gaining, as visiting military fellow William Pacatte writes in his commentary.

Across U.S. administrations, Washington has noted its concerns of Islamabad playing a “double game” of partnering with the United States while simultaneously supporting anti-U.S. militants, as Hijab Shah from CSIS International Security Program writes in her commentary.