Column Archive

Washington is rife with calls to destroy the so-called Islamic State, also known as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. The combination of far-reaching ambition, tactical skill, money, weaponry and depraved barbarity make the group a pressing, even unprecedented, security threat. Like al-Qaida a decade ago, the Islamic State has woven together a dangerous network, this one composed of fat-cat Gulf funders, angry young Western Muslims struggling with inner demons, local Sunni Arabs angered by repression from the governments in Damascus and Baghdad, violence-obsessed jihadists from across the Islamic world and former Baathists still bitter over losing power. As […]

As Russia’s intervention in Ukraine increasingly takes the form of an outright invasion, the strategic response by the West must be viewed through a different lens. No longer is the reaction of the U.S. and its European allies a matter of symbolism or messaging. The question now is whether economic sanctions, the West’s principal tactical weapon against Russia in Ukraine, can prove effective in pushing back against Russian President Vladimir Putin’s military advances. Despite the news of a possible cease-fire agreement, there is little indication that Putin is giving up his effort to exert control over eastern Ukraine and undermine […]

In responding to press queries last week about how the United States plans to tackle the threat from the Islamic State—also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS—President Barack Obama used an unfortunate choice of words in responding, “We don’t have a strategy yet.” The answer implied that Washington had been caught flat-flooted by the rapid deterioration of events in Iraq and was struggling to craft a response. In reality, whole segments of the U.S. government’s national security apparatus are devoted to strategic planning. With regard to the Islamic State crisis, options have been in development […]

Despite the recent prominence given to the issue of NATO’s membership enlargement, the alliance seems destined for at least the next few years to focus on broadening and deepening its partnerships with nonmember countries and other international institutions. NATO has developed an extensive partnership program since the Cold War and now has some two dozen official national partners, while developing ties with more countries as well as international institutions. Partners contribute capabilities, money and legitimacy to NATO activities. They have provided thousands of ground troops to NATO operations in Afghanistan and the Balkans, air capabilities in Libya and support to […]