By Ronak D. Desai —
Combating the scourge of maritime piracy has emerged as a promising area of cooperation between NATO and the Russian Federation.
Susan Landau, Marc Rotenberg, and John Palfrey address security and privacy issues concerning the proposed internet monitoring legislation.
By Malik Ahmad Jalal* – On a visit of Pakistan in July, the U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mullen acknowledged the success of the military operation against the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in South Waziristan and Swat. However, the highest-ranking U.S. military commander also expressed concern that Pakistan’s reluctance to fight the formidable Haqqani Network in North Waziristan is undermining the US efforts in Afghanistan. The U.S. pressure on Pakistan to “do more” is likely to increase as the Obama Administration views the dismantling of the Afghan Taliban in North Waziristan as crucial to its exit strategy
By Nina Catalano – News south of the U.S. border is not good these days. Mexican drug traffickers are supplementing their already gruesome violence with terrorist tactics, and Central America is increasingly faced with the destabilizing spillover effects of Mexico’s war: homicides increased 37% in El Salvador last year, while Guatemala continues to lurch through chaos. U.S. officials, on the other hand, are touting the pending deployment of 1,200 National Guard troops to the border and the recently passed 2010 Supplemental Appropriations Act, which provides an extra $175 million in assistance for Mexico. But is it enough? Two new reports
By Malik Ahmad Jalal and Agus Yudhoyono* – “I hope our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us that the less we use our power, the greater it will be.” The words of U.S. philosopher-president Thomas Jefferson adorn the walls of Jefferson Memorial Library at West Point Military Academy. They reflect the ethos that mastering warfare will not be sufficient to guarantee the pre-eminence of an army. Rather, it is the wisdom acquired by mastering all forms of knowledge that enables a country to project power through non-military means, which will ultimately determine supremacy. This article identifies the
By Mary L. Cummings – As the director of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Humans and Automation Laboratory, I was asked to comment from a technologist’s perspective at the recent symposium Drone Warfare: New Robotics & Targeted Killings on the panel “Unmanned Robotics & New Warfare.” My perspective is unique in that not only do I conduct millions of dollars of research in the development of technologies to enable one or more humans to control unmanned vehicles (i.e., robots) more easily, but I also look at these issues from the perspective of having flown advanced fighters in the U.S. Navy,
