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By Daniel Jacobson — As the public digests the results of last week’s midterm elections, many commentators have begun discussing how the makeup of the new Congress will affect various legislative areas, including national security.  Benjamin Wittes at Lawfare (and NSJ advisory-board member) suggests that the election’s impact on substantive national security issues will likely be “minimal,” noting that the 111th Congress acted much in the same way that a Republican-controlled Congress could have been expected to act. While Wittes certainly has a fair point concerning the high level of continuity on national security policies regardless of the party in […]

By John Cella — On November 8, former Central Intelligence Agency Acting General Counsel John A. Rizzo visited Harvard Law School at an event sponsored by the Harvard National Security Law Association. Currently a Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Rizzo is now working on a memoir detailing his 34 years of service at the CIA. Except for a period in 2002-2003 when Scott Muller was appointed, Rizzo served as the CIA Acting General Counsel from late 2001 through 2009. Rizzo spoke about his start at the Agency in 1976, when he was one of only 18 lawyers. Rizzo noted

By Ronak D. Desai — With President Obama’s visit to India underway, officials in New Delhi are working with Washington to ease American concerns over nuclear liability legislation recently enacted by the Indian Parliament that effectively precludes nuclear commerce between the United States and India.  Formally entitled, “Civil Liability for the Nuclear Damages Bill, 2010,” the legislation should have represented the last stage toward completion of the landmark Indo-U.S. civilian nuclear deal, but it instead threatens to undermine the practical effects of the civilian nuclear accord. Unveiled in 2005 by President George W. Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh,

By Grey Fisher — As any American who has traveled since 9/11 knows, when you arrive at the airport, you check much of your privacy at the curb.  Car stops, luggage searches, and security check points with X-ray scanners all demonstrate that, in the timeless battle between security and liberty, security trumps at the airport.  While there is no shortage of grumbling in long security lines, most Americans are more than willing to sacrifice significant privacy in order to fly safely. What many Americans may not know is that foreigners entering the United States are also asked to make considerable

In the wake of Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s dismissal, questions linger about the trajectory of the American-led war in Afghanistan. While administration officials insist that McChrystal’s counterinsurgency strategy—formulated with the help of his successor, Gen. David Petraeus—will remain in place under the latter’s leadership, the incident underscored for many the fragility of the Afghan operation as it enters its ninth year.  Pakistani officials have recently stepped up their efforts to broker a peace accord between Hamid Karzai’s Afghan government and the network of Sirajuddin Haqqani.  The impetus for such negotiations is what some Pakistani officials see to be “increasing American uncertainty”