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June 7, 2021

Back from the Brink? Prospects for U.S.-Russia Relations

As the current American and Russian leaders, Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin, prepare for their first summit on June 16 in Geneva, prospects are slim for the kind of breakthrough achieved by Reagan and Gorbachev. Tensions remain high due to Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea and subsequent invasion of Ukraine; its interference in U.S. elections; its aggressive behavior in cyberspace—including the recent SolarWinds hack, which compromised a range of public and private sector entities across the West—and the sanctions that Washington imposed in response to all those activities. ...

May 25, 2021

Arms Control in Today’s (Dis)Information Environment Part II

Dr. Justin Anderson's recent article is the second in a series of papers by Institute for National Strategic Studies (INSS) Fellows examining Arms Control in Today’s (Dis)information Environment. The goal of the series is to contribute to a discussion about how disinformation could play a role in future arms control treaties and agreements.

May 19, 2021

Managed Risks, Managed Expectations: How Far Will Targeted Killing Get the United States in Afghanistan?

The United States may be withdrawing from Afghanistan, but thus far al-Qaeda certainly hasn’t. The central instrument in the U.S. arsenal to prevent al-Qaeda from reemerging will inevitably be the monitoring and targeted killing of al-Qaeda operatives residing in or near Afghanistan.

May 11, 2021

Arms Control in Today’s (Dis)Information Environment Part I

Ms. Sarah Jacobs Gamberini's recent article for Inkstick Media examines arms control and disinformation. This is the first article in series of papers by Institute for National Strategic Studies (INSS) Fellows on Arms Control in Today’s (Dis)information Environment. The goal of the series is to contribute to a discussion about how disinformation could play a role in future arms control treaties and agreements.

May 4, 2021

#Reviewing Power on the Precipice: The Six Choices America Faces in a Turbulent World

Power on the Precipice offers a less poetic, but equally vivid, evaluation of a United States in decline.[2] The theme of the rise and fall of great powers goes back to Edward Gibbon’s classic study of the Roman Empire, and Paul Kennedy broadened our understanding in The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers, with an emphasis on finance and economics.[3] More recently Michael Beckley explored the interaction between a rising China and the United States and found more cause for optimism in his Unrivaled: Why America Will Remain the World's Sole Superpower.[4]  

April 28, 2021

Great Power Competition Explained

Dr. Thomas F. Lynch. III discusses Great Power Competition with FPRI on the Chain Reaction Podcast.

April 21, 2021

U.S. Defense Strategy After The Pandemic

After a year of loss and lockdowns, America’s vaccination efforts are slowly allowing the country to reopen. At long last, things are very slowly starting to feel normal. Among other things, this moment provides analysts the opportunity to consider how the pandemic has affected domestic support for America’s defense strategy, and whether the country will be able to afford it over the long term. This will be a difficult conversation, as it will necessarily require questioning longstanding assumptions in America’s strategic community.

April 7, 2021

A Year Of Working Intentionally

In the second article in Inkstick's series on The Future of National Security Work, CSWMD's Sarah Jacobs Gamberini pens a personal essay on the unexpected benefits of pandemic telework as a working mom in the defense world.

March 18, 2021

Quantum Sensing's Potential Impacts on Strategic Deterrence and Modern Warfare

Sarah Jacobs Gamberini and Lawrence Rubin recently wrote an article in the Foreign Policy Research Institute's Orbis journal of world affairs researching how quantum sensing could impact WMD, deterrence, and modern warfare.

March 10, 2021

Three's Company? Prioritizing Trilateral Deterrence Against North Korea

In December 2018, a South Korean destroyer allegedly locked its targeting radar on a Japanese


INSS Around the Web | Dec. 3, 2025

Strategic Ambiguity: Erdoğan’s Turkey in a Multipolar World

Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Finland and Sweden made the historic decision to seek membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

INSS Around the Web | Dec. 2, 2025

Can Seoul Take the Lead & The Alliance Expand Its Aperture?

South Korea taking a lead role in conventional deterrence of North Korea, appears linked with enabling the U.S. conventional posture and the alliance's combined posture on the peninsula to better handle multiple threats to the alliance on, around,

INSS Around the Web | Dec. 2, 2025

The Variables of OPCON: What ‘Conditions’?

Language around wartime operational control (OPCON) transition has evolved over the last decade, revealing important patterns and subtle (or not so subtle) shifts in position and policy.

INSS Around the Web | Dec. 2, 2025

Human Agency Under Predictive Insight: Neuroethical Guidance of Behavior...

The examination of the Centaur AI system highlights a turning point at the intersection of behavioral science and artificial intelligence, and reveals a compelling truth: human choice displays structured regularity that advanced analytic systems can




INSS Around the Web | Nov. 17, 2025

The Logos and Limits of Artificial Cognition: The Exemplar of Military Use

As AI increasingly emulates tasks of human judgment, abstraction, and decision-making, it challenges foundational conceptions of mind, agency, and moral responsibility.

INSS Around the Web | Nov. 17, 2025

China’s "near space" legal warfare

A recurring Chinese narrative about so-called "near space" is an expression of the People's Liberation Army doctrine of Legal Warfare.