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The Institute for National Strategic Studies serves as a focal point for analysis of critical national security policy and defense strategy issues.

 

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Category: China

Cover of podcast series by The Telegraph, "China’s military: How it went from obsolete to world-class."

July 28, 2025

INSS researchers join Battle Lines Podcast on the Chinese military

Dr. Phillip Saunders and Dr. Joel Wuthnow (CSCMA) joined Battle Lines for a three-part series focused on the Chinese military.

Russian service members in uniform stand in a line while attending a base-closing ceremony in Khojaly, Azerbaijan.

July 24, 2025

Russia Is Losing Its Near Abroad

Russia’s full-scale war on Ukraine is one piece of a broader campaign to restore a sphere of influence in post-Soviet Eurasia.

A black-and-white map of Europe and parts of Russia is overlaid with chess pieces. A prominent gold king stands in the area near Moscow, surrounded by toppled silver pawns, suggesting a geopolitical metaphor for dominance or conflict in the region.

July 16, 2025

INSS joins Power Vertical Podcast to talk rising tensions between Russia, Azerbaijan

In this episode of The Power Vertical Podcast, host Brian Whitmore speaks with Jeffrey Mankoff about rising tensions between Russia and Azerbaijan following a brutal crackdown and arrests on both sides.

Podcast cover art for "Russian Roulette" by CSIS. The design features a black-and-white photo of a historic Russian building overlaid on a red map of Moscow. Three diagonal black lines intersect the top right corner. The podcast title is in bold black letters at the bottom, and "CSIS" appears in the upper left corner.

July 16, 2025

Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Geopolitics in the South Caucasus

Jeffrey Mankoff, a Distinguished Research Fellow in the INSS Center for Strategy and Military Power (CSMP), joined The Russian Roulette podcast.

Cover of the AJOB Neuroscience journal, Volume 16, 2025, Number 3 (July–September). The background features an artistic rendering of neurons and synapses in a grayscale palette with highlighted red and orange synaptic connections. The journal title is displayed prominently in gold text on a dark banner across the top.

July 7, 2025

Super Soldiers or Social Burden? Ethical Exploration of the Benefits and Costs of Military Bioenhancement

Biotechnological enhancements for military personnel arouse scrutiny, beyond the ethics of experimental research and due care during operational service, to the eventual return to a civilian life.

The White House is pictured behind a large-scale fence at night.

July 7, 2025

Iran’s Strategic Crossroads: Options Beyond the Axis?

Events of 2023-2024, culminating with the collapse of the Assad regime in Syria, have brought Iran’s regional strategy—a triad of ballistic missile capabilities, nuclear latency, and a decentralized network of regional armed partners—to a moment of reckoning.

President Donald Trump sits with senior national security officials in the White House Situation Room during the U.S. operation targeting Iran's nuclear program on June 22, 2025.

July 6, 2025

A Better Way to Talk About Risk

Defense planners are prepared to accept risk to deter China, but what does that mean for counterterrorism?

Chinese PLA (People's Liberation Army) soldiers stand in formation attending the 100-day countdown launch event for the Group of 20 (G20) 2016 summit in Hangzhou city, east China's Zhejiang province.

July 5, 2025

China’s Military Diplomacy in the New Era

Military diplomacy — including senior-level visits, port calls, and joint exercises — has become a vital tool of Chinese statecraft.

Cover page of the publication titled "China's Military Diplomacy" by Phillip C. Saunders and Melodie Ha, part of China Strategic Perspectives 19. The cover features a photograph of a formal meeting between Chinese military officials and foreign military representatives seated around a long conference table, with Chinese flags and a traditional landscape painting in the background. The bottom of the cover credits the Center for the Study of Chinese Military Affairs, part of the Institute for National Strategic Studies at National Defense University.

June 23, 2025

China's Military Diplomacy

Chinese military diplomacy serves both strategic and operational goals.

Cover page of an occasional paper titled "Re-examining National Missile Defense Strategy: Defending Against China" by Kathleen Ellis. The publication is from May 2025, Volume 5, Number 5. The background is brown with a metallic world map illustration at the bottom. The publication is from the National Institute for Public Policy.

June 11, 2025

Re-examining National Missile Defense Strategy: Defending Against China

Dr. Kathleen Ellis, CSWMD Senior Policy Fellow, authored a National Institute for Public Policy (NIPP) Occasional Paper, “Re-examining National Missile Defense Strategy: Defending Against China,”

Homeland Defense | March 10, 2026

From Theory to Policy: The Four Waves and U.S. Counterterrorism

This article examines United States (U.S.) counterterrorism policy through the lens of David C. Rapoport’s four waves theory.
INSS Around the Web | March 4, 2026

Neuromodulating Mammals for Military Operations: Ethical Responsibility ...

Research into consideration and possible utility of employing marine mammals in military support operations is nothing new. During the Cold War, the United States (U.S.) and Soviet Union employed dolphins and sea lions for detection, retrieval, and
China | March 2, 2026

Why Is Xi Still Purging His Generals?

The removal of PLA senior generals Zhang Youxia and Liu Zhenli in January 2026 represented the peak, if not the end, of a massive purge of the military leadership that began in mid-2023.
China | Feb. 25, 2026

Assessing Xi’s Unprecedented Purges of China’s Military: Key Development...

On January 24, 2026, China’s Ministry of National Defense announced that the military’s top general, Zhang Youxia, and the chief of the Joint Staff Department, Liu Zhenli, had been placed under investigation for serious disciplinary and legal
China | Feb. 25, 2026

The Danger in the Middle: Will Xi’s Purges Increase the Risk of War?

Chinese leader Xi Jinping has purged dozens of senior People’s Liberation Army officers since mid-2023, including two in January, but will this increase the risk of war?
INSS Around the Web | Feb. 24, 2026

Laser-focusing Defense Capabilities

Contemporary warfighting is undergoing rapid and profound transformation. As noted in prior analyses of disruptive technologies and future warfare, the convergence of precision guidance, hypersonic kinematics, distributed sensors, and iteratively
Disruptive Technology | Feb. 23, 2026

How AI Can Help Enforce the Biological Weapons Convention

President Donald Trump’s recent proposal to the United Nations General Assembly regarding the use of artificial intelligence systems to support oversight and enforcement of the Biological Weapons Convention represents a significant milestone in
China | Feb. 19, 2026

To Prevent a Great Power War: Conflict Prevention Efforts and Possibilit...

War between rivalrous great powers (GPW) often is not a deliberate choice.
INSS Around the Web | Feb. 17, 2026

The Recent Rash of Biotechnology Risks: A Call to Fortify Force Capability

The tools of modern biology such as state-of-the-art gene editing, modular DNA assembly, cell-free systems, benchtop automation, and AI-enabled formulation have distributed bioweapon capability beyond the skillcraft of traditional state laboratories.
Allies and Partners | Feb. 11, 2026

Beyond the Peninsula: What OPCON Transfer Means for the Indo-Pacific

On the surface, wartime OPCON transition can appear a niche topic, marked by a change in the leadership of the South Korea-U.S. alliance’s combined military command structure.