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Event Speaker: Brian Burton

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Related Topics: Iraq, Terrorism, Irregular Warfare and Crime

Brian Burton was a Fellow at the Center of a New American Security. His most recent CNAS publications include Keeping the Edge: Revitalizing America's Military Officer Corps (co-editor and contributing author) and Learning from Experience: Lessons from the QDR for the QDDR. His writing has appeared in numerous publications, including The New York Times, Armed Forces Journal, Christian Science Monitor, The Washington Quarterly, Journal of Strategic Studies, and Small Wars and Insurgencies. He received an M.A. with honors in Security Studies from Georgetown University. He earned a B.A. in political science from Stanford University, where he also received Interdisciplinary Honors in International Security Studies and the Firestone Medal for Excellence in Undergraduate Research for his thesis entitled “Counterinsurgency Principles and U.S. Military Effectiveness in Iraq."

Related Content

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    Extreme Crises: Reassessing U.S. Preparedness after Japan
    Type of Publication: Policy Brief
    Date: 03/18/2011

    Extreme Crises: Reassessing U.S. Preparedness after Japan, calls for a reassessment of U.S. civilian and military crisis response capabilities.

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  • Beyond Borders: Developing Comprehensive National Security Policies to Address C
    Beyond Borders: Developing Comprehensive National Security Policies to Address Complex Regional Challenges
    Type of Publication: Working Papers
    Date: 12/15/2010

    This report, authored by Patrick Cronin and Brian Burton, offers recommendations for how the United States can further sharpen its understanding of emerging hybrid regional challenges; improve governmental capacity for regional decision-making and strategy-making by building on a regional COCOM platform; and enhance its ability to build partners’ capacity, especially in the areas of security sector assistance and crisis prevention.

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  • Eye to the Future: Refocusing State Department Policy Planning
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    Type of Publication: Policy Brief
    Date: 08/27/2010

    Linking plans to actions in an era of rapid change constitute the key challenges to effective planning at the Department of State. As the ongoing Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review (QDDR) process weighs whether State possesses the capabilities necessary to maximize American influence in the 21st-century diplomatic environment, S/P should also come under scrutiny. The Policy Planning staff has itself taken responsibility for coordinating the QDDR process, and it should take the opportunity to examine closely its own role during and after this review. This policy brief aims to offer several tentative conclusions and recommendations aimed at enhancing S/P’s effectiveness.

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  • QDDR | Planning Diplomacy and Development
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    Author(s): Brian Burton
    Type of Publication: Working Papers
    Date: 08/26/2010

    A comprehensive reexamination of State and USAID strategy, operations and capabilities is needed to enhance the ability of those organizations to effectively advance broader national security and foreign policy objectives. The QDDR process provides an opportunity to apply a top-down strategic planning effort to align resources and regional strategies with national priorities, and to effectively communicate State and USAID requirements to the policy and legislative communities.

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  • Keeping the Edge: Revitalizing America's Military Officer Corps
    Keeping the Edge: Revitalizing America's Military Officer Corps
    Type of Publication: Report
    Date: 02/04/2010

    This report provides an analysis of the nature of U.S. military officership in a new strategic environment and provides recomendations for how the United States can keep its edge in the officer corps amidst an ever-increasing array of challenges.

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  • Learning from Experience: Lessons from the QDR for the QDDR
    Learning from Experience: Lessons from the QDR for the QDDR
    Author(s): Brian Burton
    Type of Publication: Policy Brief
    Date: 01/19/2010

    To help inform the State Department's Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review (QDDR), this policy brief lays out lessons learned from the Department of Defense’s Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) that the State Department and USAID can learn from to optimize the review process and avoid common pitfalls. 

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  • After the Fire: Shaping the Future U.S. Relationship with Iraq
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    Type of Publication: Report
    Date: 06/11/2009

    Since 2003, debates about America’s role in Iraq have focused on how to withdraw U.S. forces. Yet the search for an “end game” emphasizes a short-term objective - getting out of Iraq - and sidesteps the strategic imperative of establishing an enduring relationship with a key country in a region of vital importance to the United States.

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  • Institutionalizing Adaptation: It’s Time for a Permanent Army Advisor Corps
    Author(s): Dr. John A. Nagl
    Type of Publication: Report
    Date: 06/27/2007

    The most important military component of the Long War will not be the fighting we do ourselves, but how well we enable and empower our allies to fight with us. After describing the many complicated, interrelated, and simultaneous tasks that must be conducted to defeat an insurgency, the new Army/Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual notes “Key to all these tasks is developing an effective host-nation (HN) security force.” Indeed, it has been argued that foreign forces cannot defeat an insurgency; the best they can hope for is to create the conditions that will enable local forces to win for them. [We] will need far more urgently in years to come—an Army that includes a standing Advisor Corps organized, designed, trained, and equipped to develop professional host nation security forces that can build freedom abroad.

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  • Staying In Iraq? DoD's Got A Plan For That
    Type: News Item
    Source: AOL Defense

    July 20, 2011 — In AOL Defense, CNAS Fellow Brian Burton said, "The department's play in Iraq is to give enough time to the government of Nouri Al-Maliki to formally request an extension of American troops in country," about U.S. forces staying in Iraq beyond the end of the year.

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  • CNAS Expert Commentary on President Obama's Afghanistan Speech
    Type: Press Release

    Washington, D.C., June 22, 2011 — In his speech tonight, President Obama announced the removal of 10,000 American troops by the end of 2011 and an additional 23,000 troops by September 2012, withdrawing a little more than the 30,000 troop surge he ordered in December 2009.  CNAS experts offered the following analysis on this decision.

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  • Stop Trying to Renegotiate the SOFA
    Type: News Item
    Source: Foreign Policy

    April 29, 2011 — CNAS Bacevich Fellow Brian Burton argues in Foreign Policy that "the United States needs to focus primarily on a long-term political and security partnership with Iraq rather than worrying about gaining approval for a residual force."

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  • Refocus Mideast Presence
    Type: News Item
    Source: Defense News

    March 28, 2011 — CNAS Bacevich Fellow Brian Burton suggests that the United States should adopt a regional defense strategy as political unrest continues in the Middle East.

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  • Lessons from State's QDDR
    Type: News Item
    Source: Federal News Radio

    March 28, 2011 — In a Federal News Radio interview, CNAS Bacevich Fellow Brian Burton dicusses the difficulties in implementing all of the proposals in the recent QDDR due to the current budget debate.

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  • CNAS Experts: Did State Get the QDDR Right?
    Type: Press Release

    Washington, D.C., March 24, 2011 — The Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review (QDDR), released by the State Department last December, provides a road map for the future of U.S. diplomacy and development. But in a political climate dominated by fiscal and budgetary constraints, the QDDR focuses on the need for new investments in civilian power when it should have focused on trade-offs, according to a new article in The Washington Quarterly by CNAS Vice President and Director of Studies Dr.

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  • Did the State Department Get the Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review Right?
    Type: News Item
    Source: The Washington Quarterly

    March 23, 2011 — The QDDR is " a document about new investments when it should be a document about trade-offs" argue Kristin Lord and Brian Burton in a Washington Quarterly article.  

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  • Broadening the Army Officer for a New Tomorrow
    Type: News Item
    Source: Cavalry and Armor Journal

    February 14, 2011 — The CNAS report Keeping the Edge: Revitalizing America's Military Officer Corps is referenced in this article in Armor Magazine.

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  • QDDR Press Release
    QDDR Release a Positive Step Forward but Execution is Critical
    Type: Press Release

    Washington, D.C., December 16, 2010 —  America's most pressing national security challenges cannot be solved with military force alone. Secretary Clinton embraced this view at yesterday's unveiling of the first-ever Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review (QDDR), which emphasizes "leading through civilian power."

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  • In Cables, a More Nuanced U.S. View of Iran in Iraq
    Type: News Item
    Source: McClatchy Newspapers

    November 30, 2010 — CNAS Bacevich Fellow Brian Burton comments on dealing with Iranian influence in Iraqi affairs.

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