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U.S. Military Forces and Operations

CNAS examines the force structure, roles, missions, and overall health and wellness of America's military in order to help ensure our forces are prepared for the demands of 21st century conflict.

In September 2010, CNAS published An Indispensable Force: Investing in America’s National Guard and Reserves. The report concluded that despite commendable progress in recent years, the U.S. government still is not investing sufficiently in the policies, laws, and budgets required for the National Guard and Reserves to fulfill their current and future role in U.S. national security. In February 2010, CNAS released a report on military officer education. Titled Keeping the Edge: Revitalizing America's Military Officer Corps, the report provided recommendations for how the United States can keep its edge in the officer corps amidst an ever-increasing array of challenges.

In 2011, CNAS will undertake work on such vital topics as the future of the all-volunteer force, defense acquisition reform, military planning and budgeting, and the future of America’s “hard power.”

For other work related to U.S. Military Forces and Operations, see the CNAS projects on Military Wellness, Special Operations Forces, and Contracting in Conflicts.

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    Type of Publication: Report
    Date: 09/21/2010

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  • Download the full report (PDF)
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  • David Barno
    Lieutenant General David W. Barno, USA (Ret.)
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    General Barno, a highly decorated military officer with over 30 years of service, has served in a variety of command and staff positions in the United States and around the world, to include command at every level. He served many of his early years in special operations forces with Army Ranger battalions, to include combat in both the Grenada and Panama invasions. In 2003, he was selected to establish a new three-star operational headquarters in Afghanistan and take command of the 20,000 U.S. and Coalition Forces in Operation Enduring Freedom. For 19 months in this position, he was responsible for the overall military leadership of this complex political-military mission, devising a highly innovative counterinsurgency strategy in close partnership with the U.S. embassy and coalition allies.

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  • Nancy Berglass
    Non-Resident Senior Fellow

    Nancy Berglass is a Senior Non-Resident Fellow at CNAS, the Director of the Iraq Afghanistan Deployment Impact Fund, and Principal of Berglass Community Investment Consulting.

    Widely respected as among the nation’s leading strategists for the independent sector, Nancy Berglass has worked for over 25 years to address the needs of families, children, low-income communities, troops and veterans, women and other underserved populations through a variety of leadership positions in the philanthropic and nonprofit sectors.

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  • Richard Fontaine
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    Richard Fontaine is the President of the Center for a New American Security (CNAS). He served as a Senior Advisor and Senior Fellow at CNAS from 2009-2012.  He previously served as foreign policy advisor to Senator John McCain for more than five years.  He has also worked at the State Department, the National Security Council and on the staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

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  • Robert Kaplan
    Robert Kaplan
    Non-Resident Senior Fellow

    Robert D. Kaplan has been a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security since March 2008, and has been a foreign correspondent for The Atlantic for over a quarter-century. He is currently Chief Geopolitical Analyst at Stratfor. He is the author of Monsoon: The Indian Ocean and the Future of American Power, published by Random House in October, 2010, with the paperback to be released in September.

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  • Dr. David Kilcullen
    President and CEO, Caerus Associates

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  • Michele L. Malvesti
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  • John Nagl
    Dr. John A. Nagl
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    Dr. John Nagl is a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Center for a New American Security and the Minerva Research Fellow at the U.S. Naval Academy as part of the Department of Defense Minerva Initiative program.  He was previously the President of CNAS. He is also a member of the Defense Policy Board, a Visiting Professor in the War Studies Department at Kings College of London, a life member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Veterans of Foreign Wars and a member of the International Institute of Strategic Studies.  Dr.

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  • Dr. Michael O’Hanlon
    Director of Research and Senior Fellow, The Brookings Institution

    Michael O'Hanlon is a senior fellow in Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution, where he specializes in U.S. defense strategy, the use of military force, homeland security and American foreign policy. He is a visiting lecturer at Princeton University, and a member of the International Institute for Strategic Studies and the Council on Foreign Relations.

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  • Thomas E. Ricks
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    Thomas E. Ricks is a Senior Fellow at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS). Concurrently with his duties at CNAS, Mr. Ricks writes an online blog for ForeignPolicy.com called, “The Best Defense," for which he won the 2010 National Magazine Award as the best blog of the year, and serves as a contributing editor for Foreign Policy.  

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  • Travis Sharp
    Travis Sharp
    Non-Resident Fellow

    Travis Sharp is a Non-Resident Fellow at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS) and was previously the Bacevich Fellow. He is currently a Master's candidate at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Prior to joining CNAS, he served as Military Policy Analyst at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, where he started as a Herbert Scoville Jr. Peace Fellow.

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