In the 21st century, the security of nations will depend increasingly on the security of natural resources, or “natural security.” This report points to Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia, Mexico and Yemen as examples for how natural security challenges within those countries borders are directly linked to regional stability and U.S. security and foreign policy interests.
U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF) are currently experiencing their most extensive use and greatest transformation, yet are still not optimized for success. This report examines challenges facing our Special Operations Forces today, and presents recommendations on how best to utilize this invaluable corps of elite soldiers.
This report offers an assessment of the Obama Administration's public engagement strategy by analyzing the public engagement dimension of key foreign policy areas and in countries of strategic importance - including Iran, China, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
This report notes that America's counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan has focused more on waging war at the operational and tactical levels at the expense of the strategic and political levels and offers recommendations to design an effective political campaign.
Broadening Horizons is an edited volume featuring four chapters and a capstone piece that explores the dual pressures of climate change and energy on each U.S. military service and combatant command and offers a road ahead to improve the country's ability to promote national security in the face of a changing climate.
This report explores the gap between the science and policy communities and offers recommendations for how they can work together to ensure the United States can effectively plan for the national security implications of climate change.
In this working paper, CNAS Research Assistant Will Rogers synthesizes how America’s air forces are considering climate change, identifies the role energy concerns play in the services’ decision-making calculations and offers recommendations on how to better integrate energy security and climate change concerns into near- and long-term strategic planning.
In this working paper, CNAS Senior Military Fellow Commander Herbert E. Carmen, USN, CNAS Bacevich Fellow Christine Parthemore and CNAS Research Assistant Will Rogers focus on the six geographic combatant commands as a way to address the effects of climate change and related energy security challenges on U.S. national security interests in regions across the globe.
The Broadening Horizons capstone report, authored by CNAS Senior Military Fellow Commander Herbert E. Carmen, USN, CNAS Bacevich Fellow Christine Parthemore and CNAS Research Assistant Will Rogers, provides an overview of the implications of climate change for DOD, the military services and the combatant commands, and makes recommendations to help the United States better navigate the potential geopolitical implications of the changing climate.
