AI Policy Lab
AI progress is fast outpacing policy. The opportunities and challenges of the AI age demand bold new ideas for U.S. national security that meet the moment. The CNAS AI Policy Lab fuses in-depth AI and national security expertise to produce cutting-edge, technically informed policy analysis. The United States and its allies must harness the benefits, manage the risks, and ensure democracies lead in this era-defining technology.
The AI Policy Lab integrates CNAS’s technology, defense, regional, and economic security expertise to address how AI is reshaping every dimension of national power and geopolitical competition. The Lab will serve as a hub for curated workshops, discussions, partnerships, and other convenings to bring industry, researchers, and the national security community to develop policy solutions. By bridging the divide between innovators and national security policymakers, the Lab will ensure that policy can match the unprecedented pace of technological innovation, harnessing the transformative power of AI while managing risks.
RESEARCH
Reports
The AGI Moment
Introduction The age of AI is upon us. What that means is not yet clear. As general-purpose AI capabilities continue to march toward human-level performance across a range of ...
Reports
Who Will Make Money on AI?
The private sector is playing a leading role in advancing the frontier of artificial intelligence (AI). As a result, commercial incentives are likely to have a significant imp...
Reports
Sovereign Agents
Executive Summary In summer 2026, OpenAI, Anthropic, Google DeepMind, and Meta each disclosed that their AI agents had escaped containment during cybersecurity task evaluation...
Reports
Adversarial Distillation
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) views artificial intelligence (AI) as central to strategic competition with the United States and is pursuing every means to strengthen its A...
Interactive
Sovereign AI Index
As the United States and China extend their AI leads, countries across the globe fear being left behind. Many have embraced “sovereign AI” as the solution....
Reports
Behind the Front Line
This report considers the near-term opportunities that exist for integrating agentic artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities across the Department of War. While integration ...
CNAS Insights
CNAS Insights | A Closing Door on Open Weights? Implications for AI Sovereignty
Earlier this month, Beijing announced draft export controls that signaled a potential shift in its longtime embrace of open-weight models. Foreign capitals and corporations sh...
Reports
Invested Allies
The United States is seeking to strengthen its domestic capabilities and supply chain resilience in a number of sectors critical for its economic security, including semicondu...
CNAS Insights
CNAS Insights | U.S.-China AI Agreements Need Verification, Not Trust
The upcoming Trump-Xi summit is likely to disappoint the leaders of top AI labs that have recently called for urgent, coordinated pacing of frontier AI progress. While agreeme...
Research Team
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Paul Scharre
Executive Vice President
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Vivek Chilukuri
Senior Fellow and Director, Technology and National Security Program
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Emily Kilcrease
Senior Fellow and Director, Energy, Economics and Security Program
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Dr. Stacie Pettyjohn
Senior Fellow and Director, Defense Program, CNAS
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Geoffrey Gertz
Senior Fellow, Energy, Economics & Security Program
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Daniel Remler
Senior Fellow, Technology and National Security Program
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Josh Wallin
Fellow, Defense Program
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Maria Dooling
Associate Fellow, AI Security and Stability
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Caleb Withers
AI Policy Researcher, Technology and National Security Program
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Ben Hayum
AI Policy Researcher, Technology and National Security Program
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Michelle Nie Duncan
Visiting Fellow, Technology and National Security Program
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Elika Somani
Fellow, Technology and National Security Program
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Valeria Allende
Executive Assistant and Deputy Director for NextGen Fellowship
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Pablo Chavez
Adjunct Senior Fellow, Technology and National Security
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Markus Anderljung
Adjunct Fellow, Technology and National Security Program
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Janet Egan
Adjunct Senior Fellow, Technology and National Security Program
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Tim Fist
Senior Adjunct Fellow, Technology and National Security Program
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Shana Mansbach
Adjunct Senior Fellow, Technology and National Security Program
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Dr. Keegan McBride
Adjunct Senior Fellow, Lecturer in AI, Government, and Policy, Oxford Internet Institute
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Chris Painter
Adjunct Senior Fellow, Technology and National Security Program
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Dr. Lynne E. Parker
Adjunct Senior Fellow, Technology and National Security Program, Associate Vice Chancellor, University of Tennessee and Director of the AI Tennessee Initiative
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James Sanders
Adjunct Associate Fellow, Technology and National Security Program
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Ruby Scanlon
Adjunct Associate Fellow, Technology and National Security Program
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Jordan Schneider
Adjunct Fellow, Technology and National Security Program
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Michael Sellitto
Adjunct Senior Fellow, Technology & National Security Program, Head of Global Affairs, Anthropic
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John (Jack) N.T. Shanahan
Adjunct Senior Fellow, Technology and National Security Program
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