Articles

The fall of Aleppo is a human catastrophe. It’s also a demonstration of the perils of choosing the middle course in a military conflict. Sometimes it’s possible to talk and fight at the same time. But in Syria, the U.S. decision to pursue a dual-track, halfway approach made the mayhem worse.

Alliances between local combatants and neighboring rulers played a crucial role in the Congo Wars. Yet the transnational dimensions of the conflicts remain understudied. Case studies reveal that the rulers of Angola, Rwanda, Sudan, Uganda, and Zimbabwe intervened in Congo to secure their own political survival. They forged alliances to thwart domestic rebels supported by foreign rulers or to gain access to resources that could ensure the loyalty of domestic elites.

The defining question about global order for this generation is whether China and the United States can escape Thucydides’s Trap. The Greek historian’s metaphor reminds us of the attendant dangers when a rising power rivals a ruling power—as Athens challenged Sparta in ancient Greece, or as Germany did Britain a century ago. Most such contests have ended badly, often for both nations, a team of mine at the Harvard Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs has concluded after analyzing the historical record. In 12 of 16 cases over the past 500 years, the result was war. When the parties avoided war, it required huge, painful adjustments in attitudes and actions on the part not just of the challenger but also the challenged.

Joel Brenner responds to Jon R. Lindsay's winter 2014/15 International Security article, "The Impact of China on Cybersecurity: Fiction and Friction."

Jon R. Lindsay responds to Lucas Kello's fall 2013 International Security article, "The Meaning of the Cyber Revolution: Perils to Theory and Statecraft."

Cyberwar has been described as a revolution in military affairs capable of overturning the prevailing world order. By itself, however, cyberwar can achieve neither conquest nor, in most cases, coercion. Conflict over the internet is much more likely to serve as an adjunct to, rather than a substitute for, existing modes of terrestrial force, and to augment the advantages of status quo powers rather than threatening existing political hierarchies.

While decisionmakers warn about the cyber threat constantly, there is little systematic analysis of the issue from an international security studies perspective. Cyberweapons are expanding the range of possible harm between the concepts of war and peace, and give rise to enormous defense complications and dangers to strategic stability. It is detrimental to the intellectual progress and policy relevance of the security studies field to continue to avoid the cyber revolution's central questions.

Several years of economic growth before the 2008-09 economic crisis allowed the Russian government to steadily increase its defense expenditures, extending their conventional forces' reach, while Russia's foreign policy ambitions also grew in scope and scale.  Just as important as the boom-driven rise in defense spending was the fact that, as the economy grew, so did Russian companies and individuals' activities abroad, including both shipping and fishing. Thanks to the expansion of the media industry's reach, and the globalization of news in general, the Russian public's awareness of piracy incidents in general, and particularly those involving Russian citizens, grew as well.

Should foreign peacekeepers be deployed to Kenya? In spite of the involvement of high-profile facilitators, like former U.N. secretary-general Kofi Annan, killings are continuing in what was once one of Africa's most stable countries.

Article in The Nonproliferation Review