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U.S. President Donald Trump shakes hands with National Security Advisor Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster on February 20. (Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images) In the next few days, the Trump administration is likely to release its first National Security Strategy (NSS) document. Even before the document is published, however, some grand strategy scholars have warned that the NSS […]

U.S. President Donald Trump with a proclaimation that the U.S. government will formally recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel on December 6, 2017. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) Last week, U.S. President Donald Trump officially recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, reversing nearly 70 years of bipartisan U.S. foreign policy. This move places the United […]Read More

U.S. President Donald Trump in a meeting with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Speaker of the House Paul Ryan at the White House on June 6. (Olivier Douliery-Pool/Getty Images) White House lawyer Ty Cobb has been attempting to keep the First Client in check by telling him that Robert Mueller’s investigation will soon be […]

Graffiti depicting U.S. President Donald Trump on the Israeli separation barrier between the West Bank town of Bethlehem and Jerusalem on Aug. 25. (Thomas Coex/AFP/Getty Images) We’re in trouble. The world, that is. Or at least those who pray for peace in Jerusalem and in the Holy Land. Some track the current conflict back 100 […]Read More

The nuclear football. (Wikimedia Commons) By Thomas KeaneyBest Defense guest columnist The recent Senate Foreign Relations Committee meeting on the authority to employ nuclear weapons brought some clarity concerning the authority and limits of employing nuclear weapons while introducing some unsettling possibilities. The occasion prompting the hearing was anything but a routine one. President Trump’s […]

Best Defense A brief list of recent military wrongdoing. A brown bear. (Flickr) The CO of a Coast Guard air station in Alaska was fined for shooting a brown bear. He says it was an accident. But then so did Oscar Pistorius. Commander of the Air Force’s Thunderbirds outfit got the big boot. Confidence was […]

Michael Flynn after his plea hearing at the Prettyman Federal Courthouse on December 1, 2017 in Washington, DC. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) One week after former national security advisor Michael Flynn’s plea deal, it still is not all that clear what it means. Close observers of special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into Russian meddling in the […]Read More

Former U.S. President Barack Obama talks with then-Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and then-Deputy Chief of Staff Jake Sullivan while attending the U.S.-ASEAN summit in Phnom Penh, Cambodia on Nov. 20, 2012. (Wikimedia Commons) Over the past few weeks, hundreds of my female colleagues in the national security community have stepped forward to describe a persistent and horrifying pattern […]Read More

This episode of Rational Security on The E.R., our friends at Lawfare discuss Mueller’s investigation. Michael Flynn is cooperating with Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation, and President Trump raises questions about whether he sought to obstruct justice. Deutsche Bank has been told to hand over information about Trump-related finances. And the U.S. national security advisor tries […]Read More

Mobile intercontinental ballistic missile launchers during a rehearsal of the Victory Day Parade in Moscow on May 5, 2014. (Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP/Getty Images) Fueled by increasing concern in Washington that Russia is violating a 30-year-old missile treaty, the United States is considering developing a new ground-launched missile capable of carrying conventional or nuclear warheads. The Intermediate-Range […]

President Donald Trump delivers a statement on Jerusalem from the Diplomatic Reception Room of the White House on Dec. 6. (Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images) Just last week, Palestinian diplomats were cautiously optimistic that U.S. President Donald Trump was on a path that could deliver what the president termed the “ultimate deal” — a negotiated solution to […]Read More

Yemeni tribesmen supporting forces loyal to Saudi-backed President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi, launch a rocket in the Nehm region of Yemen, Feb. 4, 2016. (Abdullah al-Qadry/AFP/Getty Images) On Nov. 4, Yemen’s tribal insurgents launched a short-range ballistic missile from a remote valley in the northwestern governorate of Amran over 1,000 miles to the outskirts of Saudi […]Read More