In this feature, Brookings senior fellow and terrorism expert Daniel Byman and deputy foreign policy editor Dana Stuster curate a weekly essay on foreign and military affairs of interest to national security legal practitioners and scholars. Although not specifically dealing with legal matters, the feature offers context and perspective to many of the debates that go on at the site regularly. Lawfare has always conceived of national security law broadly, because to practice it well, one needs to draw on a diversity of expertise in technical fields like communications technologies, robotics and economics. With The Foreign Policy Essay, Dan and Dana provide us with a window into the worlds of strategy, military operations, geopolitics, and whatever else grabs their interest on any given week.
Latest in Foreign Policy Essay
New innovations in biotechnology are driving rapid changes that will have far-reaching consequences. The United States and its partners need to be at the forefront of these advances.
Extremist groups like the New Mexico Civil Guard are benefitting from iterative recruitment in online and offline spaces that bridge ideologies.
International rivalries can draw powerful states into local political disputes—sometimes with disastrous consequences—but the United States and China can avoid the mistakes of the Cold War.
The new National Defense Strategy calls for working closely with partners and allies, but the convoluted and slow disclosure process makes cooperation difficult.
Despite setbacks on the battlefield, Russia's mercenaries will remain an important instrument of the Kremlin's foreign policy.
The growing prevalence of terrorist ideologies that organize and encourage attacks without formal organizational structures will require analysts and policymakers to rethink their definitions.
Across ideologies, women and children are playing more prominent roles in terrorist groups.
Russia's military mobilization and annexation of portions of Eastern Ukraine narrows the possible options for Ukraine and its partners.
The talks between the regional rivals have yielded little progress because of the countries' disparate goals and regional positions.
The protection that terrorist sanctuaries afford allow leaders to cement their ideologies and preferred tactics in their groups.