MILITARY POLICY
AP Photo
February 2, 2012
"War's Glass Ceiling"
Op-Ed, Boston Globe
By Juliette Kayyem, Lecturer in Public Policy
"Publicly, senior military and civilian leaders are expressing frustration with a policy that adheres to notions of physical aptitude or troop cohesion that were used to exclude African-Americans and gays in the past."
Photo by Martha Stewart
February 1, 2012
"Winning the War on War?"
News
“The departure of the last American troops from Iraq brings relief to a nation that has endured its most painful war since Vietnam...And it could very well be the last one,” wrote Steven Pinker and Joshua Goldstein in the New York Times last December. On Monday January 30th, the Belfer Center's Stephen Walt and Monica Duffy Toft joined Goldstein and Pinker at the JFK Jr. Forum and asked: "Is War on the Way Out?"
AP Photo
January 9, 2012
"Strategy on China: Keep It Vague"
Op-Ed, Boston Globe
By Juliette Kayyem, Lecturer in Public Policy
"With those kinds of leadership changes occurring in China, the most important move the United States can make now is to deepen its engagement throughout East Asia — including maintaining our troops and naval presence there — but to stay flexible and prepared to adjust to whatever may come next in China."
(AP Photo)
January 6, 2012
"New Defense Strategy Guidance: Hardly a Strategic Pivot"
Op-Ed, Power & Policy Blog
By Kevin Ryan, Director, Defense and Intelligence Project, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
"Don’t get me wrong – I am pleased that the executive branch and defense establishment have developed a fresh expression of our national defense goals and strategy from the top down, as it should be. But let’s stop calling this new guidance a 'strategic pivot' or a spectacular break from the past," writes Kevin Ryan, executive director for research at the Belfer Center.
Associated Press
December 9, 2011
"Our Best Foreign Policy President"
Op-Ed, Boston Globe
By Nicholas Burns, Professor of the Practice of Diplomacy and International Politics, Harvard Kennedy School
Nicholas Burns recounts one of the most important events in American history—the beginning of the end of the Cold War, 20 years ago this week—and pays tribute to President George H.W. Bush's notable foreign policy achievements during his presidency. As the Republican primaries begin, Burns encourages voters to look critically at the foreign policy credibility of their candidates and who is best prepared to lead us through the thickets of the most complex foreign policy landscape we have ever encountered.
Department of Defense
Winter 2011-2012
"Belfer Center Deepens Impact on Defense Policy in D.C."
Newsletter Article, Belfer Center Newsletter
The Belfer Center is keeping up its impressive track record of sending Center affiliates to take up senior positions in the federal government. This fall, two Center veterans were tapped for jobs that are among the most challenging in the Department of Defense. Ashton B. Carter was named deputy secretary of defense and Eric Rosenbach was appointed deputy assistant secretary of defense for cyber policy.
AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta
Winter 2011-2012
Q&A with Ashton B. Carter
Newsletter Article, Belfer Center Newsletter
Following the recent appointment of Ashton B. Carter as deputy secretary of defense, we asked Carter about the challenges and opportunities of his new position. Carter, an on-leave member of the Belfer Center Board of Directors, is a former director of the Belfer Center and was co-director of the Center’s Preventive Defense Project until leaving in 2009 to serve as under secretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics.
Ashton B. Carter, a member of the Belfer Center Board of Directors is a former director of the Belfer Center and was co-director of the Center’s Preventive Defense Project until leaving in 2009 to serve as under secretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics. Following his recent selection as deputy secretary of defense, we asked Carter about the challenges and opportunities of his new position.
AP Photo
October 30, 2011
"The Battle of Military Suicides"
Op-Ed, Boston Globe
By Juliette Kayyem, Lecturer in Public Policy
"There has always been the do-gooder answer — that this is what we owe to the men and women who have fought in Iraq and Afghanistan. But the suicide crisis is really about the future of our military. The shocking number of suicides in the all-volunteer force will make recruitment of the best talent vastly more difficult. Heartstrings aside, if service in an all-volunteer army comes to be associated with depression and misery, then solving the problem is as crucial for the next war as the ones now winding down."
AP Photo
Fall 2011
"India's Nuclear Odyssey: Implicit Umbrellas, Diplomatic Disappointments, and the Bomb"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 2, volume 36
After decades of flirting with nuclear weapons, India finally emerged as a nuclear power in the 1990s. New evidence suggests that India was able to hold off in part because it was able to secure protection through an alternate method: implicit “umbrellas” from superpowers. In the late 1970s, however, U.S. support for India waned as it began to improve its relations with Pakistan, and India lost its other major backer with the dissolution of the Soviet Union. By the late 1980s, India could no longer protect itself through diplomatic means, and acquisition of the bomb became an inevitable response to its security needs.
AP Photo
Fall 2011
"Veto Players, Nuclear Energy, and Nonproliferation: Domestic Institutional Barriers to a Japanese Bomb"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 2, volume 36
Although Japanese politicians have expressed interest in the bomb in the past, the country’s veto players make acquisition unlikely. Early research viewed proliferation exclusively as a response to security needs. Since the 1980s, most models have included domestic factors, but they have focused exclusively on a single actor whose influence can be negated if veto power is widely enough dispersed. Thus, despite Japan’s intimidating plutonium supply, and its persistence in building a complete fuel cycle, the country’s large and growing number of veto players suggests the continuation of a rigid nuclear weapons policy. As this analysis indicates, historical institutional analysis is crucial to understanding a state’s propensity for proliferation and should be considered alongside other contributing factors.
