Thomas S. Szayna

The EU Can't Treat Ukrainian Refugees Like Short-Term Visitors

Although EU countries, communities, and citizens have been very welcoming to Ukrainian refugees, it is not enough to treat them as short-term visitors, meet their immediate humanitarian needs, and let them wait out the war. By educating and employing them instead, EU countries can enrich their own communities and support Ukraine.

Confederate Statues Symbolize Role of Racism in America

Monuments are public art and symbols important to those who hold power. The renewed debate about monuments to historical figures associated with the Confederacy is part of the larger debate about the role of racism in the United States and the treatment of African Americans by institutions.

First, Manage Security Threats to Machine Learning

Deception is as old as warfare itself. Until now, the targets of deception operations have been humans. But the introduction of machine learning and artificial intelligence opens up a whole new world of opportunities to deceive by targeting machines.

Report

Assessing, Monitoring, and Evaluating Army Security Cooperation: A Framework for Implementation

To help the Army increase the effectiveness of its security cooperation activities, this report examines when Army security cooperation can have the greatest impact, and how the Army should assess, monitor, and evaluate security cooperation.

Report

U.S. Presence and the Incidence of Conflict

Empirically assesses how U.S. military presence -- in particular, U.S. troop presence and military assistance -- is associated with the interstate and intrastate conflict behavior of states and nonstate actors.

Report

Supporting Persistent and Networked Special Operations Forces (SOF) Operations: Insights from Forward-Deployed SOF Personnel

RAND Corporation researchers identified three key operational challenges that forward-deployed personnel have encountered and then assessed the extent to which persistent, networked, and distributed operations can mitigate these challenges.

Report

Conflict Trends and Conflict Drivers: An Empirical Assessment of Historical Conflict Patterns and Future Conflict Projections

Based on conflict projections through 2040, this report concludes that despite the generally declining incidence of armed conflict, the Army must prepare for conventional wars against other states as well as irregular warfare against nonstate actors.

Report

A More Peaceful World? Regional Conflict Trends and U.S. Defense Planning

This report analyzes trends in violent conflict and their implications for defense planning. It presents models estimating levels of conflict to 2040 under different scenarios and suggests early warning indicators of potential increases in conflict.

Report

Understanding Conflict Trends: A Review of the Social Science Literature on the Causes of Conflict

This report explores, through an extensive literature review, whether the extreme rarity of interstate war and reduced incidence of intrastate war represent permanent shifts in world politics or are a temporary aberration.

Report

What Are the Trends in Armed Conflicts, and What Do They Mean for U.S. Defense Policy?

This report assesses trends in armed conflict, the incidence of which has declined in recent decades. Key political, economic, and strategic factors, including the deterrent effect of the U.S. military, suggest this decline is likely to continue.

Report

The Global Landpower Network: Recommendations for Strengthening Army Engagement

The U.S. Army's global landpower network concept integrates, sustains, and advances the Army's efforts to meet U.S. national security guidance emphasizing the importance of working closely with partner nations to achieve U.S. strategic objectives.

Report

Assessing the Value of Regionally Aligned Forces in Army Security Cooperation: An Overview

This report highlights recent RAND Arroyo Center research on the value of the Army's regionally aligned forces to U.S. security cooperation activities, particularly those conducted in Africa.

Report

European Relations with Russia: Threat Perceptions, Responses, and Strategies in the Wake of the Ukrainian Crisis

This report analyzes how Europeans perceive the Russian threat following the 2014 Ukraine crisis, how European states have responded to Russia's behavior, and how European officials see the future of Russo-European relations.

Report

Russia and the West After the Ukrainian Crisis: European Vulnerabilities to Russian Pressures

Given Russia's annexation of Crimea and aggression in Ukraine, Europe must reassess the regional security environment. This report analyzes the vulnerability of European states to possible forms of Russian influence, pressure, and intimidation.

Report

Considerations for Integrating Women into Closed Occupations in U.S. Special Operations Forces

This report assesses challenges for unit cohesion from integrating women into special operations forces and provides analytical support for validating occupational standards for positions controlled by U.S. Special Operations Command.

Report

Army Global Basing Posture: An Analytic Framework for Maximizing Responsiveness and Effectiveness

This report develops a methodology and a framework for global Army positioning and uses that framework to assess U.S. Army forward stationing from a perspective of maximum responsiveness and effectiveness and identifies potential improvements.

Report

Authorities and Options for Funding USSOCOM Operations

This report examines mechanisms, sources, and inter-Service agreements for funding special operations forces (SOF) operations and provides recommendations to reduce the frequency and duration of disputes over funding responsibilities for SOF.

Report

Assessing Security Cooperation as a Preventive Tool

Based on an analysis of security cooperation (SC) data and state fragility scores for 107 countries in 1991-2008, the report describes the correlation between provision of SC by the United States and a reduction in partner state fragility.

Report

Developing and Assessing Options for the Global SOF Network

RAND researchers developed implementation options for U.S. Special Operations Command's Global SOF Network vision, which calls for a new, distributed overseas posture for Special Operations Forces (SOF) as a way to address threats.

Research Brief

Enhancing Civilian Agency Participation in Stability Operations

Examines the question of how the Army can assist in making key civilian agencies more capable partners to the Army in the planning and execution of stability, security, transition, and reconstruction (SSTR) operations.

Research Brief

Addressing Commanders' Needs for Information on "Soft" Factors

Describes a framework for thinking about commanders' critical information needs in countersurgency operations and offers practical ways for commanders to integrate influence activities into combined arms planning and assessment.

Periodical

RAND Review: Vol. 33, No. 3, Winter 2009-2010

Features focus on stabilization missions, grade retention, health financing, and RAND's president; other items discuss the European Union, sodium, health insurance, retail medical clinics, energy efficiency, disaster recovery, and alcohol pricing.

Report

Integrating Civilian Agencies in Stability Operations

Examines the question of how the Army can assist in making key civilian agencies more capable partners to the Army in the planning and execution of stability, security, transition, and reconstruction (SSTR) operations.

Report

Assessing Irregular Warfare: A Framework for Intelligence Analysis

Provides an analytic framework and procedure for the intelligence analysis of irregular warfare (IW) environments that can serve as the basis for a subsequent IW intelligence analysis curriculum development effort.

Report

Stabilization and Reconstruction Staffing: Developing U.S. Civilian Personnel Capabilities

Presents a framework for improving U.S. civilian personnel and staffing programs for stability and reconstruction operations.

Report

Preparing the Army for Stability Operations: Doctrinal and Interagency Issues

The monograph discusses ways that the U.S. Army can adapt to recent government directives to revamp the way that the armed forces plan, prepare for, and execute Stabilization, Security, Transition, and Reconstruction operations.

Report

The Civil-Military Gap in the United States: Does It Exist, Why, and Does It Matter?

Addresses the potential for a divergence in views among civilian and military elites (sometimes referred to as the civil-military gap) to undermine military effectiveness.

Report

U.S. Army Security Cooperation: Toward Improved Planning and Management

Discusses the Army’s current process for planning and resourcing its security cooperation activities and explores avenues for improvement.

Report

Faultlines of Conflict in Central Asia and the South Caucasus: Implications for the U.S. Army

Considers key factors underlying the likelihood of conflict in Central Asia and South Caucasus, assessing their implications for regional security and for U.S. interests and potential involvement over the next 10 to 15 years.

Testimony

The Future of NATO and Enlargement

Testimony for the Subcommittee on Europe of the Committee on International Relations, United States House of Representatives on April 17, 2002.

Report

The Impact of NATO Membership in the Czech Republic: Changing Czech Views of Security, Military & Defence

The Impact of NATO Membership in the Czech Republic: Changing Czech Views of Security, Military & Defence

Research Brief

Improving the Quality of DoD's Civilian Workforce: Guidance for the Office of the Chancellor for Education and Professional Development

Among the recommendations is that the Chancellor's office focus on becoming the DoD educational information center in the near term while seeking, over the medium term, to develop a role in the program approval process.

Report

The Emergence of Peer Competitors: A Framework for Analysis

This report addresses the issue by developing a conceptual framework of how a proto-peer (meaning a state that is not yet a peer but has the potential to become one) might interact with the hegemon (the dominant global power).

Report

Improving Army Planning for Future Multinational Coalition Operations

The Army currently lacks effective and appropriate processes to plan for enhanced multinational force compatibility (MFC). The authors address this problem by focusing recommendations on two primary issues.

Report

Strategic and Performance Planning for the Office of the Chancellor for Education and Professional Development in the Department of Defense

Examines several approaches to strategic planning for the DoD Office of the Chancellor for Education and Professional Development.

Report

NATO Enlargement, 2000-2015: Determinants and Implications for Defense Planning and Shaping

This report develops and applies an analytical framework for thinking about the determinants of future NATO enlargement, the specific defense challenges they pose, and shaping policies that might aid in addressing these challenges.

Research Brief

NATO Enlargement 2000–2015: Implications for Defense Planning

The study provides an analytical framework for thinking about the determinants of future enlargement, the defense challenges posed by the integration of new members, and the strategies needed to respond.

Report

Identifying Potential Ethnic Conflict: Application of a Process Model

Intrastate communitarian strife, often dubbed ethnic conflict, has gained much attention in the aftermath of the Cold War. This report outlines a model for anticipating the occurrence of communitarian and ethnic conflict.

Journal Article

Slovakia: Trying to Catch Up with Visegrad

The lengthy Meciar period let Slovakia fall behind other Visegrad countries in the pace of Euro-Atlantic institutional integration.

Journal Article

The Czech Republic: A Small Contributor or a Free Rider?

Strengths and liabilities that accompany the 1999 addition of the Czech Republic to the ranks of the 16-member North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

Journal Article

NATO Enlargement and the Future of U.S.-European Security Relations

Journal Article

Civil-military Relations in the Czech and Slovak Republics

The Czech case represents a situation in which the military retains only a minor role in domestic politics.

Report

Cuba and Lessons From Other Communist Transitions: A Workshop Report

Cuba and Lessons From Other Communist Transitions: A Workshop Report

Report

Anticipating Ethnic Conflict

This report provides a practical tool -- a guidebook and a methodology to follow -- to help intelligence analysts determine the long-term potential for communitarian and ethnic conflict.

Report

Assessing armed forces' deficiencies for peace operations : a methodology

Assessing armed forces' deficiencies for peace operations : a methodology

Report

The extreme-right political movements in post-communist Central Europe

The extreme-right political movements in post-communist Central Europe

Report

NATO's Metamorphosis and Central European Politics: Effects of Alliance Transformation

Focuses on the effects of NATO's decision to enlarge on several states and populations invited to join or that had wanted to join but were not invited at the Madrid summit: Poland, The Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovenia, and Romania.

Report

Defense conversion in East Europe

Defense conversion in East Europe

Report

East European Military Reform After the Cold War: Implications for the United States

The authors focus on the process of military reform in Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Slovakia, examining how the process of overcoming the Soviet legacy to the militaries of the six countries has unfolded.

Report

German and Polish Views of the Partnership for Peace

The Partnership for Peace (PfP) program can be seen as a lens for examining the larger security policy debates in Poland and Germany.

Report

Intervention in Intrastate Conflict: Implications for the Army in the Post-Cold War Era

With the end of the Cold War, the nature of conflict within states has turned in the direction of ethnic, nationalist, and separatist struggles.

Report

Intervention in Intrastate Conflict: Implications for the Army in the Post-Cold War Era: Supplemental Materials

This report is the supplemental volume to the main report of the study, MR-554/1-A. The bulk of it is devoted to describing six speculative "case studies," drawn from a global survey of actual and potential flashpoints, that describe possible U.S. interventions in intrastate conflict that would involve the Army.

Report

Ethnic Conflict in Central Europe and the Balkans: A Framework and U.S. Policy Options

This report provides an analytical framework for thinking about the potential for militarized ethnic conflict in the central part of Europe and the Balkans.

Draft

The rise of the extreme right in post-communist Central Europe

The rise of the extreme right in post-communist Central Europe

Report

The Military in a Postcommunist Czechoslovakia

The Czechoslovak military has become a genuinely nonpartisan institution that operates on the basis of the democratic principles governing the state. This has been the main achievement since the political changes in 1989.

Report

Civil-Military Relations and National Security Thinking in Czechoslovakia: A Conference Report

Summarizes the results of a workshop entitled "Civil-Military Relations and the Development of National Security Policy in the United States and Czech and Slovak Federal Republic," held in Prague on May 5-7, 1991.

Report

The Ethnic Factor in the Soviet Armed Forces: The Muslim Dimension

Open ethnic conflict has swept the entire Soviet Union during the last few years. The Muslims already have had a powerful negative impact on the efficiency of the Soviet military.

Report

The Military in a Postcommunist Poland

Examines the evolution of the Polish armed forces since the political changes of mid-1989 in Poland.

Report

Polish National Security Thinking in a Changing Europe: A Conference Report

Analyzes the discussions between Polish and U.S. security experts during a conference on The Military and National Security Policy, held in Warsaw, Poland, June 11-13, 1990.

Report

Polish Foreign Policy under a Non-Communist Government: Prospects and Problems

Analyzes Polish foreign policy directions following the establishment of a government led by non-Communists.