Throughout years of halting attempts to negotiate an end to the war in Afghanistan, none of the conflict parties articulated more than the barest outlines of envisioned outcomes of talks. In this report, the authors paint a detailed picture of a plausible final comprehensive peace agreement for Afghanistan. The report includes options for and analysis of realistic compromises, presented in the form of a peace agreement text.
The Army is currently reorienting from a focus on counterinsurgency operations to a focus on conventional combat operations, and this shift has highlighted the need to take a detailed look at the state of the field artillery. The authors of this report identify capability gaps in the field artillery and actions that the Army should consider taking from today to roughly 2030.
Discourse by governments, news media, and citizens flows freely over transboundary water resources and air quality between India and Pakistan. In this report, researchers assess the potential capacity of Indian hydroelectric projects along a major tributary of the Indus River to affect downstream flows in Pakistan. The authors also examine the influence of agricultural burning in Pakistan and India's Punjab regions on regional air pollution.
Testimony presented before the House Homeland Security Committee, Subcommittee on Transportation and Maritime Security on September 19, 2019.
The authors of this report examine cases from Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea to understand whether and how states use cyber operations to coerce other states or actors, and highlight the challenges of identifying cyber coercion. They also propose ways to develop a deeper understanding of cyber coercion and how to counter it.
The practitioners of hostile social manipulation employ social media, sophisticated forgeries, cyberbullying and harassment, distribution of rumors and conspiracy theories, and other tools to cause damage to their target state. This report represents an effort to better define and understand the challenge by focusing on the activities of the two leading authors of such techniques — Russia and China.
U.S. allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific have been broadening and deepening their defense ties with regional partners over the past two decades. This report highlights the extent to which these initiatives are a response to the perceived threat of a rising, assertive China; points out the importance of understanding the motivations involved in expanding regional security partnerships; and highlights key areas for building partner capacity.
Document submitted on August 19, 2019, as an addendum to testimony before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission on July 31, 2019.
