Atlantic Council blogs

Canada deploys ‘mostly’ unarmed jets to NATO air policing mission over Iceland

By Canada’s Department of National Defense

From Canada’s Department of National Defense:  A Royal Canadian Air Force detachment of six CF-18 Hornet jet fighters will patrol Iceland’s airspace from Keflavik Air Base during Operation Ignition in March and April of this year.

Putin orders surprise military exercises in Black Sea

By Reuters

From Reuters:  President Vladimir Putin ordered the launch of large-scale Russian military exercises in the Black Sea region on Thursday

A Visionary Reinvention of the Two-State Solution

By Anne-Marie Slaughter

Imagine a two-state solution in Israel and Palestine in which Palestinians would have the right of return; Israelis could settle wherever they could purchase land in the West Bank; and Jerusalem need not be divided. This is not a fanciful vision, but a creative and eminently sensible reinvention of 21st-century statehood. And President Barack Obama’s […]

Islamists, secular rebels battle in Syria over Nusra Front’s call for Islamic state

By David Enders, McClatchy

From David Enders, McClatchy:  Two Syrian rebel groups – one seeking an elected civil government, the other favoring the establishment of a religious state – are battling each other in the city of Tal Abyad

An Inconvenient or Irritating Truth: Applying Law to the New Face of Modern Warfare

By Jason Thelen

In war, there are rules. Some were written long ago in treaties. Others are found in binding customs written in volumes of commentary compiled over time. The point is that these rules can all be found in written form to cite and to reference. They can be used to describe who can be targeted in […]

Paradigms and National Security

By Derek Reveron

To make sense of our complex world, we rely on paradigms to offer insights to solve problems. After World War II, for example, the dominant paradigm was the Cold War, which envisioned a world divided between free and unfree or democratic-capitalist and authoritarian-socialist countries. The paradigm prevented global cooperation and miscalculations almost led to war. While […]

Obama signs 2013 budget bill, funds MEADS missile defense

By Roger Runningen & Brian Faler, Bloomberg

From Roger Runningen & Brian Faler, Bloomberg:  President Barack Obama signed into law a catchall government-funding bill that ends the 2013 budget fight and locks in $85 billion in spending cuts he opposes. With Obama’s signature yesterday, day-to-day operations of cabinet departments and federal agencies will continue without interruption through Sept. 30, the end of […]

Top News: Liberals, Islamists at Odds Over Controversial Protest Law

By Egypt Source

A new law governing protests, approved in principle by the Shura Council Tuesday, has sparked anger among the opposition’s political forces. Opponents, comprised mostly of liberal, secular and revolutionary youth groups, criticized the bill, saying it restricts Egyptians’ right to demonstrate peacefully. Meanwhile, the law’s supporters, who are mainly Islamist factions, said the legislation is […]

Syrian opposition leader: U.S. rebuff of Patriot request helps Assad

By Yara Bayoumy and William Maclean, Reuters

White House and NATO chief rule out using Patriot missiles to support Syrian rebels

By AFP

From AFP:  The White House said Tuesday that NATO would not provide Patriot missile batteries to protect rebel strongholds in Syria, following a request from opposition chief Ahmed Moaz al-Khatib.