New Atlanticist

Sharp insights and bold ideas from across the Council

From climate change to the China challenge and the contest between democracy and dictatorship, the New Atlanticist is where top experts and policymakers at the Atlantic Council and beyond offer exclusive insight on the most pressing global challenges—and the US role in addressing them alongside allies and partners.

The Council’s flagship section features big ideas, groundbreaking research, lightning-fast expert reactions, in-depth analyses, and thought-provoking commentary to shape public policy.

Davos 2010: No Agreement on Bank Regulation

New Atlanticist
Sep 4, 2025

Dispatches from Damascus: The state of Syria’s postwar transition nine months after Assad’s fall

On a recent trip to the Syrian capital, Atlantic Council experts took note of how far the country has come since the Assad regime’s fall and what still needs to happen to secure peace and prosperity.

New Atlanticist
Aug 29, 2025

Twenty questions (and expert answers) about the negotiations to end Russia’s war in Ukraine

By
Atlantic Council experts

August saw a flurry of diplomatic activity to end Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. As September nears, Atlantic Council experts share their insights on what to expect next.

Conflict
Peacekeeping and Peacebuilding

New Atlanticist
Aug 28, 2025

Germany wants to double its defense spending. Where should the money go?

By
Atlantic Council experts

After decades of Berlin underinvesting in its defense, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has plans to transform the Bundeswehr into Europe’s strongest military.

Defense Policy
Europe & Eurasia

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Experts React

Dive deep into developing stories, guided by continually updated expert analysis that leaves you better informed about the most pressing global issues behind the headlines.

Markup

Our experts decipher and annotate major speeches and policy documents to break down big ideas and lay them out in plain language.

New Atlanticist

Jan 28, 2010

Davos 2010: No Agreement on Bank Regulation

By James Joyner

French president Nicolas Sarkozy opened up the World Economic Forum with a call for tighter regulation of business, including executive pay limits and new accounting rules.

New Atlanticist

Jan 28, 2010

India and Pakistan are Nuclear States—Let’s Make it Official

By Luv Puri

In May 1998, surprise nuclear tests by India and Pakistan transformed regional strategic calculations and added a dangerous new dimension to tensions between the two. According to Taylor Branch, writing in The Clinton Tapes: Wrestling History with the President, Indian officials who spoke with Bill Clinton were fully aware of the potential devastation a clash […]

New Atlanticist

Jan 28, 2010

Assessing the Yemen Strikes in the Short-Term and Long-Term

By Bernard Finel

I keep harping on our lack of strategic thinking in the United States. I know many people consider this an academic exercise, as in (paraphrasing): “Ivory toward academic Bernard Finel keeps suggesting we consider strategy explicitly, but the reality is that we have a complex threat environment and receive plenty of guidance from senior leaders […]

Yemen

New Atlanticist

Jan 27, 2010

Congress Viewed from Across the Pond

By James Joyner

"Viewed from across the pond, the U.S. Congress seems at best incompetent and at worst a joke," Alex Massie argues. And that perception is not without consequence.

New Atlanticist

Jan 27, 2010

Davos 2010: New Year, Same Mission (Saving the World)

By James Joyner

The 40th World Economic Forum kicked off in Davos today, with a modest agenda to "Improve the State of the World: Rethink, Redesign, Rebuild." As Spiegel‘s Anne Seith notes, Klaus Schwab, the forum’s German founder, has always been decidedly ambitious and has by all accounts been successful as a gathering (although not so much at […]

New Atlanticist

Jan 27, 2010

Governance in the U.S. and UK

By Harlan Ullman

One of the many dilemmas in politics is finding the balance between winning elections and providing good governance.

United Kingdom

New Atlanticist

Jan 26, 2010

Transnistria Remains the Only Really “Frozen” Conflict

By Vladimir Socor

in 2008, Russia “unfroze” the conflicts in Abkhazia and South Ossetia through outright war and occupation of these Georgian territories. In the latter part of 2009, the United States and Russia each accelerated negotiations on the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict, with Washington and Moscow each pressing for some kind of quick results.

New Atlanticist

Jan 26, 2010

America’s Decline, Europe’s Anxiety

By James Joyner

Futurist Joel Kotkin is swimming against the recent American decline tide in forecasting a world where China will still trail the United States as an economic power in 2050. Then again, as Matthew Yglesias points out, Kotkin thinks previous predictions of European preeminence proved "staggeringly off the mark," even though the combined EU economy is […]

New Atlanticist

Jan 25, 2010

Bombing Al Qaeda

By Don Snow

The contest against Al Qaeda (the “war on terror”) has moved to Yemen, where a franchise of the original organization, Al Qaeda on the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has set up shop and is organizing and dispatching terrorist missions against the United States (Ft. Hood, the Christmas underwear bomber) and apparently Great Britain

New Atlanticist

Jan 25, 2010

Bangladesh’s India Charm Offensive

By Zafar Sobhan

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