Security & Defense

Best of Friends: Why Reassuring European Allies is a Job for Special Forces

By Magnus Nordenman

US and European special forces have been incredibly busy over the last decade in global hot spots such as Iraq and Afghanistan. But as major counterinsurgency operations recede, there is still work for them to do, not least in Europe

New NATO Young Professionals Report

By Atlantic Council

ACT Young Professionals Day is an annual, solutions-oriented exercise hosted by Allied Command Transformation (ACT) alongside the NATO Transformation Seminar (NTS).

NATO’s Cybermen

By NATO

There are six men. All dressed in black like the ones in the famous movie. They have black cases too but they are not using their technology to erase your memory. Their name: NATO Rapid Reaction Team, or RRT.

Is this France’s Own Patriot Act?

By Ashish Kumar Sen

Controversial surveillance rules unlike the ‘knee-jerk’ US law passed after 9/11, says Atlantic Council’s Dungan Controversial surveillance rules passed May 5 by France’s lower house of Parliament are quite unlike the “knee-jerk” US Patriot Act that followed al-Qaeda’s terrorist attack on September 11, 2001, said Atlantic Council analyst Nicholas Dungan. Dungan, a Nonresident Senior Fellow […]

NATO Moves Command HQ to Romania for Military Exercise

By AP and Allied Joint Force Command Naples

From Alison Mutler, AP:  NATO will briefly move an allied joint force command headquarter to Romania as the alliance continues to hone its ability to react to Russia’s moves in Ukraine and other security challenges, a top commander said Tuesday.

Northern Mali’s critical moment

By Africa Center

Mali has largely fallen from international headlines after a 2013 French military intervention drove back the constellation of terror groups occupying the northern part of the country, but the security situation has again deteriorated to the point it poses an urgent threat to the whole of the country as well as the region. There are […]

Nations Around Baltic Sea Increasing Defense Spending

By Charles Duxbury, Christina Zander, and Juhana Rossi, Wall Street Journal

After Russia grabbed a piece of the Black Sea coast from Ukraine and ramped up its marine and air force exercises on and over the Baltic, the other eight countries with a piece of that sea’s shoreline have realized that this backwater isn’t as placid as it was.

NATO transformation seminar

NATO is confronting the most rapid negative change in its security environment since its founding, compelling Allies to refocus on collective defense in Europe and re-examine the relevance of NATO’s strategy. While this effort started in advance of NATO’s previous summit in Wales, the Alliance’s latest adaptation has only just begun. The crises of today […]

Commander of US Military in Europe Sees Signs of Russia Preparing Another Offensive

By Philip Breedlove, EUCOM

Compared to just one year ago, Europe faces a very different, and much more challenging security environment.one with significant, lasting implications for U.S. national security interests.