Security & Defense

Opinion: Iran, US Finally Get to Yes in Landmark Nuclear Deal

By Barbara Slavin

There is much work to be done and much that can still go awry, but April 2, 2015 will go down in history as the day when the Islamic Republic of Iran and the United States finally got to yes. After 36 years of mutual demonization, proxy wars and occasional direct conflict, the two old […]

What Does Shay Assad Mean by “Fair Price”?

By James Hasik

Pentagon pricing policy should aim for long-term value, not an economically intractable concept. Shay Assad, the Pentagon’s director of pricing policy, has had over his tenure a tense relationship with industry. At a private meeting at the Aerospace Industries Association last week, and in an interview with Reuters this week, Assad insisted that his accountants haven’t been always and everywhere […]

Force Structure That’s Too Big to Fail?

By James Hasik

Against more challenging adversaries, temper enthusiasm for returns to scale. Ever since I was a midshipman—way back under a Navy Secretary named Lehman—pundits, analysts, and strategists have been wondering whether the US Navy’s supercarriers are too big. And so again in 2015. The new Ford-class ships are a few billion more expensive than their Nimitz predecessors, and Senate […]

General Wesley Clark: Exclusive Briefing from Ukraine’s Front Lines

Russian-backed separatists are planning a fresh offensive in eastern Ukraine that could come within a matter of months, retired Gen. Wesley Clark, a former NATO Supreme Allied Commander, warned at an Altantic Council forum on March 30, 2015. “What is happening now is preparations for a renewed offensive from the east,” and this could take […]