Scowcroft Center Commentary, Analysis, & Reports

Explore the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security’s latest insights, commentary, articles, media hits, and in-depth reports

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New Atlanticist

May 20, 2011

NATO and the EU: Centrifugal Forces and Fragmentation?

By Ioan Mircea Pascu

Even before the adoption of the New Strategic Concept and the Lisbon Summit, one of the major concerns of the new allies, namely us from East-Central Europe, was the necessity that NATO retains the capacity to honour its fundamental obligation to guarantee the security of its members. That was so because, on the one hand, […]

European Union International Organizations

New Atlanticist

May 17, 2011

Locating the Sources of Extremism in Pakistan

By Luv Puri

In 2006, a friend of mine took me to Abbottabad, which falls on the Karakorran highway, and introduced it as a city of oranges while driving from Islamabad to earthquake impacted areas of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Muzaffarabad district of Pakistan-administered Jammu and Kashmir. Abbottabad, which was the final abode of  the world’s most wanted man, […]

New Atlanticist

May 16, 2011

Raging at Rawalpindi

By Shuja Nawaz

The United States has long complained that Pakistan’s military and intelligence services are playing a double game when it comes to terrorism and extremism: publicly promising cooperation-and indeed delivering some-while privately supporting America’s enemies. They point to Pakistan’s apparent reluctance to take on groups like the Haqqaani network, a Taliban affiliate that launches attacks on […]

New Atlanticist

May 13, 2011

The Perfect Storm in Af-Pak

By Shuja Nawaz

With the killing of Osama bin Laden, attention has shifted to the endgame in Afghanistan. But a persistent problem remains inside Pakistan: the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), or Pakistani Taliban. This homegrown terrorist organization swore war against the state when the army was sent into the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) bordering Afghanistan. For the past […]

NATOSource

May 12, 2011

The Lawfulness of Killing Bin Laden

By Robert Bracknell, the New Atlanticist

From Robert Bracknell, the New Atlanticist:  Killing bin Ladin was not an extrajudicial execution, a murder, or a war crime.  It was a combat engagement lawful under U.S. and international legal authority – full stop.

United States and Canada

New Atlanticist

May 12, 2011

The Lawfulness of Killing Bin Laden

By Robert Bracknell

Much has been made of the recent revelations that Osama bin Laden was unarmed at the moment he was killed by U.S. special operations forces in close quarters battle.  Let us put this issue to rest with dispatch, once and for all:  Killing bin Ladin was not an extrajudicial execution, a murder, or a war […]

New Atlanticist

May 9, 2011

Nuking NATO

By Julian Lindley-French

Tallinn, Estonia. Sitting here on the banks of the serene Baltic in a beautiful city founded by eighth century Danish knights it is difficult to imagine the tsunamis of violent history that have washed over this place. And yet, for the past two days I have been discussing a seismic shift in NATO’s nuclear reality […]

Event Recap

May 3, 2011

Atlantic Council Launches Brent Scowcroft Center and Rafik Hariri Center

By Jason Harmala

The Atlantic Council announced two ambitious new initiatives: the Brent Scowcroft Center on International Security and the Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East.

New Atlanticist

May 3, 2011

The Pakistan Dilemma

By Shuja Nawaz

 U.S. President Barack Obama’s announcement yesterday about Osama bin Laden’s death in Abbottabad, Pakistan raises questions about the health of the U.S.-Pakistani relationship. Pakistan seems to have helped the United States track down bin Laden’s lair, as Obama acknowledged. But it is unclear whether Pakistan was involved in planning the mission that brought U.S. Special […]

New Atlanticist

May 3, 2011

Is Britain a Pocket Superpower or Super-Belgium?

By Julian Lindley-French

Oh no, not again! The BBC’s Robert Peston has discovered that the two currently under construction and now infamous British aircraft carriers, HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales will cost more than originally envisaged. One outlier estimate has the cost as high as £10bn, rather than the £3.9bn budgeted for. This is apparently […]

United Kingdom

New Atlanticist

May 2, 2011

After Bin Laden: The Future of the US-Pakistan Relationship

By Shuja Nawaz

"Over the years, I’ve repeatedly made clear that we would take action within Pakistan if we knew where bin Laden was. That is what we’ve done. But it’s important to note that our counterterrorism cooperation with Pakistan helped lead us to bin Laden and the compound where he was hiding. Indeed, bin Laden had declared […]

New Atlanticist

Apr 29, 2011

A European Perspective on NATO in Libya

By Jason Harmala

The conflict in Libya is NATO’s first war without America in the lead. What is the reaction in Europe? The Dutch just announced a drastic cut in their defense budget. How are they reacting to the Libyan campaign? Will there be European boots on the ground in Libya?In the latest installment of the New Atlanticist […]

New Atlanticist

Apr 28, 2011

Meet the New NATO

By Jorge Benitez

Last November, President Barack Obama wrote that NATO would “transform itself” at the Lisbon Summit through “a new Strategic Concept that recognizes the capabilities and partners we need to meet the new threats of the 21st century.” 

New Atlanticist

Apr 28, 2011

Learning from Afghan History

By Derek Reveron

Today marks Victory Day in Afghanistan, the anniversary of the Mujahedeen overthrow of the Afghan socialist government in 1992. While a cause for celebration in Afghanistan, the subsequent years were marked by civil war, Taliban consolidation, and eventual intervention by the United States in 2001.

New Atlanticist

Apr 22, 2011

Chinese Takeaway

By Arnaud de Borchgrave

While World Bank President Robert Zoellick warns that the world is "one shock away from a full-blown crisis," China has broken ground and taken over the economic future of a country whose nearest island to the U.S. mainland is Bimini, only 50 miles away. The Nassau Guardian editorialized: "The Bahamas has fallen fully into the […]

New Atlanticist

Apr 18, 2011

The Dying Peace Constituency

By Mehreen Zahra-Malik

“Unless it starts to behave, why should India not treat Pakistan like the errant child that it is and simply ignore it?” thundered a journalist from The Hindu. “You can’t ignore it even if you tried,” a Pakistani security analyst said in challenge. “I can tell you from my experience as a parent that ignoring […]

New Atlanticist

Apr 14, 2011

Operation Libyan Freedom

By Harlan Ullman

The stated political aim of NATO and the coalition now conducting military operations over Libya authorized by U.N. Security Resolution 1973 to “use all necessary measures” to protect civilians is to end the rule of Moammar Gadhafi and his regime. But when queried about the seeming inconsistency between the military objective of protecting civilians and […]

New Atlanticist

Apr 13, 2011

Feeding Pakistan’s Paranoia

By Shuja Nawaz

Behind all the talk of a strategic dialogue and strategic partnership between the United States and Pakistan lurks the reality of a persistent transactional relationship, based on short-term objectives that intrude rudely into the limelight every time a drone attack kills civilians inside Pakistan or in the instance when an American “operative” is caught by […]

New Atlanticist

Apr 13, 2011

Georgia Gives Up MAP, but Expects to Join NATO Anyway

By Matthew Czekaj

It should now be crystal clear: Georgia no longer wants a Membership Action Plan (MAP) for NATO accession. But it still expects to become a member of the Alliance. 

New Atlanticist

Apr 7, 2011

How to Win a Kazakh Election

By Joseph Hammond

On Friday Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbaev will officially be sworn in for a new five-year term in office, following an election which saw him take home a staggering 95.5 percent of the vote. Turn out was also officially 90 percent. Like so many elections before it in Kazakhstan, the polls were marred by reports of […]

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