Forward-looking…
Strategy requires foresight. Leveraging the Scowcroft Center’s cutting-edge strategic foresight practice, Forward Defense helps identify the most important long-term developments, trends, and technologies that are shaping the future geostrategic and military environment.
Emerging military technology
Mon, Nov 30, 2020
The Five Revolutions: Examining defense innovation in the Indo-Pacific region
The Indo-Pacific region has become a center of gravity for innovation in defense technologies and emerging military capabilities. This report explores major drivers of modernization and advances a new framework to capture defense technology and investment efforts in the region.
Report by
Tue, Nov 3, 2020
Embracing underseas robots: a US strategy to maintain underseas superiority in an age of unmanned systems
The future of warfare is progressing towards uncrewed systems and automation. This report takes a look at this trend in the undersea domain, proposing a strategy for the United States to leverage the emerging capacity of unmanned undersea vehicles.
Report by Erich Frandrup
Mon, Aug 17, 2020
Primer on hypersonic weapons in the Indo-Pacific region
Hypersonic weapons are nearing maturation, but debates about their military relevance are often defined solely by technology. This primer situates hypersonic weapons within the regional context of the Indo-Pacific to provide a foundation for strategic analysis.
Report by
Tue, Jul 28, 2020
Is the United States already losing the military tech race to China?
On June 30, Forward Defense hosted a panel of distinguished speakers to discuss the opportunities for, and challenges of, integrating autonomous technologies into the US military to better prepare it for great-power competition.
Event Recap by
Fri, Mar 6, 2020
Russia’s exotic nuclear weapons and implications for the United States and NATO
Great-power competition has returned, and with it, the importance of nuclear weapons in international politics.
Issue Brief by
Nontraditional threats
Wed, Feb 10, 2021
Looking beyond COVID-19: The need to focus US national strategy on the next major crisis
Health security and technology experts joined the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center and its Forward Defense practice for a discussion on building resilience for the next major national security shock.
Event Recap by
Wed, Sep 9, 2020
Future of DHS Project: Full report
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) needs to refocus its mission to lead the defense of the United States against major nonmilitary threats.
Report by
Fri, Oct 9, 2020
Future of DHS Project identifies new threats to the homeland
On Wednesday, September 9, the Scowcroft Center’s Forward Defense practice launched the Future of DHS Project Final Report, building on its Key Findings and Recommendations released in August. Following the report release, Forward Defense hosted three panels of distinguished speakers to discuss the future of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in a changing threat landscape.
Event Recap by
Related Scowcroft Center content on emerging dual-use technology
Wed, Apr 1, 2020
The battle for 5G leadership is global and the US is behind: The White House’s new strategy aims to correct that.
The West has fallen behind in the competition for leadership of the 5G transition, a reality that has huge economic implications and also risks the West facing the reality of a global telecommunications backbone that not only has serious security flaws, but is also shaped by political values incompatible with our own. A new White House strategy aims to close the 5G transition gap.
New Atlanticist by John T. Watts
Tue, Dec 10, 2019
A candle in the dark: US national security strategy for artificial intelligence
AI is expected to have a transformational impact on the future of geopolitics, defense, and security. In this fluctuating environment, where the US is engaged in a high-stakes competition with is near-peer adversaries, and AI is enabling paradigm-shifting changes in public and private sector operations, how should the US respond?
Atlantic Council Strategy Paper Series by
Mon, Sep 9, 2019
Recommendations on 5G and national security
China’s aggressive attempt to subsidize the development of global 5G networks as a tool of Beijing’s geopolitical and economic power requires an urgent and robust, public- and private-sector response from the United States government, its allies, and partners to bring secure 5G technology to our allies.
Strategic Insights Memo by
Modeling the geopolitical future
Pavel in Defense One: Pandemic raises likelihood of great-power conflict
On June 1, Defense One published an article by Scowcroft Center Director Barry Pavel titled: “The Coronavirus is Raising the Likelihood of Great-Power Conflict.” The article addresses the intensifying military operations in the western Pacific and warns of potential escalation if efforts are not calibrated carefully.
The geopolitical implications of COVID-19
In this virtual ‘fireside chat’ co-hosted by the Atlantic Council and SACC-USA, Scowcroft Center Director Barry Pavel addresses the Scowcroft Center’s efforts to both comprehend the geopolitics of COVID-19 and shape the US and allied response.
What world post-COVID-19? Three scenarios
In this report, the Foresight, Strategy, and Risks Initaitve’s Mathew Burrows and Peter Engelke explore the geopolitical implications of COVID-19. They outline three potential scenarios for the future world order: 1) great accelerator downwards; 2) China first; and 3) new renaissance.
Global risks 2035 update: Decline or new renaissance?
The Scowcroft Center’s conclusion in 2016’s “Global Risks 2035” was that state-on-state conflict posed a bigger threat than terrorism. In the two years since, the post-Cold War order has continued to unravel without a ‘new normal’ emerging.
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Experts and futurists
Forward Defense shapes the debate around the greatest military challenges facing the United States and its allies, and creates forward-looking assessments of the trends, technologies, and concepts that will define the future of warfare.