In The News

Libyan Fallout: Does NATO Divide the Atlantic Partners? Part I

Alistair Burnett May 10, 2011
With differing levels of enthusiasm among members, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization mounts military operations to end the Libyan government’s attacks on civilians. This two-part series analyzes the NATO mission and members’ commitment to the alliance’s future. In the first article, Alistair Burnett, of BBC News, describes the alliance’s intervention in Libya as half-hearted. Of 28 NATO...

The Force of Special Forces

Lawrence Korb May 10, 2011
Governments across the globe and US industries have good reason to parse details of the US mission that killed Osama bin Laden. The mission’s success will have profound effects on US military strategy, organization and spending, argues Lawrence Korb, former assistant defense secretary in the Reagan administration, in an opinion essay for Politico. In recent decades, US legislators have assessed...

Foreign Dollars for an American Dream

Coeli Carr May 6, 2011
To create jobs, governments typically invest in local businesses. But Ecuador looked beyond its borders and invested in Runa, a small New York–based firm that markets guayusa, a caffeinated drink. The investment tackles numerous policy goals: The drink is made from leaves of holly, native to the Amazon; developing a commercial product could preserve rainforest and aid indigenous communities. Napo...

Advanced Economies: Minutes to Midnight? Part I

David Dapice April 28, 2011
Advanced economies face momentous decisions to sustain their prosperity and lifestyles. In a two-part series, YaleGlobal reviews the challenges faced by the US and the Eurozone. In 1917 the US Congress passed statutory limits, unusual by world standards, for issuing bonds, to avoid separate approval on every issue. The ceiling has been raised many times since to the current limit, $14.294...

What the Guantanamo Leaks Won't Reveal

Darryl Li April 27, 2011
WikiLeaks has begun publishing 779 US secret military files on Guantánamo Bay prisoners. Dated 2002 to 2008, the assessments detail US intelligence and rationales for indefinite detention of prisoners or transfer to other governments. The raw documents require context, suggests Darryl Li, who has worked on the legal defense of Guantánamo detainees, in an opinion essay for Al Jazeera. The threat...

How the US Intends to End War with Taliban

Ahmed Rashid April 21, 2011
A spring offensive from the Taliban has flared up in Afghanistan. More than 40 nations have troops there at a cost of $2 billon per week, reports Ahmed Rashid for the Financial Times. The US and NATO are intent on withdrawing by 2014, but a clean end requires more diplomacy than military force. “[T]he US now accepts – and is working on – a Taliban request to open a Taliban political office, most...

The War on Soft Power

Joseph S. Nye Jr. April 19, 2011
In a global age, national power rests less on issuing orders from top of a hierarchy than on being the center of a network. Countries depend on many tools besides military might – skilled diplomats, aid programs, educational and cultural exchanges and so on. Confronting a ballooning deficit, the US has to tackle budget cuts: A deal recently negotiated by Congress makes deep cuts in so-called soft...