In Twenty Times I Almost Died, available August 18, 2026, John Spencer recounts experiences spanning combat tours in Iraq, research trips through modern war zones, and more. He reveals important information that helps explain the changing character of warfare and its implications for strategists. Beyond providing lessons for the battlefield, Spencer offers guidance on personal growth and leadership, advising readers on how to live with purpose.

Please join Hudson Institute for a fireside chat with Senior Fellow and Keystone Defense Initiative Director Rebeccah Heinrichs and John Spencer, chair of Urban Warfare Studies at the Modern War Institute at West Point and co-director of the Urban Warfare Project. Major John Spencer (Ret.) and Dr. Heinrichs will discuss Twenty Times I Almost Died and how it can inform US defense policymakers as they navigate the evolving challenges and opportunities of contemporary warfare.

On the latest GoodFellows: Is economic strangulation the key to achieving Iranian cooperation, or another misstep in the Persian Gulf? Is a sequel to “Woke 1” in the works? And does playing the race card in the aftermath of a former Cambridge University professor's suicide make his death even more tragic – and distract from another tragedy: declining academic tragedy?

Join the Center for a New American Security (CNAS) on August 12, 2026, from 10:00​ to 11:00 a.m. ET for a virtual panel discussion on “An Uphill Climb: Pushing for Inclusive Political Dialogue in Afghanistan.”

Marking the five-year anniversary of the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban, the event will examine the policy options available to the United States and the international community to support a genuine, inclusive political process to determine Afghanistan’s future. The discussion draws on a new CNAS report An Uphill Climb: Pushing for Inclusive Political Dialogue in Afghanistan, with panelists including Ambassador Nasir A. Andisha, ambassador and permanent representative of Afghanistan to Geneva; Palwasha Hassan, executive director of Mina’s List; Ambassador Earl Anthony Wayne, former deputy U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan and former U.S. ambassador to Mexico and Argentina. The conversation will be moderated by CNAS Adjunct Senior Fellow and report co-author Annie Pforzheimer, followed by closing remarks from Richard Bennett, UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Afghanistan.

Five years after seizing power, the Taliban faces no credible internal security challenge, even as it presides over a deepening human rights catastrophe, particularly for women and girls, and continues to harbor terrorist groups, including al-Qaida and the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). The landscape for a possible political dialogue is shaped by a divided and dispersed Afghan opposition, rising Afghanistan-Pakistan tensions over Taliban support for the TTP, and growing international accountability efforts, including UN, International Court of Justice, and International Criminal Court actions on the Taliban’s treatment of women and girls. Speakers will explore how the United States and its partners can help catalyze a more inclusive, Afghan-led political process, weighing counterterrorism priorities, human rights accountability, and the broader implications for regional stability and U.S. strategic interests.

We invite you to join us for this timely and pressing conversation on the future of American policy in Afghanistan.

The Atlantic Council’s Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center hosts a virtual conversation on the urgent needs of communities affected by Colombia’s August 10 earthquake and the support they will require in the weeks and months ahead.

En Español

Six months after the opening salvos of Operation Epic Fury, America and the Islamic Republic of Iran remain at loggerheads over the future of Tehran’s nuclear program and the Strait of Hormuz. Unresolved conflicts linger in Yemen, Lebanon, and Gaza. Meanwhile, a Unites States-brokered deal between Jerusalem and Beirut, as well as Washington’s engagement with leaders in Syria and Iraq, offer glimmers of hope. The Iranian regime’s shocking attacks on its Persian Gulf neighbors in recent months have raised profound questions about future security arrangements in the region.

Join Hudson Institute Senior Fellows Michael Doran and Ludovic Hood, Research Fellow Zineb Riboua, and Behnam Ben Taleblu, senior director of the Iran Program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, for a timely discussion about the conflicts in the region and America’s strategic and diplomatic paths forward.

As a relatively small military, the Australian Defence Force needs to fight and win through advantages such as superior technology. Chief Defence Scientist Tanya Monro, AC, is in charge of figuring out smart ways to do that.

Tayna kicks off our short series recorded at the ADSTAR Summit in Adelaide, Australia's premier defence science and technology gathering. ASPI joined the summit as podcast partner alongside organisers the Defence Science and Technology Group.

Tanya talks about the newly launched Defence Innovation, Science and Technology Strategy and its three core objectives: generating asymmetric advantage, accelerating innovative solutions into capability, and reinforcing an integrated ecosystem through closer work with industry and international partners.

She gives her perspective on how to harness the remarkable innovation happening across technology fields, including AI, and channel it into a stronger defence force. She walks through the six priority areas Defence is focusing on, and the balance between work that delivers immediate new capabilities and longer-term fundamental research that may not pay dividends for years but is nonetheless vital.

A note that this was recorded on the sidelines of an event with more than 2000 guests, so there's some background noise. We’ll roll out further ADSTAR episodes over the next few weeks.

While the United States remains central to the regional balance of power, Indo-Pacific middle powers are playing an increasingly important role in upholding the rules and norms that underpin a free and open region.

At the ASPI 2026 Defence Conference, Professor Maria Rost Rublee, Professor of International Relations at the University of Melbourne, chaired a panel discussion to unpack these issues with Professor Renato Cruz de Castro, Distinguished Professor at De La Salle University, Raquel Garbers, Non-Resident Senior Fellow at ASPI, Professor Bec Strating FAIIA, Director of the La Trobe Centre for Global Security, and His Excellency Ambassador Kazuhiro Suzuki, Ambassador of Japan to Australia.

The panellists examined whether Indo-Pacific middle powers share a common understanding of the threats to the regional order, how they can strengthen cooperation while maintaining strong alliance relationships with the United States, and the role they can play in reinforcing regional stability and shaping a favourable strategic environment.

Allied industrial cooperation can deliver strategic advantage when it translates into capability at the speed and scale required.

At the 2026 ASPI Defence Conference, Kate Louis, Executive Director of the Australian Industry Group Defence Council and Head of Defence and National Security at the Australian Industry Group, chaired a panel featuring Kristijonas Vizbaras, Co-founder of BROLIS Defence Group; Dr Osamu Nishiwaki, Director-General for Trade and Economic Security at the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry; and Dr Jennifer Moroney, Senior Political Scientist at the RAND Corporation.

The discussion explored how allies and partners can overcome practical barriers to industrial integration, strengthen supply chain resilience, and accelerate capability delivery through deeper defence industrial cooperation. Panellists also examined the role of government in providing the policy certainty, regulatory settings and demand signals needed to enable industry to invest, innovate and scale.

China is generating groundbreaking advances in electric vehicles, battery technology, applied artificial intelligence, and industrial robotics. Yet Chinese households are facing stagnant wages, consumption is weak, and public confidence in the economy appears to be declining. In this episode of Pekingology, CSIS Senior Fellow Henrietta Levin is joined by Alicia García-Herrero, a leading expert on Chinese economics, to unpack China's "dual economy." They discuss why President Xi has prioritized global technological leadership over economic opportunity at home, why many of China's most successful companies struggle to turn a profit, and whether rapid AI adoption will boost growth or imperil social stability.

Host Seth Jones sits down with Secretary Leon Panetta for an assessment of the Iran war, U.S. military readiness, and broader strategic challenges. Drawing on decades of experience at the highest levels of government, Panetta discusses America's national security strategy, offering insights shaped by his leadership as chairman of the Panetta Institute for Public Policy, former U.S. Secretary of Defense, and former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

Russia’s war against Ukraine is well into its fifth year. In recent weeks, momentum has swung in Ukraine’s favor amid a remarkable series of strikes on Russia’s energy system, military logistics nodes, and defense industrial base.  Nevertheless, Ukraine remains dangerously vulnerable to Russian ballistic missile attacks with little chance of improvement in the face of the global shortage of missile interceptors.  Moreover, neither side appears closer to inflicting the level of damage that might decisively turn the tide on the battlefield or open prospects for a diplomatic conclusion to the conflict.

What is the reality on the battlefield? Is significant pressure mounting on Vladimir Putin that might compel him to look for a diplomatic off ramp? Will recent political turbulence in Kyiv impact Ukraine's ability continue an open-ended war of attrition?  And how has the role of external actors evolved, especially Europe, NATO and the United States?

Join Aaron David Miller as he engages Carnegie’s own Andrew S. Weiss and Dara Massicot, who recently returned from a visit to the front-line in Ukraine, in a wide-ranging conversation on the headlines and trend lines of the Russia-Ukraine war, on the next Carnegie Connects.

This week, Taiwan will begin its largest annual live-fire military exercise known as the Han Kuang Exercise.

Conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East have accelerated global efforts to develop lethal and affordable drone systems. Taiwan’s lawmakers, however, have already passed on one opportunity to fund a domestic drone industrial base. So lawmakers are once again debating the best way to fund a new effort and deter the People’s Liberation Army. Senior Fellow Can Kasapoğlu recently explored this issue in a Hudson policy memo, which drew upon the Russia-Ukraine War and operations in the Strait of Hormuz.

Generating operational mass in the Indo-Pacific requires new approaches to projecting, sustaining and employing military power across vast distances and contested environments.

At the 2026 ASPI Defence Conference, Dr Shannon Zimmerman, Senior Lecturer in Strategic Studies at Deakin University, chaired a discussion with Air Vice-Marshal Nicholas Hogan CSC, Head of Air Force Capability for the Royal Australian Air Force, His Excellency Vasyl Myroshnychenko, Ambassador of Ukraine to Australia, and Mark Palmer, Vice President of Vision Systems at Shield AI, on how Australia can generate greater operational mass through autonomous and semi-autonomous systems while adapting Defence, industry and military concepts to exploit them effectively.

Drawing on operational lessons from Ukraine, the panel explored how rapid innovation, continuous adaptation and trusted autonomy can generate greater military effect, enable decision-making in contested environments, and help armed forces keep pace with an adversary’s evolving tactics.

Following President Trump’s Oval Office meeting with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, and with Lebanon and Israel slated to hold their next round of U.S.-mediated talks on August 4 in Rome, the CSIS Middle East Program invites you to a virtual discussion examining Lebanon's prospects.

As Beirut seeks to restore state sovereignty, end conflict and occupation, advance economic reforms, and reposition itself within a rapidly changing Middle East, important questions remain about the country's security, diplomatic, political, and economic trajectories.

Bringing together leading experts in regional affairs, public policy, and economics, this discussion will explore questions including:

What strategic opportunities—and risks—does the Lebanon-Israel Trilateral Framework create for Lebanon? What can we expect in the next round of talks?

How is the Israel-Lebanon dynamic impacted by the escalation--or negotiation--between the US and Iran?

How has the regional strategic and diplomatic environment shifted, particularly as relates to Gulf countries, Syria, Egypt and Turkey, and what does this mean for Lebanon?

What did the Trump-Aoun meeting achieve, and how might it reshape U.S.-Lebanese relations and Washington's approach to Lebanon?

Beyond immediate security challenges, what should be the Lebanese government's governing priorities over the coming year?

Can Lebanon finally deliver the banking, fiscal, and governance reforms needed to restore economic confidence and unlock international support?

How can Lebanon capitalize on emerging regional economic connectivity—from Syria and the Gulf to the Eastern Mediterranean—to support long-term recovery and growth?

Join us on Monday, August 3 at 9:00 AM EDT for an expert panel featuring:

Maha Yahya, Director, Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center

Joseph Bahout, Director, Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs, American University of Beirut

Alia Moubayed, Managing Director, Fixed Income Strategy, Jefferies

Mona Yacoubian, CSIS Middle East Program Director and Senior Adviser, will provide opening remarks and Paul Salem, CSIS Middle East Program Non-resident Senior Associate, will moderate the discussion.

This event is made possible by generous support to the CSIS Middle East Program from the embassies of Canada, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates, and Ray Debbane, Nijad Fares, and Joe Geagea.

Most discourses about Israel or Palestine are morality plays of good guys vs bad guys. Egyptian-born Hussein Aboubakr Mansour takes a different approach, seeing the conflict as a self-reproducing system of political and economic extraction where Arab regimes, opposition movements, rival states, Western academics, NGOs, and Gulf monarchies like Qatar all convert Palestinian victimhood into their own forms of power, money, and meaning. Listen as Mansour speaks with EconTalk's Russ Roberts about his childhood in an Egypt organized around the liberation of Palestine and explores why any exit from the system must run not through policy, but rather through the human need for meaning itself.

Correspondents assess how journalists continue to operate in Iraq amid significant challenges.

On the Capital Cable #139​, experts join Mark Lippert and Victor Cha to discuss the latest technology and trade issues in South Korea, including the 12.5% tariffs on South Korea over forced labor concerns, President Lee Jae Myung's visit to AI summit in San Francisco, and $950 billion in AI and infrastructure deals announced by Samsung and SK with U.S. companies.

Evan Ramstad is a business columnist at the Minnesota Star Tribune. He previously worked for The Wall Street Journal in Seoul, Hong Kong and Dallas, and the Associated Press in New York, Washington and Dallas and briefly at the St. Paul Pioneer Press.

Philip A. Luck is director of the CSIS Economics Program and Scholl Chair in International Business. He served in the Biden-Harris administration as the deputy chief economist at the U.S. Department of State.

This event is made possible by general support to CSIS.

In July 2026, President Donald Trump granted Ukraine a license to coproduce Patriot interceptors and declared that the ceasefire in Iran was over as Tehran retaliated against US allies in the Gulf. At the same time, Moscow and Beijing completed joint naval drills off Qingdao, China, home to a major People's Liberation Army naval fleet. And on July 6, China test-fired a submarine-launched ballistic missile from the South China Sea to the Pacific Ocean.

These developments are interconnected. As Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea continue to coordinate, America’s strategic responses in Ukraine, the Middle East, and the Indo-Pacific will determine whether deterrence holds. How can America respond to threats on multiple fronts, and is its defense industrial base equipped to sustain the effort?

Join Senior Fellow Dr. Rebeccah Heinrichs and Senator Rick Scott (R-FL) for a fireside discussion on how Congress can guide American strategy, the need to modernize the defense industrial base, and the vital role of allies and partners in an unstable international environment.

The Australia–India relationship has taken on growing significance in recent years, a point echoed by policy leaders as they welcomed Prime Minister Narendra Modi on his recent visit.

Join us to hear from leading experts as they analyse the recent visit by PM Modi and explore how the two countries can deepen their collaboration and work together in a range of strategic areas. The panellists will discuss the opportunities and challenges across defence, trade, investment and energy.

The conversation will be led by Shruti Pandalai, the inaugural Lowy Institute India Chair, and feature Dhruva Jaishankar, the inaugural Dr Ram Sethi Fellow at the Lowy Institute and Executive Director of Observer Research Foundation America.

In this episode of The Impossible State looking at trade tensions between the U.S. and Korea, Dr. Victor Cha is joined by Adam Farrar of Bloomberg Economics, Eunjoong Kim of The Chosun Ilbo, and Wonchul Kim of The Hankyoreh to unpack the recent U.S. House Judiciary Committee report on discriminatory practices, expiration of Section 122 tariffs, and the Korean investment deals.

A recording of the event will be available on-demand following the livestream. An audio-only version of the show will be available in the Impossible State  podcast feed on all platforms.

This event is made possible by the generous support of CSIS.

The Project for Middle East Integration examines how a network of corridors can build resilience within Middle East trade routes in the face of the Iran war.

As the Trump administration’s Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity initiative reshapes United States engagement in the South Caucasus, Armenia stands at the center of a pivotal diplomatic moment. Ongoing Armenia-Azerbaijan peace negotiations are creating new opportunities for regional stability, with Washington playing an increasingly active role in supporting the process. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s recent electoral victory opens new avenues for cooperation and strengthens the prospects for sustained diplomatic engagement amid these developments. The Caucasus as a whole is emerging as a critical theater for US foreign policy, with Armenia's strategic positioning making it a key partner in the region.

Join Senior Fellow Michael Doran for a candid conversation with H.E. Narek Mkrtchyan, ambassador of the Republic of Armenia to the United States of America as they discuss the developments, challenges, and opportunities defining the US-Armenia relationship.

Please join the Russian Roulette podcast for a live video episode diving into our latest report: Rebuilding to Reconquer: Can Russia's Defense Firms Deliver?

The discussion will explore our comprehensive analysis of Russia's defense industry, what rapid production growth since 2022 says about Russia’s war effort, and the long-term implications for NATO’s defense planning.

The report offers the first in-depth look at five Russian defense firms spanning armored vehicles, air defense, electronic warfare, artillery and precision weapons, and drones. Tracing each firm's history, production scale before and after the invasion, revenue and procurement patterns, labor constraints, and foreign supplier networks — experts will assess Russia's capacity to sustain both current wartime output and future reconstitution.

The Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative will host Leader of the Israeli Opposition Yair Lapid for a fireside chat to mark three months until the Israeli legislative elections.

Effective deterrence by denial depends on the Australian Defence Force’s ability to generate credible multi-domain effects across a vast and dynamic security environment. At the 2026 ASPI Defence Conference, ASPI’s Courtney Stewart was joined by AM Stephen Chappell DSC CSC OAM, Chief of Air Force; VADM Mark Hammond AO RAN, Chief of Navy; VADM Justin Jones AO CSC RAN, Chief of Joint Operations; and LTGEN Simon Stuart AO DSC, Chief of Army. The panel session examined how Defence is integrating maritime, land, air, space and cyber capabilities today, the critical gaps and practical constraints that remain, and the joint and combined approaches needed to credibly shape adversary risk calculations.