|
- Learning to Listen in Iraq, Brian Katulis
and Emily Hogin
- Understanding the Terrorist Threat, Brian
Katulis and Peter Juul
- Anxiety and Recommitment in Russia's
Neighborhood, Samuel Charap
- Fighting Over Fighter Jets: Obama, Gates
and the F-22, Lawrence Korb and Krisila Benson
- Seizing the Opportunity for Progress,
Said Jawad
- Real Economic Development in Afghanistan:
Women Rug Weavers Create Hope, Connie Duckworth
- Abyei: Sudan's Next Test, Colin
Thomas-Jensen and Maggie Fick
- The Iranian Conundrum, Peter Juul
- No Grand U.S.-Russia Bargain, Samuel
Charap
- The Evolving Situation in Iran, Karim
Sadjadpour
- Going to Congress Risks Broader Authority
for Detention Than What the Administration Seeks, Ken Gude
- Closing Guantanamo, Ken Gude
|
|
|
Brian Katulis and Emily Hogin, "Learning to Listen in
Iraq," Center for American Progress, July 22, 2009
Prime Minister Maliki is meeting President Obama this week as a
strong, popular leader of an increasingly independent nation, but his
government is a long way from making the political compromises that
will resolve Iraq’s internal divisions. The United States has a
role to
play in reconciliation through its diplomatic mission, but the success
of that mission depends on America’s ability to listen and offer
concrete assistance without dictating a political solution.
Click here to
read the full article.
Brian Katulis and Peter Juul, "Understanding the
Terrorist Threat," Center for American Progress, July 21, 2009
When Secretary of Defense Robert Gates
introduced the idea of a Pakistan counterinsurgency fund earlier this
spring, we noted that the counterinsurgency effort itself was
incomplete at best and that a broader strategy
was needed. Unfortunately, the defense authorization bill now before
the Senate doesn’t require a strategic plan for implementing the
Pakistan Counterinsurgency Fund before the funds are released—a
flaw
that still needs fixing.
Click here to
read the full article.
Samuel Charap, "Anxiety and Recommitment in Russia's
Neighborhood," Center for American Progress, July 21, 2009
An unusual episode in international
politics took place last week, days
before Vice President Joe Biden embarked on his trip to Ukraine and
Georgia this Monday. Several former politicians and other prominent
figures from Eastern and Central Europe, including former Polish
President and Nobel Peace Prize winner Lech Walesa and former Czech
President and Playwright Vaclav Havel, issued an open letter to the
Obama administration in the wake of President Barack Obama’s trip
to
Moscow. The letter essentially represents a plea not to be forgotten by
the administration in its foreign policy as it “resets” its
relationship with Russia. They write: “We see that Central and
Eastern
European countries are no longer at the heart of American foreign
policy. As the new Obama administration sets its foreign-policy
priorities, our region is one part of the world that Americans have
largely stopped worrying about.”
Click here to
read the full article.
Lawrence Korb and
Krisila Benson, "Fighting Over Fighter Jets: Obama, Gates and the
F-22," Huffington
Post, July 21, 2009
The Senate is locked in a heated debate
on the future of the F-22, the
Air Force's 5th generation fighter plane. It is the most advanced
air-to-air combat fighter plane in the world, and at $350 million per
plane, it is also the most expensive. President Obama is threatening a
veto if any additional F-22s wind up in the Defense Authorization bill,
leaving both sides of the issue locked in hand-to-hand combat trying to
eek out the necessary votes. This has become an entirely politicized
debate when what we need is thoughtful analysis based on risk
assessment and the overall best interest of U.S. national security.
Click here to
read the full article.
Said Jawad, "Seizing
the Opportunity for Progress," Middle East Bulletin interview, July 21, 2009
There is a history of our relations with some of our neighbors, which
is unfortunately complicated, but today’s reality is that
Afghanistan, Pakistan and many countries around Afghanistan are
suffering from the same threat, which is terrorism and extremism. So we
are asking our friends and neighbors in the region not to use terrorism
and extremism as a tool of foreign policy and to realize that these are
the real enemy of Afghanistan and the region, and work with the Afghan
government, the United States and NATO countries in a more sincere
way ... There are also
other threats that are binding Afghanistan with other neighbors, such
as Iran, for instance—mainly narcotics and lawlessness. So there
are many other opportunities and threats that force Afghanistan and its
neighbors to work closely, to capitalize on the opportunities and to
fight against the threat collectively.
Click here to
read the full interview.
Connie Duckworth, "Real Economic Development in
Afghanistan: Women Rug Weavers Create Hope," Center for American
Progress interview, July 21, 2009
A successful woman-run rug business has
been operating for the last
five years in Afghanistan. Arzu Rugs currently employs 600 people and
provides direct economic support to almost four times that many. Arzu
means “hope” in Dari. In addition to the well-paying jobs
created by
the rug-weaving work, the company funnels its profits back to the
community in the form of medical care, education, and social services
that touch the lives of an estimated 100,000 Afghans.
Click here to
read the full interview.
Colin Thomas-Jensen
and Maggie Fick, "Abyei: Sudan's Next Test," Enough Project, July 20,
2009
The countdown has begun in
Sudan. This week’s legal decision on the boundaries of
Abyei—an oil-rich, contested region along the disputed
North-South border within Sudan—is the first major test of recent
commitments made in Washington by the two parties to Sudan’s
Comprehensive Peace Agreement, or CPA. Although senior representatives
of the ruling National Congress Party, or NCP, and the Sudan
People’s Liberation Movement, or SPLM, have committed themselves
to accept the ruling, how each side responds is a crucial litmus test
of each side’s will to implement the CPA, and, by extension, a
barometer for the efficacy of the Obama administration’s
engagement on Sudan.
Click here to
read the full report.
Peter Juul, "The Iranian Conundrum," Center for
American Progress, July 17, 2009
Iranian opposition leader Mir Hussein
Mousavi made his first public appearance
today in nearly a month, while crowds of protestors apparently chanted
“death to Russia”—a reference to Russia’s quick
congratulations to
incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and subsequent hosting of him
at a summit in that country. The continuing protests in Iran over that
country’s rigged June 12 presidential election
will continue to influence Tehran’s foreign policy, and
consequently
U.S. overtures to the Iranian regime about the country’s nuclear
program and its relations with Iraq.
Click here to read the full article.
Samuel Charap,
"No Grand U.S.-Russia Bargain," The Guardian Comment is
Free, July 17, 2009
The
reviews of President Barack Obama's Moscow trip are in – and they
are distinctly lukewarm. Those who see a lack of breakthroughs at the
summit point out that the two sides did not resolve the most difficult
issues in the relationship, in particular US plans to install
components of a missile defence shield in Poland and the Czech Republic
and possible Nato membership for Ukraine and Georgia. The Kremlin
objects to both vehemently. But these issues were never going to be
resolved at the summit – and for good reason.
Click here to
read the full article.
Karim Sadjadpour,
"The Evolving Situation in Iran," Middle East Bulletin interview, July 16, 2009
In terms of the political costs, I would
argue that over the last four weeks the legitimacy of the Ahmadinejad
government has decreased rather than increased. Meaning, as time has
passed more people have questioned the legitimacy of the elections
rather than endorsed the results. This scale of repression is not only
politically costly for the regime but it's also financially costly. To
have, essentially, martial law—tens of thousands of basij militia
and Revolutionary Guards patrolling the streets of major cities in
Iran—and to have thousands of people in prisons throughout the
country, and to constantly be filtering the internet and jamming
satellite broadcasts from abroad is very expensive.
Click here to
read the full interview.
The World
- Ken Gude says the postponement of the administration's detainee task
force report, while a sign of the difficult questions it is grappling
with, does not represent a shift in the administration's stated goal of
closing Guantanamo: "It is clear, despite what has been kind of a
sluggish process so far, that the administration is firmly commited to
closing Guantanamo and reforming U.S. detention policy. That hasn't
changed, regardless of what timeline they may now be working on."
Washington Independent - Ken Gude says the
question of going to Congress to secure new legislation on
detention policy may end up with a greater concentration of executive
power than that sought by the administration: "if
they go to Congress, what will inevitably emerge is a broad preventive
detention system regardless of what the Obama administration wants. If
they rely on [existing Authorization for the Use of Military Force]
authority, then it can be much more narrow."
|
|
|
Ukraine
in Crisis
July 22, 2009, 10:00 AM -11:30 AM
On July 20, Vice President Joe Biden arrived in
Kyiv for talks with
the Ukrainian political leadership. Ukraine remains mired in a
deepening political crisis with seemingly intractable conflicts in the
parliament and between the executive and the legislature paralyzing
governance. The country is also gearing up for presidential elections
in January 2010.
Please join the Center for American Progress for a
special event
featuring Volodymyr Lytvyn, speaker of the Verkhovna Rada (Parliament)
of Ukraine and leader of the Volodymyr Lytvyn Bloc. Lytvyn, who
announced last week that he will be participating in the upcoming
presidential elections, has been in the highest echelons of Ukrainian
politics for over a decade and brings a unique perspective to bear on
the problems facing his country. In his talk, Lytvyn will offer his
thoughts on Ukraine's domestic political situation, its relations with
the United States under the Obama administration, and its ties with
Russia in the context of the "reset" in U.S.-Russia relations.
To RSVP and for more information on speakers at this event, please
click here.
Sign
up:
Policy
e-newsletters
The
Progress Report
To
unsubscribe, click here
Support
the Center for American Progress
Comments, questions:
Email
Us
National
Security Policy Weekly
is a product of the Center for American Progress |
|
|
