“The Future of Terrorism,” Intelligence and Defense Seminar with Peter Bergen. Harvard Kennedy School

Utility Menu

For the Press About Subscribe Contact Us Directory

Harvard Kennedy School Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
Main navigation (extended config)

Research

Engima machine
Experts Programs & Projects
Fellowships Events

Seminar – Harvard Faculty, Fellows, Staff, and Students
“The Future of Terrorism,” Intelligence and Defense Seminar with Peter Bergen
RSVP

Mon., Sep. 25, 2017 | 12:15pm – 1:30pm

John F. Kennedy School of Government – Littauer Building, Belfer Center Library, Room L369
Series
Intelligence and Defense Project Series

The Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs will host a Intelligence and Defense Seminar Lunch with Peter Bergen on “The Future of Terrorism” in the Belfer Center Library (L369).

RSVP to event
Add to Calendar

Share

Photo of Peter Bergen
CNN.com
Photo of Peter Bergen
About

Peter Bergen is a journalist, documentary producer, vice president at New America, CNN national security analyst, professor of practice at Arizona State University, and the author or editor of seven books, three of which were New York Times bestsellers and four of which were named among the best non-fiction books of the year by The Washington Post. The books have been translated into twenty languages. Documentaries based on his books have been nominated for two Emmys and also won the Emmy for best documentary.

Bergen also serves as New America’s Director of the International Security, Future of War and Fellows Programs. He is a contributing editor at Foreign Policy and writes a weekly column for CNN.com. He is a member of the Aspen Homeland Security Group and a fellow at Fordham University’s Center on National Security. Bergen is on the editorial board of Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, a leading scholarly journal in the field. He has held teaching positions at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University. For many years he was a fellow at New York University’s Center on Law and Security. He has testified on Capitol Hill seventeen times about national security issues.

In 2011 he published The Longest War: The Enduring Conflict between America and Al-Qaeda. The book won the Washington Institute’s $30,000 Gold Prize for the best book on the Middle East. In 2012 he published Manhunt: The Ten Year Search for Bin Laden, from 9/11 to Abbottabad. It won the Overseas Press Club award for the best book on international affairs. HBO based the film “Manhunt” on the book, which won the 2013 Emmy for best documentary. In 2013 he published Talibanistan: Negotiating the Borders Between Terror, Politics and Religion, a collection of essays about the Taliban that Bergen co-edited. In 2014 he published Drone Wars, a collection of essays about drone warfare that Bergen co-edited. In 2016, he published United States of Jihad: Investigating America’s Homegrown Terrorists and HBO adapted the book for the documentary film “Homegrown: The Counter-Terror Dilemma.”

Bergen has hosted, produced, or executive produced multiple documentaries for HBO, CNN, National Geographic, and Discovery. Bergen co-produced CNN Films’ Legion of Brothers, which premiered at Sundance in January 2017 and will be released theatrically in May 2017. Bergen produced the first television interview with Osama bin Laden in 1997. The interview, which aired on CNN, marked the first time that bin Laden declared war against the United States to a Western audience.

Bergen has written for a wide range of newspapers and magazines around the world including the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Foreign Affairs, Time, The Atlantic, Vanity Fair, The Daily Telegraph, The Times, The Guardian, Prospect, La Repubblica, Die Welt and Der Spiegel. He has a degree in Modern History from New College, Oxford.

Bergen is married to the documentary director/producer Tresha Mabile. They have two children.
Belfer Center Email Updates
Social Media

Facebook
Twitter
YouTube
LinkedIn
Google+
Soundcloud
RSS

Harvard Kennedy School Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs

Research, ideas, and leadership for a more secure, peaceful world.

79 John F. Kennedy Street, Cambridge, MA 02138
Locations & Directions
Footer – external links

Harvard Kennedy School of Government
Harvard University

Privacy PolicyCopyright © 2017 The President and Fellows of Harvard College

16 years after 9/11: The state of the terrorist threat, CNN.com

16 years after 9/11: The state of the terrorist threat
Peter Bergen

By Peter Bergen, CNN National Security Analyst

Updated 5:37 PM ET, Sat September 9, 2017

Story highlights

Peter Bergen: The threat of terrorism by foreigners is quite low in the United States
Attacks are by American citizens and permanent residents, inspired by ISIS but had no direct contact with the group

“Peter Bergen is CNN’s National Security Analyst, a vice president at New America and the author of “United States of Jihad: Who Are America’s Homegrown Terrorists and How Do We Stop Them?” ”

(CNN)Sixteen years after the 9/11 attacks, there is a fair amount of good news about the state of the battle against jihadist terrorists: The United States has not suffered a successful attack by a foreign terrorist organization since al Qaeda’s horrific attack on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.
Al Qaeda’s core group, based in Afghanistan and Pakistan, hasn’t launched a successful attack in the West since the suicide bombings on London’s transportation system more than a decade ago in 2005, which killed 52 commuters.

The terrorist group that sprang up in the wake of the setbacks suffered by al Qaeda, ISIS is itself now largely defeated, having lost the city of Mosul, its headquarters in Iraq, and much of the city of Raqqa, its headquarters in Syria.

The US-led coalition has also killed an estimated 60,000 to 70,000 ISIS fighters, according to US Special Operations Command’s Gen. Raymond “Tony” Thomas, speaking at the Aspen Security Forum in July.
A month later Brett McGurk, the US envoy to the anti-ISIS coalition, said ISIS had lost control of more than three-quarters of the territory that it had once held in Iraq and more than half of what it had once controlled in Syria.
The threat posed by American “foreign fighters” returning to the United States who were trained by ISIS or other jihadist groups in Iraq and Syria is quite low compared to European countries. According to public records, only seven American militants have returned from the Syrian and Iraqi battlefields and none has carried out an act of terrorism.
That’s the good news, but there are other troubling trends. Since 2014 there have been six lethal jihadist terrorist attacks in the United States, killing 74 people, according to New America’s research.

Those attacks were carried out by American citizens and legal permanent residents, not by foreign terrorists as was the case on 9/11.
These American terrorists were inspired by ISIS propaganda online, but had no direct contact with the group.
Jihadist terrorists in the United States today overwhelmingly radicalize online. Of the 129 militants from the United States who joined jihadist terrorist groups in Iraq and Syria, or attempted to do so, or helped others to do so, 101 of them downloaded and shared jihadist propaganda online and some conducted encrypted online discussions with ISIS militants based in the Middle East, according to New America research.
The Israeli counterterrorism expert Gabriel Weimann rightly points out that the “lone wolf” is now part of a virtual pack.
In the cases of the 129 militants drawn to the Syrian conflict, none appears to have been recruited in person by other militant operatives.

The Trump administration’s temporary travel ban from six Muslim majority countries does nothing to address this “homegrown” militant threat that is enabled by jihadist propaganda online. Travel bans, of course, have no impact on the Internet.
While the United States has seen no lethal attacks in which the perpetrators were trained and directed by foreign terrorist organizations since 9/11, there have been five ISIS-directed attacks in Europe since 2014 that killed 188 people, around twice the death toll of all deadly jihadist attacks in the United States since 9/11.
Meanwhile, the Taliban in Afghanistan are at their strongest point since their defeat by US forces shortly after 9/11.

Other forms of political violence in the United States

Terrorism in the United States doesn’t emanate only from jihadists, who have killed 95 people in the States since 9/11.
Individuals motivated by far-right ideology have killed 68 people in the United States during the same period, while individuals motivated by black nationalist ideology have killed eight people, according to New America research.

The drivers of terrorism

Even though ISIS is largely defeated, the conditions that led to the group’s emergence largely remain, including the regional civil war in the Middle East between Sunni and Shia that has consumed Iraq, Syria and Yemen; the collapse of Arab governance around the region; the collapse of economies in war-torn Muslim states and the population bulge in the Middle East and North Africa.
This has precipitated a tidal wave of Muslim immigration into Europe. Those immigrants are arriving in countries where Muslims are often marginalized and this wave of Muslim immigration has helped fuel the recent rise of European ultranationalist parties. This is a combustible mix, which may help propel some European Muslims to subscribe to the tenets of militant jihadism.
These drivers of jihadism strongly suggest that a son of ISIS will form in coming years.
Even as ISIS suffers repeated setbacks, al Qaeda’s branch in Syria has shown surprising resiliency and it’s possible that a rump version of ISIS might merge with al Qaeda in Syria. The two groups split from each other in 2014.

Al Qaeda’s core group also seems to be grooming Hamza bin Laden, one of Osama bin Laden’s sons, as a next generation leader. Hamza bin Laden, who is in his late twenties, has appeared in a number of al Qaeda media productions in recent years.
The continued resilience of al Qaeda in Syria and the fact that the drivers of global jihadism are not going away anytime soon suggests that the long war that began on 9/11 more than a decade and half ago has many years left before it finally sputters out.

“Inside Terrorism, 3rd Edition”: Book Talk with Dr. Bruce Hoffman Georgetown Univ.

“Inside Terrorism, 3rd Edition”: Book Talk and Reception with Dr. Bruce Hoffman

Join the Center for Security Studies for a special event featuring the latest publication by director and core faculty member Bruce Hoffman—moderated by best-selling author and CNN analyst Peter Bergen, author of The United States of Jihad, Manhunt, and Holy War, Inc., among other books.

During the first part of the evening, Mr. Bergen will engage Dr. Hoffman in discussion about terrorism’s evolution from when the first edition of Inside Terrorism was published in 1998 until today. The majority of the program, however, will be devoted to question and answer and audience discussion. Light refreshments will be provided for all attendees before and after the event.

RSVP to reserve your spot!
Inside Terrorism: Book Talk and Reception with Dr. Bruce Hoffman
Tuesday, September 12
7:00 – 9:00 PM*
Bioethics Research Library
Healy Hall, 1st Floor
RSVP HERE

*Students with class until 7:30 are welcome to join us for the latter portion of the talk.

About the Book

Inside Terrorism has remained the seminal work for understanding the historical evolution of terrorism and the terrorist mindset. The revised edition of this classic book maps terrorism’s historical trajectory from its ancient origins through the 19th and 20th Centuries to the rise of ISIS and stubborn resilience of al Qaeda. It specifically explores the remarkably consistent demographic background of terrorists throughout the ages; the reasons behind the continued salience of suicide terrorism as a fixture of contemporary political violence; terrorism as an historically pernicious form of violent communication, continuing today with the exploitation of new communications media and social networking technologies; the global radicalization and foreign fighter phenomena; and potential future trends, including the repercussions of a post-caliphate ISIS and the potential resurgence of al Qaeda. Closer to home, Inside Terrorism also examines the resurgence in the United States of violent, anti-government militants, neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and opponents of legalized abortion.

About the Author

Bruce Hoffman has been studying terrorism and insurgency for over four decades. He is a tenured professor in Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, where he is also the Director of both the Center for Security Studies and of the Security Studies Program. In addition, Professor Hoffman is visiting Professor of Terrorism Studies at St Andrews University, Scotland and has decades of experience in a variety of advisory roles. Professor Hoffman’s other books include the prize-winning Anonymous Soldiers: The Struggle for Israel, 1917-1947 (2015) and The Evolution of the Global Terrorist Threat: From 9/11 to Osama bin Laden’s Death (2014).

Afghanistan Policy Under Trump, New America DC

Afghanistan Policy Under Trump

September 7, 2017

11:30 am – 1:00 pm
Where

New America

740 15th St NW #900

Washington, D.C. 20005

On August 21st, President Trump announced his new Afghanistan strategy, calling for the deployment of more troops and a conditional regional process. Yet many details of the strategy remain vague and Afghanistan continues to face an ongoing political-military crisis, as moves towards the 16th year of American military involvement in the country. What impact will the Trump strategy have, and where does Afghanistan stand today.

To discuss these issues, New America welcomes Peter Bergen, Vice President of New America, John Dempsey, a fellow with New America’s International Security Program and former senior advisor to Ambassador Richard C. Holbrooke and his successors in the State Department’s Office of the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, where he oversaw U.S. government rule of law and elections policy in the region from 2009-2016 and Ioannis Koskinas, a senior fellow with New America’s International Security Program who has been based in Afghanistan for the past seven years, to discuss these questions. Koskinas focuses on foreign policy issues with an emphasis on Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, and the Levant. Koskinas is the CEO of the Hoplite Group, a company focused on sustainable and innovative solutions to complex problems, in the most challenging environments and harshest conditions. The event will be moderated by Awista Ayub, Deputy Director of New America’s Fellows program and author of Kabul Girls Soccer Club and prior to joining New America worked as the director of South Asia programs at Seeds of Peace.

Follow the discussion online using #AfghanCrisis and following @NewAmericaISP.
Participants:

John Dempsey
Fellow, New America International Security Program

Ioannis Koskinas, @Gianni_in_Kabul
Senior Fellow, New America International Security Program
CEO, Hoplite Group

Peter Bergen, @PeterBergenCNN
Vice President, New America
Moderator:

Awista Ayub
Deputy Director, New America Fellows Program
Author, Kabul Girls Soccer Club

Trump, the Generals and the Afghan Decision, CNN.com

For Trump’s generals, this is personal
Peter Bergen

By Peter Bergen, CNN National Security Analyst

Updated 7:50 AM ET, Tue August 22, 2017

Peter Bergen says many of the President’s top advisers have served in Afghanistan or have personal ties to the war
They know that an abrupt withdrawal would be a mistake and they prevailed in discussions with President Trump, Bergen says

“Peter Bergen is CNN’s national security analyst, a vice president at New America and a professor of practice at Arizona State University. He is the author of “United States of Jihad: Investigating America’s Homegrown Terrorists.” This article has been updated with commentary on President Trump’s speech on Afghanistan.”

(CNN)The seriously deteriorating situation in Afghanistan — and what to do about it — is a deeply personal issue for Trump’s top national security advisers and generals.

In the months after the 9/11 attacks, Trump’s secretary of defense, retired Marine four-star General James Mattis, led the deepest assault from a ship in Marine Corps history near the key Taliban city of Kandahar in southern Afghanistan.

Trump’s National Security Adviser Lt. General H.R. McMaster served in Afghanistan, leading an anti-corruption task force there in 2010.

Trump’s top military adviser, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Marine Gen. Joseph F. Dunford, was the commanding general in Afghanistan in 2013.

And General John Kelly, the retired four-star Marine general who is now Trump’s chief of staff, lost a son in Afghanistan, 29-year-old Marine 1st Lt. Robert Kelly who was killed by a landmine there in 2010.

Four days after his son’s death, in a speech in St. Louis, Kelly said that the United States’ war against jihadist terrorists will go on for a very long time. “The American military has handed our ruthless enemy defeat after defeat, but it will go on for years, if not decades, before this curse has been eradicated,” he said at the time.

So when it came to developing a new strategy for Afghanistan, the generals brought a degree of commitment to the longest war in US history that their commander in chief, at least initially, did not share.
In 2013, for example, Trump tweeted, “Let’s get out of Afghanistan. Our troops are being killed by the Afghanis we train and we waste billions there. Nonsense! Rebuild the USA.”

The generals had a different view of what was at stake.

Generals Mattis, Kelly and Dunford have fought alongside each other since the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Then-Major General Mattis, then-Brigadier General Kelly and then-Colonel Dunford led the Marine force that went into Iraq in March 2003 during the initial US invasion of the country.

All of them experienced the visceral sense that US forces leaving Iraq at the end of 2011 helped pave the way for the collapse of the Iraqi army in the face of ISIS’s campaign in Iraq in 2014.

None of them wanted the same scenario to play out in Afghanistan, where the Taliban is at its strongest point since 9/11 and a virulent local affiliate of ISIS has established itself.

These Marine generals also know how hard-fought were the battles in the southern Afghan province of Helmand, where 349 Marines died in a campaign that began there in 2009 and ended in 2014.

Now 300 Marines are back in Helmand because the Taliban have recently regained territory the Marines had seized there several years ago. The Taliban also control or contest about a third of the Afghan population, around ten million people.

Monday night President Trump delivered an unusual prime-time address from Fort Myer in Arlington, Virginia about what his Afghanistan and larger South Asia strategy will be.

The well-delivered, well-written and well-argued speech largely reflected the consensus views of the generals and of the American national security apparatus.

As President Trump conceded in the speech, “My original instinct was to pull out. And historically, I like following my instincts.”

But Trump acknowledged that “a hasty withdrawal would create a vacuum for terrorists, including ISIS and Al Qaeda, would instantly fill just as happened before Sept. 11. And as we know, in 2011, America hastily and mistakenly withdrew from Iraq. As a result, our hard-won gains slipped back into the hands of terrorists.”

Trump also had stern words for Pakistan, a common theme of the American military: “Pakistan often gives safe haven to agents of chaos, violence and terror.”

Trump also made clear the American commitment to Afghanistan will be conditions based: “A core pillar of our new strategy is a shift from a time-based approach to one based on conditions. I’ve said it many times how counterproductive it is for the United States to announce in advance the dates we intend to begin or end military options.”

This was an implicit criticism of the Obama administration’s approach to Afghanistan. President Obama surged tens of thousands of additional US troops into Afghanistan in 2009, but he also simultaneously announced their withdrawal date. The Trump administration isn’t planning to repeat what it sees as a grave mistake.

But he also said, “America will work with the Afghan government as long as we see determination and progress. However, our commitment is not unlimited, and our support is not a blank check. ”

Trump’s national security advisers and generals with deep experience in Afghanistan had advised against the complete withdrawal that was Trump’s first instinct and also against the notion of using contractors as substitutes for US soldiers.

Both these options were on the table as the Trump national security team discussed the options in Afghanistan.
Those options were being pushed, in part, by Trump’s chief strategist Stephen Bannon, who was forced out of the White House on Friday.

Bannon didn’t attend the final war cabinet meeting on Afghanistan that Trump hosted at Camp David on Friday.
A decision to use American contractors in battlefield roles would face a number of legal obstacles, not least that they would be subject to Afghan laws.

For these reasons, privatizing the Afghan war and outsourcing it to contractors or withdrawing completely were really non-starters during the war cabinet’s deliberations on Afghanistan.

The United States’ key strategic goal in Afghanistan is to prevent the country from being taken over by jihadist groups such as the Taliban, al-Qaeda and ISIS, allowing the country to be once again used as a launching pad for attacks against the United States and its allies, as it was on September 11, 2001.
So far, that goal has cost the lives of 2,403 American soldiers.

Trump’s top national security advisers and generals understand both the stakes and the costs of the Afghan War well, because they have been personally deeply affected by it.

In the end, Trump came around to their view.

Future of War conference, ASU and New America, Reagan Building, DC

April 9, 2018 Washington, D.C.
Future of War Conference 2018
About

April 9, 2018 Washington, D.C.
Future of War Conference 2018
About

About the Event

New America and Arizona State University invite you to the 2018 Future of War Conference on April 9 in Washington, D.C. Leaders from government, military, journalism, academia, and the private sector will explore pressing issues in international security and defense, including:

What would a war with North Korea look like?
Do future conflicts require new Geneva Conventions?
How can the U.S. make sure it wins the cyber war of 2028?
After ISIS, what comes next in the Middle East?

This conference is one of the signature events of the Future of War project—a partnership between New America and Arizona State University—which brings together interdisciplinary experts working to develop new paradigms for understanding and addressing the changing character of war and systematic violence.

To request an invitation, please email events@newamerica.org with your name, affiliation, and title.

Note: schedule is subject to change.
Speakers
Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster
Lieutenant General H.R. McMaster

U.S. National Security Advisor

General Mark A. Milley
General Mark A. Milley

Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army

Gen. Stephen Wilson
General Stephen W. Wilson

Vice Chief of Staff of the U.S. Air Force

Peter Bergen
Peter Bergen

Vice President and Director, International Security and Future of War Programs

sharon-burke_person_image.jpeg
Sharon Burke

Senior Advisor, International Security Program and Resource Security Program

Matt Cavanaugh
Maj. Matt Cavanaugh

Fellow, Modern War Institute at West Point

Eliot Cohen
Dr. Eliot A. Cohen

Robert E. Osgood Professor of Strategic Studies, School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University

Davidson
Dr. Janine A. Davidson

President, Metropolitan State University of Denver

Davulcu
Hasan Davulcu

Associate Professor, School of Computing, Informatics and Decision Systems Engineering at Arizona State University

suzanne-dimaggio_person_image.jpeg
Suzanne DiMaggio

Leader, Track 2 Initiative

Easterly
Jen Easterly

Managing Director, Morgan Stanley

Freakley
Lt. Gen. Benjamin C. Freakley

Professor of Practice of Leadership and Special Advisor to the President, Arizona State University

Hathaway
Oona A. Hathaway

Gerard C. and Bernice Latrobe Smith Professor of International Law and Counselor to the Dean, Yale Law School

Kilcullen
Dr. David Kilcullen

ASU Future of War Senior Fellow

Gianni Koskinas
Gianni Koskinas

Senior Fellow, International Security Program, New America

robert-m-lee_person_image.jpeg
Robert M. Lee

Cybersecurity Policy Fellow, New America

Magsamen
Kelly Magsamen

Vice President for National Security, Center for American Progress

Nurkin
Tate Nurkin

CEO and Founder, OTH Intelligence Group LLC

O’Brien
James O’Brien

Senior Vice President of University Affairs and Chief of Staff, Arizona State University

douglas-ollivant_person_image.jpeg
Douglas A. Ollivant

ASU Future of War Senior Fellow

Oweidat
Nadia Oweidat

Assistant Professor, Kansas State University

Ricks
Tom Ricks

Senior Columnist, Task & Purpose

Rosen
Nir Rosen

Special Adviser for Syria and Iraq, Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue

daniel-rothenberg_person_image.jpeg
Daniel Rothenberg

Professor of Practice, School of Politics and Global Studies at Arizona State University

Schake
Dr. Kori Schake

Deputy Director-General, International Institute for Strategic Studies

Shapiro
Dr. Scott Shapiro

Charles F. Southmayd Professor of Law and Professor of Philosophy, Yale Law School

peter-warren-singer_person_image.jpeg
Peter W. Singer

Strategist & Senior Fellow, New America

anne-marie-slaughter_person_image.jpeg
Anne-Marie Slaughter

President and CEO, New America

Terry
Dr. Sue-Mi Terry

Senior Fellow for Korea at the Center for Strategic and International Studies

ian-wallace_person_image.jpeg
Ian Wallace

Co-Director, Cybersecurity Initiative, New America

Watts
Clint Watts

Robert A. Fox Fellow, Foreign Policy Research Institute

Yasseen
H.E. Ambassador Fareed Yasseen

Ambassador of the Republic of Iraq to the United States

Schedule

8:00 AM – 8:30 AM
Registration
8:30 AM – 8:40 AM
Welcome and Opening Remarks
Anne-Marie Slaughter President and CEO, New America
James O’Brien Senior Vice President of University Affairs and Chief of Staff to President Michael Crow, Arizona State University
8:40 AM – 9:25 AM
What Does the Army of the Future Look Like?
General Mark A. Milley Chief of Staff, U.S. Army
9:25 AM – 10:10 AM
How Can the United States Ensure It Wins the Cyber War of 2028?
Jen Easterly Managing Director and Head of the Cybersecurity Fusion Center, Morgan Stanley
Peter W. Singer Strategist and Senior Fellow, New America; Author, “Ghost Fleet: A Novel of the Next World War”
Robert M. Lee Founder and CEO, Dragos Inc.; Cybersecurity Fellow, New America
10:10 AM – 10:20 AM
Break
10:20 AM – 11:05 AM
How Will the Air Force Fight in Future Space, Air and Cyber Domains?
General Stephen W. Wilson Vice Chief of Staff, U.S. Air Force
Peter W. Singer Strategist and Senior Fellow, New America; Author, “Ghost Fleet: A Novel of the Next World War”
11:05 AM – 11:25 AM
Is Afghanistan Already Lost?
Gianni Koskinas CEO, the Hoplite Group; Senior Fellow, International Security program, New America
Candace Rondeaux Professor of Practice and Center on the Future of War Senior Fellow, ASU
11:25 AM – 11:35 AM
How to Harness Big Data to Respond to Violent Extremism?
Hasan Davulcu Co-director, ASU Center for Assured and Scalable Data Engineering; Creator, LookingGlass
11:35 AM – 12:15 PM
Do U.S. Generals Have Too Much Power?
Kori Schake Deputy Director-general, International Institute for Strategic Studies
Eliot A. Cohen Robert E. Osgood Professor of Strategic Studies, Johns Hopkins SAIS
Janine A. Davidson President, Metropolitan State University of Denver
MAJ Matt Cavanaugh Fellow, Modern War Institute at West Point
LTG (Ret.) Ben Freakley Professor of practice of Leadership and Special Adviser to the President, ASU
12:15 PM – 1:00 PM
Lunch
1:00 PM – 1:40 PM
After ISIS: What Is Next in the Middle East?
H. E. Ambassador Fareed Yasseen Ambassador of Iraq to the United States
David Kilcullen ASU Future of War Senior Fellow, New America; President and CEO, Cordillera Applications Group
Nir Rosen Journalist and Author, “Aftermath: Following the Bloodshed of America’s Wars in the Muslim World”
Nadia Oweidat Assistant Professor, Kansas State University; Senior Fellow, New America
1:40 PM – 1:50 PM
#War: Tracking Russian Influence Operations on Twitter
Clint Watts Robert A. Fox Fellow, Program on the Middle East, Foreign Policy Research Institute
1:50 PM – 2:30 PM
How Does North Korea See the Future of War?
Sue Mi Terry Senior Fellow for the Korea Chair, Center for Strategic and International Studies
Sharon Burke Director, Resource Security program, New America
2:30 PM – 3:00 PM
How Should the Pentagon Use Artificial Intelligence?
Michael D. Griffin Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, Department of Defense
Evanna Hu Technologist and Founding Partner, Omelas
Stephen Rodriguez Senior Fellow, New America
3:00 PM – 3:20 PM
Are North Korean Decision Makers Rational?
Suzanne DiMaggio Leader, U.S.-North Korea Track 1.5 and Track 2 Diplomacy Initiatives; Fellow, New America
Anne-Marie Slaughter President and CEO, New America
3:20 PM – 3:30 PM
Break
3:30 PM – 4:30 PM
What is the Future of U.S. National Security?
Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster National Security Advisor
Peter Bergen Director, International Security program, New America; National Security Analyst, CNN
4:30 PM – 4:50 PM
Can International Law Prevent Future Wars?
Oona Hathaway Gerard C. and Bernice Latrobe Smith Professor of International Law and Counselor to the Dean, Yale Law School
Scott J. Shapiro Charles F. Southmayd Professor of Law and Professor of Philosophy, Yale Law School
Daniel Rothenberg Professor of practice, School of Politics and Global Studies and Co-director, Center on the Future of War, ASU
4:50 PM – 5:30 PM
How Does China See the Future of War?
Kelly Magsamen Vice President for National Security and International Policy, Center for American Progress
Tate Nurkin Former Executive Director for Strategic Assessments, Jane’s by IHS Markit
Tom Ricks Senior Columnist, Task & Purpose; Author, Churchill and Orwell; and ASU Future of War Senior Fellow, New America
Venue

Ronald Reagan Building & International Trade Center
1300 Pennsylvania Ave NW, Pavilion Room
Washington, D.C. 20004

Future of War 2018 will be held in the Pavilion Room of the Ronald Reagan Building & International Trade Center in Washington, D.C.
Directions
By Car

Enter parking garage from any of the three entrance ramps
Follow posted GREEN signs for the Atrium elevator banks
Take Atrium North or Atrium South elevator to “G” Ground level
Exit the Atrium elevator and turn right
Walk to the intersection near the Environmental Protection Agency office lobby (in the Ronald Reagan Building) and make a right
Follow the corridor to the Pavilion elevator banks on the right hand side
Take the Pavilion elevators to the Second “2” Floor

By Cab or Metro from Metro Center (Red Line)

Enter the Moynihan Plaza at the corner of 13th and Pennsylvania Avenue
Walk towards ARIA Restaurant (orange awning)
Enter the building through the door on your right just before the restaurant
Once you are through the security checkpoint walk to the Pavilion elevator banks on your left
Take the Pavilion elevator to the Second “2” Floor

By Cab or Metro from Federal Triangle (Blue, Orange and Silver Lines)

Follow signs inside station to Ronald Reagan Building
Once inside the building, walk straight down the corridor to the ATM and turn right
Follow the directional signage toward the Conference Center
Once you reach the Business Center turn left
Walk to the Pavilion elevator bank and take the elevator to the 2nd floor

New America® is a registered trademark

Contact Jobs Policies and Procedures Creative Commons

Facebook Twitter LinkedIn

2018 Global SOF Symposium, Tampa, Florida

2018 Global SOF Symposium

GLOBAL SOF FOUNDATION
U.S. and international special operations leaders will gather on February 19-21, 2018 for an exclusive event to focus on strategic security issues, innovation, and relationship-building.
A full agenda featuring international thought leaders, technical experts, and transition education will provide attendees with a unique experience
Attendees include: active duty and retired military and police, government civilians, industry, academia, journalists, and non-governmental organizations
Previous year’s event attracted 400 attendees from 25 nations

Jaipur Literary Festival, Diggi Palace Jaipur, India

25th – 29th January, 2018
Diggi Palace Jaipur
contact@teamworkarts.com

24th – 29th January, 2018 at Diggi Palace, Jaipur
The Greatest Literary Show on Earth

Registrations are now open!

The 2018 edition of the Festival will bring together a dizzying array of voices and cerebral conversations.
Register Now

24th – 29th January, 2018 at Diggi Palace, Jaipur
The Greatest Literary Show on Earth

Described as the ‘greatest literary show on Earth’, the ZEE Jaipur Literature Festival is the world’s largest free event of its kind.
Equity and democracy run through the Festival’s veins, placing some of the world’s greatest minds, humanitarians, historians, politicians, business leaders.
Read More

The Jaipur Literary Festival is part-circus, part-postgraduate seminar and part-revolutionary assembly.

Special Operations and Modern Warfare, ASU, UT, Global SOF and NA, New America DC

For Trump’s generals, this is personal. CNN.com

For Trump’s generals, this is personal
Peter Bergen

By Peter Bergen, CNN National Security Analyst

Peter Bergen says many of the President’s top advisers have served in Afghanistan or have personal ties to the war
They know that an abrupt withdrawal would be a mistake, Bergen says

“Peter Bergen is CNN’s national security analyst, a vice president at New America and a professor of practice at Arizona State University. He is the author of “United States of Jihad: Investigating America’s Homegrown Terrorists.””

(CNN)The seriously deteriorating situation in Afghanistan — and what to do about it — is a deeply personal issue for Trump’s top national security advisers and generals.

In the months after the 9/11 attacks, Trump’s secretary of defense, retired Marine four-star General James Mattis, led the deepest assault from a ship in Marine Corps history near the key Taliban city of Kandahar in southern Afghanistan.

Trump’s National Security Adviser Lt. General H.R. McMaster served in Afghanistan, leading an anti-corruption task force there in 2010.

Trump’s top military adviser, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Marine Gen. Joseph F. Dunford, was the commanding general in Afghanistan in 2013.
And General John Kelly, the retired four-star Marine general who is now Trump’s chief of staff, lost a son in Afghanistan, 29-year-old Marine 1st Lt. Robert Kelly who was killed by a landmine there in 2010.

Four days after his son’s death, in a speech in St. Louis, Kelly said that the United States’ war against jihadist terrorists will go on for a very long time. “The American military has handed our ruthless enemy defeat after defeat, but it will go on for years, if not decades, before this curse has been eradicated,” he said at the time.

So when it came to developing a new strategy for Afghanistan, the generals brought a degree of commitment to the longest war in US history that their commander in chief, at least initially, did not share.

In 2013, for example, Trump tweeted, “Let’s get out of Afghanistan. Our troops are being killed by the Afghanis we train and we waste billions there. Nonsense! Rebuild the USA.”

The generals had a different view of what was at stake.

Generals Mattis, Kelly and Dunford have fought alongside each other since the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Then-Major General Mattis, then-Brigadier General Kelly and then-Colonel Dunford led the Marine force that went into Iraq in March 2003 during the initial US invasion of the country.

All of them experienced the visceral sense that US forces leaving Iraq at the end of 2011 helped pave the way for the collapse of the Iraqi army in the face of ISIS’s campaign in Iraq in 2014.

None of them want the same scenario to play out in Afghanistan, where the Taliban is at its strongest point since 9/11 and a virulent local affiliate of ISIS has established itself.

These Marine generals also know how hard-fought were the battles in the southern Afghan province of Helmand, where 349 Marines died in a campaign that began there in 2009 and ended in 2014.

Now 300 Marines are back in Helmand because the Taliban have recently regained territory the Marines had seized there several years ago. The Taliban also control or contest about a third of the Afghan population, around ten million people.

Monday at 9 p.m. ET, President Trump will make an unusual prime-time address from Fort Myer in Arlington, Virginia about what his Afghanistan and larger South Asia strategy will be.

Trump’s national security advisers and generals with deep experience in Afghanistan have advised against a complete withdrawal and against the notion of using contractors as substitutes for US soldiers.

Both these options were on the table as the Trump national security team discussed the options in Afghanistan.

Those options were being pushed, in part, by Trump’s chief strategist Stephen Bannon, who was forced out of the White House on Friday.

Bannon didn’t attend the final war cabinet meeting on Afghanistan that Trump hosted at Camp David on Friday.

A decision to use American contractors in battlefield roles would face a number of legal obstacles, not least that they would be subject to Afghan laws.

For these reasons, privatizing the Afghan war and outsourcing it to contractors or withdrawing completely were really non-starters during the war cabinet’s deliberations on Afghanistan.

Trump officials are tight-lipped about what Trump will announce on Monday night, but he is likely to endorse something close to what the National Security Council plan for Afghanistan has been for the past few months. By mid-June, Trump’s approach to the Afghan War was emerging and it was different from President Obama’s in an important respect.

Trump seemed to be committing US military forces to an open-ended deployment in Afghanistan, according to a senior US official familiar with the plans.
While Obama surged tens of thousands of additional US troops into Afghanistan, he also simultaneously announced their withdrawal date. According to the US official, the Trump administration won’t make the same mistake.

Trump on Monday night will likely also announce some form of conditionality for the expanded US presence in Afghanistan, setting benchmarks, for instance, to reduce corruption in one of the most corrupt countries in the world.

Trump may also mention Afghanistan’s mineral wealth as a “return on investment” that the United States can help to exploit.

Tapping Afghanistan’s vast mineral wealth is a challenge because of the declining security situation and Afghanistan’s rudimentary road infrastructure, but it was one of the key items that Trump and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani discussed when Ghani called Trump to congratulate him on his election to the presidency, according to a senior Afghan official.

When Trump speaks on Monday night, the additional American forces he will likely announce he is sending to Afghanistan are not going there to do anything close to “nation building.” But they are providing triage to help reinforce the Afghan army, which faces its gravest challenge yet from the Taliban.
The United States’ key strategic goal in Afghanistan is to prevent the country from being taken over by jihadist groups such as the Taliban, al-Qaeda and ISIS, allowing the country to be once again used as a launching pad for attacks against the United States and its allies, as it was on September 11, 2001.

So far, that goal has cost the lives of 2,403 American soldiers.

Trump’s top national security advisers and generals understand both the stakes and the costs of the Afghan War well, because they have been personally deeply affected by it.