Ambassador Stephen Bosworth was typically cryptic in his remarks after concluding two days of meetings last week with North Korean counterparts. Bosworth stated that the bilateral talks were “moving in the right direction [since] we have made some progress.” He added that the tone of the meetings was “positive and …
Whatever became of President Barack Obama’s vaunted foreign policy czars, who were to transform America’s international relations through soft power diplomacy? The answer is nothing good. One by one the czars have fallen by the wayside, leaving a trail of bureaucratic irritation and diplomatic failure behind them. The Administration now …
Yesterday, the State Department released an official reaction to media reports on upcoming joint naval exercises between Russia and North Korea. The U.S. declared that “any engagement with the North Koreans should be conducted in a way that does not detract from the international community’s clear message of concern about …
The French Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defense and the Armed Forces recently released a report called “Ballistic Missile Defense: Military Shield or Strategic Challenge?” This report urges France to take a strong role in the NATO missile defense program and to develop a space-based (exoatmospheric) ballistic missile defense interceptor. …
According to unconfirmed reports, two missile warheads capable of being armed with a nuclear weapon have been acquired by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Reza Kahlili, a former member of the Revolutionary Guards who became a spy for the CIA before defecting to the United States, charged in an article …
North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il’s visit to China this week has again raised questions about the nature of their relationship. A recently leaked U.N. report described suspected ballistic missile technology exchanges between North Korea and Iran. The technology transited through an unnamed neighboring country, which several U.N. diplomats, under the …
By further cementing the positive relationship between South Korea and the United States, the pending South Korea–United States (KORUS) free trade agreement will further weaken the oppressive North Korean regime’s strategic position and help disabuse the regime’s leaders of any hopes they might have had of flagging U.S. support for …
Some critics of the proposed South Korea–U.S. Free Trade Agreement (KORUS) have expressed concerns about imports from North Korea, specifically goods originating from the Kaesong Industrial Region. This should be a non-issue. The chart below compares how imports from North Korea are treated today and how they will be treated …
The book Ballistic Missile Defense: Its Past and Future by Jacques Gansler is yet another contribution to the ongoing debate on the role of ballistic missile defense (BMD) in the U.S. strategic posture. Unfortunately, a middle path to ballistic missile defense proposed in the book stems from incorrect premises about …
