• We Rarely Hear About the Disasters Which Were Avoided – but There’s a Lot We Can Learn from Them

    We frequently see headlines about disasters. But where are the headlines covering the good news of lives saved and damage averted when disasters do not happen? Our work, now published, offers examples we can learn from.

  • Learning from When the Earth Moves: Protecting Indonesia’s New Capital City

    Indonesia plans to build a new capital city from scratch. Protecting the new city from the effects of earthquakes will be crucial. Here’s how researchers are helping.

  • Outsourcing Surveillance: A Cost-Effective Strategy to Maintain Maritime Supremacy

    Persistent surveillance is one of the most valuable types of surveillance missions. But, Josh Portzer and Aaron Stein write, “Persistent surveillance is a challenging problem for two reasons: capacity and cost. In today’s budgetary climate, “simply increasing U.S. military capacity is not tenable. [But] by increasing the number of sensors globally, the Department of Defense would not only gain valuable, near-persistent surveillance data in areas of interest at (relatively) affordable prices, but also would enjoy the option of gray-zone operations given the strategic ambiguity that outsourcing provides.”

  • How Do Civilians Respond to Political Violence?

    When conflict breaks out, civilians inevitably suffer. But they do not react uniformly, with some fleeing, others staying, and still others joining the fray. Civilians’ perceptions of their own agency often shape their behavior. Aidan Milliff writes that this understanding has implications for policy: The United States and other countries, in their efforts to help civilians who face political violence, should focus more on changing these civilians’ perceptions.

  • Preparing U.S., Partners for Radiological Response

    After the September 11th attacks, security professionals worried that terrorists might detonate a “dirty bomb” – an explosive device enhanced with radiological source materials. Responders for this type of event had to be trained.

  • Los Alamos National Lab Safely Shipping Radiological and Hazardous Waste Off-Site

    A substantial amount of Los Alamos National Lab’s radiological and hazardous waste from years past was permanently disposed of at off-site facilities — a move in step with the Lab’s goal to mitigate hazards to workers, the community, and the environment while carrying out its national security mission.

  • The Path to Peace in Gaza Lies in Defeating Hamas

    Israel cannot continue living with a Hamas-controlled Gaza. The untenability of having Hamas on Israel’s border has long been clear. However, to dismantle and disarm the group was always going to involve grievous civilian bloodshed and the inflaming of anti-Israeli opinion—a prohibitive proposition for Israel prior to 7 October. Yet now Israel finds itself facing this task anyway, which is a reminder to the world that tolerating the intolerable—even grudgingly, because the alternatives are too difficult—is never sustainable in the long term. This was demonstrated on 7 October.

  • Regional Security Analysts Say Africa at Risk of Drone Terrorism

    African terrorist groups are using global affiliations to acquire and modify drones for their own needs. Though the drones are not yet being used to launch attacks, the growing use of drones by terrorist groups is only a question of time, and analysts worry that in the long run, they could change the balance of power with governments.

  • Japan Military Aid Expands Southeast Asia Footprint

    A new security assistance scheme is allowing Japan to expand its role in helping smaller countries like the Philippines cope with China’s military ambitions.

  • EFF to Supreme Court: Fifth Amendment Protects People from Being Forced to Enter or Hand Over Cell Phone Passcodes to the Police

    The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) last week asked the Supreme Court to overturn a ruling undermining Fifth Amendment protections against self-incrimination and find that constitutional safeguards prevent police from forcing people to provide or use passcodes for their cell phones so officers can access the tremendous amount of private information on phones.

  • “Rogue” Security Officers Pose a Threat to Life and Public Safety

    Halo Solutions, a British security and safety technology firm helps stamp out fraudulent security guards at events and gigs. The issue of qualified and certified security officers becomes even more important now, ads the U.K. is about to mandate robust public security measures at public events.

  • Analysis of IAEA Iran Verification and Monitoring Report — November 2023

    Iran’s stocks of enriched uranium and its centrifuge capacity combined are sufficient to make enough weapon-grade uranium (WGU), taken as 25 kilograms (kg) of WGU, for six nuclear weapons in one month, eight in two months, ten in three months, eleven in four months, and twelve in five months.

  • Antisemitism and Anti-Muslim Hate Are Surging. Here's How to Curb the Worst American Tradition.

    As violence escalates in Israel’s struggle with Hamas, the potential for hate-based violence in the United States grows, too. American leaders need to step in to defuse tensions – with the awareness that the United States has a history of mirroring overseas conflicts in its own communities.

  • Reforms Needed to Expand Prescribed Burns

    Prescribed fire, which mimics natural fire regimes, can help improve forest health and reduce the likelihood of catastrophic wildfire. But this management tool is underused in the fire-prone U.S. West and Baja California, Mexico, due to several barriers. Study highlights four strategies to overcome barriers to prescribed fire in the West.

  • Hamas Isn’t the First Military Group to Hide Behind Civilians as a Way to Wage War

    Using places and things civilians need, like hospitals, as a means to fight a war is considered a weapon of the weak. It is a way to use another side’s values against it. I think it is clear that Hamas has – in this war and historically – tried to embed themselves and weapons in places civilians live or visit, in order to make it more difficult for the Israelis to target them. But using civilians to further a military advantage is not a new phenomenon.