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U.S. Capitol Police Chief Highlights Improvements Capitol Security
During the last two years, the U.S. Capitol Police (USCP) has been working around the clock to implement more than 100 significant improvements. “Today we are clearly better off than we were before the January 6 attack,” USCP chief says.
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U.S. Gun Violence Soars in 2022
Across America, gun violence surged in many communities in 2022 as overall death rates from firearms rose to the highest level in nearly three decades. The year saw a near-record number of mass casualty shooting incidents, including several motivated by hate.
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Wildfires in Colorado Are Growing More Unpredictable. Officials Have Ignored the Warnings.
A year after the deadly Marshall Fire drove thousands of Coloradans from their homes, the state’s densest communities aren’t preparing for the next climate-driven wildfire.
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New Study Suggests Climate Change Will Make Submarine Warfare More Complex
Over the coming decades, soundwaves will travel further through a warmer, chemically different, less dense ocean—and it will be noisier underwater than ever. With sound traveling further, undersea stealth platforms such as submarines will find it more difficult to hide in the open ocean. But they may also find it easier to hide in coastal waters, as the ocean becomes noisier.
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U.S. Military Expert: “Ukraine's Position on the Battlefield Is Very Strong”
John Spencer says Russian President Vladimir Putin is unlikely to end the Russian invasion of Ukraine anytime soon but he predicts Ukraine will ultimately prevail. He says the recent decision by Washington to deliver a Patriot missile battery to Ukraine may not be a game-changing move, but it could trigger other Western allies to donate similar systems, bolstering Kyiv’s defenses.
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What’s Happened to Russia’s Much-Vaunted Battlefield AI?
So far, Russia’s deployment in Ukraine has been a demonstration of some of the limitations and vulnerabilities of AI-enabled systems. It has also exposed some longer-term strategic weaknesses in Russia’s development of AI for military and economic purposes.
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In Some U.S. Zip Codes, Young Men Face More Risk of Firearm Death Than Those Deployed in Recent Wars
The risk of firearm death in the U.S. is on the rise: in 2020, firearms became the leading cause of death for children, adolescents and young adults, but the risk is uneven. New research puts the risk of firearm-related death in perspective and calls attention to the urgent need for violence reduction interventions in the U.S.
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Portable Outdoor Gunshot Detection Technology for Law Enforcement
A new portable Gunshot Detection System can provide critical information about outdoor shooting incidents almost instantaneously to first responders.
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Major Losses Shift Islamic State, Al-Qaida's Balance of Power
Across the United States and many other Western countries, the threat from Islamist terror groups has been increasingly overshadowed by the threats from other extremist groups, but despite a rise in far-right and white-power-driven terrorist threats, counterterrorism officials have been careful not to overlook the still persistent threat from groups such as the Islamic State and al-Qaida., even though both the Islamic State, known as IS, ISIS or Daesh, and al-Qaida suffered significant setbacks in 2022.
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Concerns About Extremists Targeting U.S. Power Stations
Attacks on four power stations in Washington State over the weekend added to concerns of a possible nationwide campaign by far-right extremists to stir fears and spark civil conflict. Violent extremists “have developed credible, specific plans to attack electricity infrastructure since at least 2020, identifying the electric grid as a particularly attractive target given its interdependency with other infrastructure sectors,” the DHS said in a January.
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Drug Gangs Threatening Rule of Law in the Netherlands
The Netherlands is a country known for upholding the rule of law. But the yearlong investigation of the murder of crime reporter Peter R. de Vries has exposed cracks in the Dutch legal system.
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Wildfires Threats Not Commonly Disclosed by U.S. Firms Despite Risk to Economy
Wildfires in the United States, especially in Western states, increasingly pose a significant risk to entire communities, often destroying homes, businesses and lives. Yet U.S. firms rarely report their wildfire risks in required federal filings and instead bury such risks in nonspecific risk disclosures.
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U.S. Saw Increase in Domestic Terror Threats in 2022
The sweeping police raids in Germany earlier this month which nabbed 25 members of a far-right group who were plotting to topple the government and replace it with a Kaiser, highlighted the shifting and increasingly complex landscape facing Western countries in 2022 and, counterterrorism officials say, for years to come.
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What the Patriot Missile System Can -- and Can't -- Do for Ukraine
Washington will supply an expensive, highly advanced Patriot missile battery to Ukraine, but experts say the defensive weapon may not be the game changer many are hoping for.
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Experts: North Korea's ICBMs Pose Preemption Challenges for US
North Korea’s rapidly advancing ICBM capabilities pose a growing threat to the United States and its allies, especially as it will become increasingly difficult to destroy Pyongyang’s missiles prior to launch with preemptive strikes.
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The long view
AI-Controlled Fighter Jets May Be Closer Than We Think — and Would Change the Face of Warfare
Could we be on the verge of an era where fighter jets take flight without pilots – and are controlled by artificial intelligence (AI)? US R Adm Michael Donnelly recently said that an upcoming combat jet could be the navy’s last one with a pilot in the cockpit.
What We’ve Learned from Survivors of the Atomic Bombs
Q&A with Dr. Preetha Rajaraman, New Vice Chair for the Radiation Effects Research Foundation in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan.
Need for National Information Clearinghouse for Cybercrime Data, Categorization of Cybercrimes: Report
There is an acute need for the U.S. to address its lack of overall governance and coordination of cybercrime statistics. A new report recommends that relevant federal agencies create or designate a national information clearinghouse to draw information from multiple sources of cybercrime data and establish connections to assist in criminal investigations.
Autonomous Weapon Systems: No Human-in-the-Loop Required, and Other Myths Dispelled
“The United States has a strong policy on autonomy in weapon systems that simultaneously enables their development and deployment and ensures they could be used in an effective manner, meaning the systems work as intended, with the same minimal risk of accidents or errors that all weapon systems have,” Michael Horowitz writes.
Twenty-One Things That Are True in Los Angeles
To understand the dangers inherent in deploying the California National Guard – over the strenuous objections of the California governor – and active-duty Marines to deal with anti-ICE protesters, we should remind ourselves of a few elementary truths, writes Benjamin Wittes. Among these truths: “Not all lawful exercises of authority are wise, prudent, or smart”; “Not all crimes require a federal response”; “Avoiding tragic and unnecessary confrontations is generally desirable”; and “It is thus unwise, imprudent, and stupid to take actions for performative reasons that one might reasonably anticipate would increase the risks of such confrontations.”
Luigi Mangione and the Making of a ‘Terrorist’
Discretion is crucial to the American tradition of criminal law, Jacob Ware and Ania Zolyniak write, noting that “lawmakers enact broader statutes to empower prosecutors to pursue justice while entrusting that they will stay within the confines of their authority and screen out the inevitable “absurd” cases that may arise.” Discretion is also vital to maintaining the legitimacy of the legal system. In the prosecution’s case against Luigi Mangione, they charge, “That discretion was abused.”