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Begin New Search Content Type Working Paper Publishing Institution Atlantic Council

1. A candle in the dark: US national security strategy for artificial intelligence

Author:
Tate Nurkin and Stephen Rodriguez
Publication Date:
12-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
AI is expected to have a transformational impact on the future of geopolitics, defense, and security. The emerging geopolitical and security context influencing the future of AI technology development has been driven by the erosion of traditional geopolitical frameworks, increased conflict between liberalism and authoritarianism, the pervasiveness of social media use and 4IR-driven digitization of industries, as well as the ability of more actors to affect strategic and operational environments. However, the future of AI will depend on the decisions of great power competitors—the US, China and Russia—global trends development, and the management of uncertainties associated with emerging technologies. In this fluctuating environment, where the US is engaged in a high-stakes competition with is near-peer adversaries, and AI is enabling paradigm-shifting changes in public and private sector operations, how should the US respond? In this new Atlantic Council Strategy Paper, A Candle in the Dark: US National Security Strategy for Artificial Intelligence, Tate Nurkin and Stephen Rodriguez provide an integrated strategy to respond to this key issue. According to Former US Secretary of Defense Dr. Ashton B. Carter, author of the foreword, this paper “effectively articulates the current technological landscape and offers a coherent strategic framework for the United States and its allies to harness AI’s upside potential, while mitigating downside risks and defending against emerging threats.” In a world full of uncertainties, this paper provides a holistic way forward for the US to leverage the full potential of AI while maintaining America’s technological competitiveness.
Topic:
Defense Policy, NATO, Intelligence, National Security, Science and Technology, Cybersecurity, Entrepreneurship, Drones, Conflict, and Disinformation
Political Geography:
Russia, China, Eurasia, Asia, North America, and United States of America

2. Present at the re-creation: A global strategy for revitalizing, adapting, and defending a rules-based international system

Author:
Ash Jain and Matthew Kroenig
Publication Date:
10-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
In the immediate aftermath of the Second World War, the United States and other leading democracies built an international system that ushered in an almost 70-year period of remarkable peace and prosperity. After three decades of largely uncontested primacy, however, this rules-based system is now under unprecedented challenge, both from within and without. We need a new strategy— one ambitious enough to meet the moment, and one innovative enough to fit the challenges and opportunities of the 21st century.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and NATO
Political Geography:
China, Canada, Asia, North America, and United States of America

3. Dealing with the Offshore Economy

Author:
Alan Riley
Publication Date:
04-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
Given that offshore tax havens are largely located in small, independent states or self-governing territories, it could be assumed that they have little connection to OECD states and major financial centers such as London and New York. This is not the case. The so-called tax havens are in fact part of a much larger network of financial and corporate services that depends on lawyers, accountants, and bankers located in major Western cities. Only one part of the havens’ business actually involves providing lower tax rates to individual foreign account holders
Topic:
International Affairs and Global Political Economy
Political Geography:
Global Focus

4. Russia and Iran in Syria— a Random Partnership or an Enduring Alliance?

Author:
Michel Duclos
Publication Date:
01-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
Russia and Iran are allies in Syria not out of mutual sympathy, but for pragmatic reasons. According to many reports, Iranian leaders—notably including Qasem Soleimani, the head of the Al-Quds force of the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC)—were instrumental in convincing Vladimir Putin to send his air force to Syria and save Bashar al-Assad’s skin in September 2015
Topic:
International Affairs
Political Geography:
Russia and Iran

5. Human Rights Abuses in Russia-Occupied Crimea

Author:
Andrii Klymenko
Publication Date:
08-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
The “green men” who fanned out across Crimea in early 2014, establishing control over key infrastructure and clearing the way for once-marginal political actors to seize the reins of power, were the vanguard of a forced political change that has led to grave human rights abuses across the Crimean peninsula. Firmly in control of the executive and law enforcement bodies, the so-called Crimean authorities ostensibly implemented the law of the Russian Federation but in reality created a hybrid system where Russian law is subsidiary to the whims of “selfdefense forces” and “republican authorities.” Those forces derive their power from their weapons rather than from the support of the local population. In an environment where brute force rules the day, the international community has lost access to basic information about political, economic, and social developments on the Crimean peninsula. As a result, human rights abuses, now a regular part of life in Crimea, are left unreported or poorly understood. Freedom House and the Atlantic Council’s Dinu Patriciu Eurasia Center are proud to present Andrii Klymenko’s report, Human Rights Abuses in Russian-Occupied Crimea. His work makes an important contribution to our understanding of what has happened in Crimea since the Kremlin forcibly seized the peninsula in February 2014, setting off a crisis that is transforming security calculations in Europe and Eurasia.

6. Empowering America: How Energy Abundance Can Strengthen US Global Leadership

Author:
Senator Lisa Murkowski, Senator Mark Warner, Bud Coote, and David L. Goldwyn
Publication Date:
07-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Chairwoman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resource Committee, and Senator Mark Warner (D-VA), co-chaired the Atlantic Council Global Energy Center's US Energy Boom and National Security task force, which convened foreign policy, defense, and energy experts. The experts assessed how the United States can strengthen American leadership, advance international security, and promote global prosperity by leveraging necessary hydrocarbon export policies and deploying US prowess in energy innovation and technology to others. The task force report, Empowering America: How Energy Abundance Can Strengthen US Global Leadership, makes the case for a more robust energy strategy that capitalizes on US energy resources to advance our foreign policy and economic interests. It calls on US policymakers to repeal the crude oil export ban, ease the process of licensing for LNG exports, sustain research and investment in clean energy technology, support energy diplomacy and technical assistance abroad, advance North American energy integration efforts, and more. The report unequivocally concludes that, if properly utilized, American energy abundance will be an extremely valuable tool that favorably impacts global energy security, trade, and US foreign policy.

7. Cuba’s Economic Reintegration: Begin with the International Financial Institutions

Author:
Pavel Vidal and Scott Brown
Publication Date:
07-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
Cuba's Economic Reintegration: Begin with the International Financial Institutions is the first major policy publication on Cuba's role in the global economic community since the December announcement of new policies toward Cuba. The team of authors include Cuban economist Pavel Vidal and former Senior IMF Economist Scott Brown, a former mission chief for Albania. Beyond examining conditions in Cuba, the report also looks to the successful reintegration of previously isolated economies such as Vietnam and Albania as possible models for Cuba. It calls on the United States to put aside longstanding objections to Cuban membership to the IFIs and for Cuban authorities to re-evaluate why this may be the moment to take steps toward engaging the international organizations. Joining the IFIs could provide necessary technical assistance to transition the economy, spur economic growth, assist with infrastructure development, and improve the lives of everyday Cubans.

8. Hiding in Plain Sight: Putin's War in Ukraine

Author:
Maksymilian Czuperski, John Herbst, Eliot Higgins, Alina Polyakova, and Damon Wilson
Publication Date:
07-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
Russia is at war with Ukraine. Russian citizens and soldiers are fighting and dying in a war of their government's own making. Russian President Vladimir Putin continues to deny Russian involvement in the fighting, but the evidence is overwhelming and indisputable. Drawing upon open source information, Hiding in Plain Sight: Putin's War in Ukraine provides irrefutable evidence of direct Russian military involvement in eastern Ukraine.

9. The Naval Alliance: Preparing NATO for a Maritime Century

Author:
Magnus Nordenman
Publication Date:
07-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
For more than a decade, NATO has been engaged in expeditionary ground-centric operations that have shaped the strategic thinking, capabilities, and planning of the Alliance and its members. But moving forward, NATO must also consider its role in the global maritime domain as it relates to transatlantic security and interests, as well as NATO operations. The maritime domain is increasingly competitive and contested, and the return of geopolitical competition has important maritime dimensions. Russian aggression to the east and Mediterranean turbulence to the south present unique maritime challenges for European security.

10. The Impact of Turkish Stream on European Energy Security and the Southern Gas Corridor

Author:
John Roberts
Publication Date:
07-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
Russia has proposed building a major new pipeline intended to carry gas to customers in both Turkey and the European Union. The project, dubbed Turkish Stream, is controversial for two interconnected reasons. Firstly, it is intended to help Gazprom fulfil its stated intention of terminating gas exports to Europe via Ukraine by the end of 2019. Secondly, it is far from clear that customers in the European Union would accept delivery of gas at Turkey's border with Greece in place of current deliveries to locations in Central Europe.