We strive to examine issues important to U.S. national security from a post-partisan perspective, meaning we try to break through the spin to find ideas we can use to encourage fresh thinking and build genuine consensus.
What we are reading
posted by Paul Hamill on March 21, 2012 at 11:19 am
ASP EVENT Monday 26 March: The Iranian Nuclear Problem: Status and Prospects
FACT CHECK: More US drilling didn’t drop gas price
SETH BORENSTEIN and JACK GILLUM / Associated Press
It’s the political cure-all for high gas prices: Drill here, drill now. But more U.S. drilling has not changed how deeply the gas pump drills into your wallet, math and history show.
New adviser teams key to US exit from Afghanistan
LOLITA C. BALDOR / Associated Press
Deep in the piney woods of western Louisiana, a mob of Afghans gathers at the gate of what looks like a typical government building in southern Afghanistan.
India asks Iran to bear oil insurance risk amid sanctions
Nidhi Verma and Luke Pachymuthu / Reuters
Indian oil buyers are asking Iran to bear the insurance risk for transporting its crude as tighter Western sanctions make it more difficult to buy Tehran’s principal export, industry sources said on Wednesday.
Powerful pulse a milepost on the way to fusion energy.
Eric Hand/ Nature
The world’s largest laser has just put a little more zing in its zap. On 15 March, the 192 laser beams of the National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California, fired a record 1.875-megajoule shot into the laser’s target chamber, surpassing its 1.8-megajoule design specification. The shot, which was just a demonstration and did not incorporate a target, nonetheless represents a milepost in an effort to get past the break-even point — ignition — in coaxing fusion energy from a tiny frozen fuel pellet.
Nuclear fusion simulation shows high-gain energy output
R&D Magazine
High-gain nuclear fusion could be achieved in a preheated cylindrical container immersed in strong magnetic fields, according to a series of computer simulations performed at Sandia National Laboratories.
The world can’t referee two different trade games
Clyde Prestowitz / FT
As the director of President Reagan’s strike force against unfair trade, I targeted Airbus subsidies and a variety of Japanese trade barriers. Although we achieved positive results in specific cases, in a broader sense we got nowhere. Airbus still found ways to get subsidies and Japan remained largely impervious to imports.
Karzai’s team clash over relations with US
Qais Azimy and Mujib Mashal / Al Jazeera
The increasing influence of a conservative circle within President Hamid Karzai’s palace has impeded progress in signing a crucial strategic agreement with the US to chart the relationship beyond 2014, officials and analysts have said.
On Our Flashpoint Blog
Dorsk: Rare Earths and Energy: China’s Monopoly
A BBC article was just published discussing the new trade dispute the US has filed against China for its monopolization of the rare earths market (rare earths are of strategic importance to the US, check out ASP’s February 2011 report)
About the American Security Project: The American Security Project is a non-profit, non-partisan public policy and research organization dedicated to fostering knowledge and understanding of a range of national security issues, promoting debate about the appropriate use of American power, and cultivating strategic responses to 21st century challenges.
For more information, visit www.americansecurityproject.org. info@americansecurityproject.org
Relevant Reports
FACT SHEET – Shipping Container Security
Protecting the Homeland – The Rising Costs of Inaction on Climate Change
International Progress on Fusion Energy – How American Leadership is Slipping
PERSPECTIVE – The Defense Industrial Base
AMERICAN SECURITY QUARTERLY
