I spoke to Xinhua for this article about the lessons of the Iraq war: WASHINGTON, Sept. 2 (Xinhua) — As the U.S. combat mission in Iraq officially ended Tuesday, U.S. experts are wondering what strategic lessons the United States has learnt from a conflict that cost thousands of American lives and, according to some estimates, a few trillion U.S. dollars. One of the major blunders the United States made, the experts said, was falling into “mission creep” — the expansion of a mission beyond its original objectives. While U.S. troops succeeded in the missions they were...

This piece originally appeared in Politico. Effective security cooperation means responsibilities for both sides. The Mexican government has the bulk of the work when it comes to fighting the drug runners threatening their country. They look to be taking this seriously. U.S. policymakers need to match that seriousness: both by following through on past commitments and by laying the groundwork for a successful bilateral relationship with Mexico in the future.

This piece originally appeared in Foreign Policy’s AfPak Channel: Recent polls showing pessimism about U.S. prospects in Afghanistan seem to suggest that Barack Obama has lost the United States’ support for the war there. However, general exhaustion from years of war and specific support for Obama’s Afghanistan strategy should not be so easily conflated. A careful reading of the polling data on Afghanistan shows that while the public is weary, they haven’t yet given up on the mission or Obama’s redefined strategy…yet. The U.S. public has significant doubts about...

I talked to Voice of America’s Urdu-language program a couple weeks ago about Pakistan and terrorism. You can check it out here, but its all in Urdu. I start at around...

A new memo I co-authored defends Obama’s nuclear doctrine and outlines the security-focused aspects of the Nuclear Security Summit, the Nuclear Posture Review, and the New START treaty with Russia: From the introduction: The Obama administration’s nuclear doctrine, defined by New START, the Nuclear Security Summit, and the Nuclear Posture Review, is a responsible approach to improving US security. It builds on a long, bipartisan history of seeking to contain and reduce the prevalence of nuclear weapons around the world. It properly places the threat of nuclear terrorism as a top security...