Donald Rumsfeld’s departure from the Pentagon will alter the transformation of the American military. Much of Rumsfeld’s transformation program rested on a technologically deterministic understanding of war, and the Iraq war has shown that the path to victory cannot always be paved with Joint Strike Fighters. Finding the right course...

Success in war depends on more than equipment or well-trained personnel. It also depends upon a clear and well-articulated idea of why we fight. In Finding the Target: The Transformation of American Military Policy (Encounter Books, 2006), AEI resident scholar Frederick W. Kagan makes clear that many of the problems...

Moreover, most allies haven't a clue how the pivot will manifest itself and what role they should be playing. If a "pivot" means anything, it is at the least keeping security commitments. Now Obama has made one -- helping Taiwan close the "fighter gap."

The Japanese military is emerging from decades of pacifism. But do the country's political leaders have the vision and the will to make the country strong again?

Washington's South Asia strategy ought to be shaped less by the memory of failure, and more by an under-rated success: the transformation of once conflict-ridden Southeast Asia into an oasis of peace and relative prosperity.

Containing and deterring a nuclear Iran may be the least-bad choice. However, that does not make it a low-risk or low-cost choice. In fact, it is about to be not a choice but a fact of life.

Washington can ignore the world for only so long before the world comes knocking on its door. And while getting America’s fiscal house in order has to be the priority for any new president elected in 2012, his or her administration will be faced with a growing list of foreign-policy issues hardly any less important.