Talks aimed at resolving the Iranian nuclear weapons threat will again resume this Friday. In Seoul late last month, the President reminded Iran that it must act with “‘urgency.” “There is time to solve this diplomatically,” Obama enthused. “It is always my preference to solve these issues diplomatically. But time is short.”

When President Obama unveiled his new strategic guidance in January, highlighted by a pivot to Asia, many assumed (incorrectly) that the Navy and Air Force would reap the benefits. But if the president's own 2013 defense budget request did not make it clear to policymakers already, the release of the Navy's 30-year shipbuilding plan confirms this is a pivot in name only.

For the first time in 20 years, Saudi Arabia has named an ambassador to Iraq. For years the Saudis resisted U.S. entreaties to take this step, and the current relationship between these two most important Arab countries in the Gulf has not been warm, so the timing is curious and...

Saturday’s NYT had a piece bylined by James Risen about the Ghosts of Iraq Haunting CIA in Tackling Iran. It’s a Captain Obvious story in conception.

The U.S. military faces a readiness crisis - one confronting not just its people and end-strength cuts - but pushing equipment to the breaking point. Across all services, long-standing readiness problems are worsening and breakdowns are happening more frequently.

On April 18, the Transition to Governing Project held a panel discussion that addressed the relationship between the incoming and outgoing administrations, the structuring and staffing of foreign policy institutions, relations with allies and adversaries during a transition, and the foreign policy challenges facing the new administration.

Russia's demographic decline will undermine the Kremlin's plans for economic and military modernization--and could make Moscow more dangerous in the international arena.

As in Chicago, President Obama seems to live in a cocoon in which Republicans are largely absent, offscreen actors that no one pays any attention to.