Kathleen Hicks, PhD, of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and Thomas Manhken, PhD, of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments -- who served on the National Defense Strategy Commission -- discuss US defense strategy, making hard tradeoffs and importance of rhetoric in great power competition with Defense & Aerospace Report Editor Vago Muradian. The interview was conducted on the sidelines of the West Coast Aerospace Forum at the Rand Corporation's headquarters in Santa Monica, Calif. The forum is sponsored by Rand, The Aerospace Corporation, CSIS and the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies.

Mauricio Meschoulam, PhD, professor at Universidad Iberoamericana Mexico and founder of the Mexico Research Center for Peace, discusses how to tackle Latin America's security challenges that are driving migration caravans to the United States with Defense & Aerospace Report Editor Vago Muradian. Our coverage was sponsored by L3 Technologies and Leonardo DRS.

Renee Wegrzyn, PhD, a program manager at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, discusses her work on gene editing to combat infectious diseases or counter future enemies that may employ genetically modified insects as weapons with Defense & Aerospace Report Editor Vago Muradian at the DARPA-D60 Symposium in September 2018 to commemorate the agency's 60th anniversary.

Kori Schake, PhD, the deputy director general of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, discusses US defense strategy, tradeoffs and priorities, innovation and more with Defense & Aerospace Report Editor Vago Muradian at the Reagan National Defense Forum at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif. Our coverage was sponsored by L3 Technologies and Leonardo DRS.

Sen., Job Kyl, R-Ariz., discusses the need to spend more on defense to deter future conflict, missile defense investment, and intermediate range weapons with Defense & Aerospace Report Editor Vago Muradian at the Reagan National Defense Forum at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif. Our coverage as sponsored by L3 Technologies and Leonardo DRS.

Foreign Talent Has Always Been Instrumental in US Military and Technological Superiority President Trump has been eager to deliver on his campaign promise to build the wall, deport illegal immigrants as well as cap legal immigration. But the history of America is a history of immigration, of a nation built on inspirational ideas consistently attracting the best and brightest — and their families — who want contribute to their new nation advancing science, technology, medicine, innovation, art, music and every other field.

As America and its allies bid farewell to one national security giant, they must prepare for the departure of another Washington, the nation and the world last week bid an emotional farewell to Sen. John McCain, a towering international security figure who lost his battle with cancer.

Bluffing may work in poker and real estate, but not when dealing with the most dangerous country in the world. And history has taught that escalating rhetoric by inexperienced or misguided leaders has unintended consequences.

Since 1909, the Paris Air Show has served as a showcase where the newest military-, commercial- and general-aviation aircraft make their international debuts. And for years, organizers have been hungry to feature the F-35 Lighting II, a game-changing Lockheed Martin jet that promises to transform air combat with its stealth and sophisticated sensor and networking capabilities.

In its recent report, "Artificial Intelligence and National Security: The Importance of the AI Ecosystem," the Center for Strategic and International Studies writes that "AI has profound potential to affect the balance of power in both the global economy and in military competition. While AI has a long history, AI has begun to deliver results within the last decade, particularly with the recent rapid progress in machine learning and the increased availability of data and computing power. As impactful as the recent progress has been, AI remains highly problem-specific and context-dependent. It has proven extremely challenging to translate the progress in some fields to others, even those that are closely related. Enthusiasm in both the public and private sectors has obscured the importance of building the robust supporting capabilities for AI—an AI ecosystem—that are crucial to successful AI adoption." The report was sponsored in part by Thales USA.

In "Trump's 2019 Missile Defense Budget: Choosing Capacity over Capability," a February 28, 2018, installment of the Center for Strategic and International Studies' CSIS Briefs series, Tom Karako, PhD, director of CSIS' Missile Defense Project and a senior fellow in its International Security Program, and Wes Rumbaugh, an research assistant with the ISP, analyze the missile-defense side of the Trump administration's FY19 budget request, identify its priorities and shortfalls, lend historical context and deem the proposed budget "inadequate" to combat "the threat for both ballistic and nonballistic missile attack."

"The Malicious Use of Artificial Intelligence: Forecasting, Prevention, and Mitigation," a February 2018 joint report from the Center for a New American Security, the Future of Humanity Institute, the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk, the University of Cambridge, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and OpenAI, looks at the potential for artificial intelligence to be weaponized in the digital, physical and political security domains, predicts the future AI threat landscape and offers preventative recommendations for policymakers to combat the risk of misused AI. "This report surveys the landscape of potential security threats from malicious uses of artificial intelligence technologies, and proposes ways to better forecast, prevent, and mitigate these threats," the report reads. "We analyze, but do not conclusively resolve, the question of what the long-term equilibrium between attackers and defenders will be. We focus instead on what sorts of attacks we are likely to see soon if adequate defenses are not developed.

In "Overview of the 2019 President's Budget Request for Defense," a Feb. 15, 2018, report from the Center for a New American Security, authors Susanna Blume, a CNAS Defense Strategies and Assessment Program fellow, and Lauren Fish, a research associate with the program, provide a bird's-eye look at what the White House's FY19 defense-budget request means for readiness, procurement, research, development, test and evaluation, the Missile Defense Agency, US Army, US Navy, US Marine Corps and US Air Force, and the US Defense Department, as a whole. "Even in these times of increasing budgets, DoD must still make tough decisions about what to prioritize and where to accept risk," they write.