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“While the details for how and when the RD-180 will be replaced are not yet settled, the consensus within the U.S. Congress and executive branch remains that the United States must end its reliance on the RD-180,” the Center for Strategic and International Studies writes of its new report, “Beyond the RD-180,” written by Aerospace Security Project Director Todd Harrison, Defense-Industrial Initiatives Group Director Andrew Hunter, International Security Program Research Associate and Program Director Kaitlyn Johnson, and Aerospace Security Project Program Coordinator and Research Assistant Thomas Roberts. “This report explains the impetus for finding an alternative engine, explores the options that are available going forward, and describes the challenges that will be placed on the federal government and the private sector in doing so.” The report was released ahead of CSIS’ 2017 Space Security Conference, held on March 22, 2017.

“Since the advent of the space age, a primary constraint on military, commercial, and civil space missions has been the cost of launch,” CSIS writes of its new report, “Implications of Ultra-Low-Cost Access to Space,” written by Aerospace Security Project Director Todd Harrison, Defense-Industrial Initiatives Group Director Andrew Hunter, International Security Program Research Associate and Program Manager Kaitlyn Johnson, and Aerospace Security Project Program Manager and Research Assistant Thomas Roberts. “Launching objects into space requires substantial investments in launch systems and infrastructure, which has restricted the market to only a handful of national governments and several large private companies. This study explores the possibility of a space industry significantly less constrained by the cost of access to space.”

“Iran’s approach to soft power is sophisticated and varied,” the American Enterprise Institute’s Michael Rubin writes in a new report entitled “Strategies Underlying Iranian Soft Power.” In the report, Rubin makes the case that comprehending Iranian soft power demands that one recognizes “Persia’s imperial past, its religious evolution, Persian language and culture, and its history.”