Recent Publications

2024 Annual Estimate of the Strategic Security Environment
July 24, 2024 — The United States faces a complex and ever-changing global environment. The 2024 Annual Estimate of the Strategic Security Environment is designed to guide the collective defense community to research and write about critical national security challenges to help the Army prepare for a wide range of potential conflicts and threats... MORE

The 2024 Annual Estimate of the Strategic Security Environment sets the foundation for cutting-edge research to understand the ever-evolving security environment domestically and internationally.

Parameters | Winter 2023–24
November 20, 2023 — The Winter issue is out! In this edition: “Was the Russian Invasion of Ukraine a Failure of Western Deterrence?” by Bettina Renz and “Ukraine’s Lessons for Future Combat: Unmanned Aerial Systems and Deep Strike,” by Harry Halem; CLSC DIRECTOR’S CORNER “Introduction to the China Landpower Studies Center”; From deterring major powers, to achieving strategic influence, and beyond... MORE

Welcome to the Winter 2023–24 issue of Parameters.

This issue consists of two In Focus commentaries which bring to light observations from the Russia-Ukraine War, two forums addressing deterrence and strategic influence, and the inaugural Director’s Corner for the China Landpower Studies Center (CLSC).

Keywords: deterrence; Ukraine; Russia; Putin; NATO; unmanned aerial systems; deep strike; reconnaissance-strike complex; electronic warfare; Russia-Ukraine War; nuclear; misperception; Russia; multidomain operations; freedom to roam; grand strategy; offshore balancing; offensive realism; regional hegemony; stopping power of water; Middle East; integrated deterrence; strategy; Cold War; flexible response; New Look; economic interests; globalization; strategic competition; multinational exercises; bilateral exercises; reflexive control; strategic behavior; strategic analysis; nonlinearity; complex adaptive system; civil-military relations; general officers; promotions; flag officers; political participation; People’s Liberation Army; Chinese Communist Party; Belt and Road Initiative; China; Landpower; security assistance; Iran; Operation Iraqi Freedom; Operation Enduring Freedom; Bill Clinton; George W. Bush; Barack Obama; Civil War; Army of Tennessee; John B. Hood; William Tecumseh Sherman; Battle of Atlanta; Close Combat Lethality Task Force; Secretary of Defense General James N. Mattis; Iraq; Vicksburg Campaign; Ulysses S. Grant; William T. Sherman; Chickasaw Bayou; World War I; World War II; W. E. B. Du Bois; Talented Tenth; 1920s; citizen-soldier; National Guard; modern Army; Harry S. Truman; atomic bomb; Japan; nuclear war; North Korea; George W. Bush; Kim Il-Sung; Kim Jong-Un; China; Xi Jinping; Chinese Dream; authoritarianism; diplomacy; Samuel P. Huntington; Carl von Clausewitz; Dwight D. Eisenhower; George S. Patton; Kenneth Payne; Jan Smuts; South Africa; World War I in Africa; German South West Africa; German East Africa

A Call to Action: Lessons from Ukraine for the Future Force
September 29, 2023 — Fifty years ago, the US Army faced a strategic inflection point after a failed counterinsurgency effort in Vietnam. In response to lessons learned from the Yom Kippur War, the United States Army Training and Doctrine Command was created to reorient thinking and doctrine around the conventional Soviet threat. Today’s Army must embrace the Russo-Ukrainian conflict as an opportunity to reorient the force into one as forward-thinking and formidable as the Army that won Operation Desert Storm. This article suggests changes the Army should make to enable success in multidomain large-scale combat operations at today’s strategic inflection point... MORE

2023 Annual Estimate of the Strategic Security Environment
August 24, 2023 — The United States operates within a global context that is increasingly complex, interconnected, and unpredictable. The Annual Estimate of the Strategic Security Environment serves as a guide to define broadly the contemporary security landscape and the diverse range of interests that shape our national security agenda... MORE

2023 Annual Estimate of the Strategic Security Environment
The Annual Estimate of the Strategic Security Environment serves as a guide for academics and practitioners in the defense community on the current challenges and opportunities in the strategic environment. This year’s publication outlines key strategic issues across the four broad themes of Regional Challenges and Opportunities, Domestic Challenges, Institutional Challenges, and Domains Impacting US Strategic Advantage. These themes represent a wide range of topics affecting national security and provide a global assessment of the strategic environment to help focus the defense community on research and publication. Strategic competition with the People’s Republic of China and the implications of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine remain dominant challenges to US national security interests across the globe. However, the evolving security environment also presents new and unconventional threats, such as cyberattacks, terrorism, transnational crime, and the implications of rapid technological advancements in fields such as artificial intelligence. At the same time, the US faces domestic and institutional challenges in the form of recruiting and retention shortfalls in the all-volunteer force, the prospect of contested logistics in large-scale combat operations, and the health of the US Defense Industrial Base. Furthermore, rapidly evolving security landscapes in the Arctic region and the space domain pose unique potential challenges to the Army’s strategic advantage.
https://press.armywarcollege.edu/monographs/962/