Micah Zenko examines U.S. President Barack Obama's May 23, 2013 speech on drone strike and counterterrorism policies. "The enduring impact of Mr. Obama's speech will not be what he says, but whether the new policies are reflected in how drone strikes are conducted, and whether his administration will finally and faithfully engage with the public, more than a decade after the operations began," Zenko writes.

The Obama administration has increasingly relied on drones in its counterterrorist operations. And, as I explain in a recent CFR report, U.S. special operations forces are doing more things in more places than ever before. The heavy reliance on both drones and unilateral commando raids needs to be reassessed.

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Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel held a press conference in Abu Dhabi to wrap up his five day trip to Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and United Arab Emirates. He discussed U.S. intelligence on the use of chemical weapons in Syria.

The Boston Marathon bombings illustrate the stresses on domestic intelligence gathering and counterterrorism in a democratic system, says CFR's Richard Falkenrath.

After visiting North Korea, Jared Cohen and Eric Schmidt write about the future of surveillance and digital police states.

Linda Robinson discusses her recently released Council Special Report, The Future of U.S. Special Operations Forces, which calls for conceptual, institutional, and operational changes to reorient U.S. special operations forces to ensure that they are employed to best effect.

Douglas Dillon Fellow Micah Zenko asserts that shifting lead executive authority for U.S. drone strikes from the CIA to the Pentagon is the essential first step toward greater transparency and oversight.

Grounded in a realistic assessment of technology, Matthew C. Waxman and Kenneth Anderson outline a practical alternative with which to evaluate the use of autonomous weaponry that incorporates codes of conduct based on traditional legal and ethical principles governing weapons and warfare.

Director of National Intelligence James Clapper testified before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on March 12, 2013, and before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligenceon April 11, 2013, regarding the Intelligence Community's Worldwide Threat Assessment. He discussed the effects of sequestration on the intelligence community and listed cybersecurity as the top threat to U.S. security.

For many senior Pakistani spies, the man sitting in the jail cell represented solid proof of their suspicions that the C.I.A. had sent a vast secret army to Pakistan, men who sowed chaos and violence as part of the covert American war in the country. For the C.I.A., the eventual disclosure of [Raymond] Davis's role with the agency shed an unflattering light on a post–Sept. 11 reality: that the C.I.A. had farmed out some of its most sensitive jobs to outside contractors — many of them with neither the experience nor the temperament to work in the war zones of the Islamic world.

Max Boot reflects on the tenth-anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq.

Micah Zenko asks why we aren't asking Chuck Hagel about the stuff the secretary of defense actually does.

Max Boot says recent films about the CIA focus on the agency's successful operations, but also highlight a real problem—that it's actually a hypercautious bureaucracy.

Max Boot says the U.S. intelligence community already suffers from a propensity to put quantity over quality.

The Senate's Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs , Subcommittee on Investigations, released this report on "Federal Support for and Involvement in State and Local Fusion Centers" on October 2, 2012.

Pakistan-U.S. ties have rebounded, but domestic turmoil and looming leadership transitions should command U.S. attention on this vital terrorist frontline, writes CFR's Daniel Markey.

The NYPD's new "Domain Awareness System" raises familiar questions about privacy and transparency that are likely to spark a debate at multiple levels of government, writes CFR's Matthew Waxman.

Max Boot says that the United States should consider tougher actions against the Syrian government.

Adam Segal says that rather than just defacing websites, Anonymous should target five specific Chinese websites to obtain real secrets.

Elliott Abrams says the politicizing of intelligence on Syria is part of the Obama administration's continuing defense of its failure to help the Syrian opposition and is a misuse of the intelligence community.