Recent Articles

The Intel Community’s Annual Transparency Report Raises More Questions Than It Answers
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence's new mandatory report, summarizing certain intelligence agencies’ surveillance activities in 2017, is one of the most important…

The Early Edition: May 14, 2018
Signup to receive the Early Edition in your inbox here. Before the start of business, Just Security provides a curated summary of up-to-the-minute developments at home and abroad.…

Recap of Recent Pieces on Just Security (May 7-May 11)
Gina Haspel Nomination and Torture Steve Vladeck, The Haspel Nomination as a Referendum on (Un-)Accountability Steve Vladeck, Gina Haspel and the Elusive Shadow of CIA Torture:…

Navigating the Terrain at the Intersection of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law
This article is the latest in our Fog of Law series that examines the gray zones in international law and conflict that can be exploited by states. The series comes in advance…

What the Heck is Happening in Al-Nashiri?: The Ten-Layer Dip at the Heart of the Latest Guantánamo Mess
It’s hard to imagine a better microcosm of everything that’s gone wrong with the Guantánamo military commissions than the current headaches arising out of the prosecution…

Crime or Slime: Making Sense of Michael Cohen’s Shell Company
How do we know whether Michael Cohen's Essential Consultants was unlawful or just awful?

The Devastating Legacy of British and American Nuclear Testing at Kiritimati (Christmas) and Malden Islands
Teeua Tetua was a child during the British nuclear weapons tests, known as Operation Grapple, on the Kiritimati (Christmas) and Malden Islands, then under British colonial control.…

A View from a Syrian International Lawyer: Were the April 14 Strikes Legal?
On April 14, the United States, the United Kingdom and France conducted air strikes in Syria in response to the Syrian government’s alleged use of chemical weapons in Douma.…

The Early Edition: May 11, 2018
Signup to receive the Early Edition in your inbox here. Before the start of business, Just Security provides a curated summary of up-to-the-minute developments at home and abroad.…

With Western Diplomacy Under Assault, Only European Stewardship Can Save It
The “Free World,” as a term for the global community of free-market democracies, owes its origins to Frank Capra’s 1943 propaganda film, Why We Fight, which laid out the…

DHS: Not Entitled to Its Own Facts
Despite DHS’s breathless claims to the contrary, its numbers don’t demonstrate a "continuing security crisis" along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Germany’s Research Report on the Syria Strikes: Unlawful Acts of Reprisal
Just hours after the United States, United Kingdom and France launched the first series of coordinated strikes against targets related to Syria’s chemical weapons program, Germany’s…