The National Security Project (NSP) is committed to developing realistic and robust bipartisan policy recommendations for the principal national security and foreign policy issues confronting the United States.

With a number of ongoing initiatives, NSP works with ideologically diverse groups of distinguished experts to address today’s rapidly evolving international challenges. Our initiatives range in focus from determining appropriate policy responses to very specific and timely international situations to considering more broadly the shape and direction of global politics in the 21st century.

NSP's pioneer initiatives, An Open, Civilized World, was motivated by the absence of an overarching conceptual framework to guide American foreign policy and command public support, five years after 9/11 and more than fifteen years after the end of the Cold War. Not since the policy of containment and deterrence, which was developed sixty years ago and lasted throughout the Cold War, has the U.S. Government devised a new foreign policy that garnered support from both sides of the aisle, the Executive and Congressional branches, and the American people.

Active Inititives

Iran Initiative

This timely initiative addressed the challenges of a potentially nuclear Iran to U.S. policy, challenging existing assumptions in the policymaking community about the strategic implications of a nuclear Iran; examining, in real depth, the practical ramifications of the various policy options available to the U.S.; and recommending a coherent, bipartisan U.S. strategy towards Iranian nuclear development. Read more here.

Russia Initiative

The Russia Initiative will work to create a more cohesive U.S. strategy towards Russia—one that is designed to better advance U.S. security and economic interests and builds on the two countries’ common interests. Co-chaired by Senator Chuck Robb and Secretary of Commerce Don Evans, the initiative will offer ways to construct an improved bilateral relationship in the energy, business, trade, and investment sectors--areas critical to our collective future. Read more here.

Stabilizing Fragile States Initiative

This initiative aims to develop concrete policy and legislative recommendations to augment U.S. government capacity to assist fragile states to stabilize themselves. When states are unable to carry out basic functions, they can undermine U.S. strategic interests by contributing to terrorism, international crime, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and limited access to vital natural resources. It seeks to examine the efficacy to date of existing U.S. bureaucratic and operational capacity to effectively buttress weak states through the spectra of security capacity, governing services, and civic resilience. Read more here.

Strategic Public Diplomacy Initiative

The goal of this initiative is to create the framework for a modern public diplomacy strategy that is technologically savvy, that leverages the potential of the private sector, and that is tightly coordinated with U.S. national security goals. In addition, it will demonstrate that such diplomacy is vital to our reputation around the world and to undermining the ideology behind violent extremism. NSP hopes to convince policymakers that public diplomacy is an important part of our foreign policy toolbox -- as valuable as military power and intelligence. Co-chaired by Secretary Dan Glickman and Ambassador James Glickman, the initiative will look at how the U.S. Government should conduct public diplomacy around the globe, specifically toward countries with Muslim majorities, while leveraging new media opportunities. Read more here.