AGI

Security & Defense

German-American defense and security ties and the NATO alliance are critical to meeting modern threats. Moving past the traditional threats found in earlier years, today’s concerns range from rouge states, to cybersecurity, to terrorism, and more. German-American cooperation is essential.
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Coping with Crises: Refugees, Russia, and Responsibilities

The mass assaults against women that occurred in Cologne and elsewhere on New Year’s Eve have reverberated all over Germany and indeed well beyond. The fact that most of the …

A New Assertiveness? Germany wades into the Syrian conflict with vote for anti-ISIS military mission

Introduction Three weeks after the terrorist attacks in Paris, the German Bundestag approved a military deployment to provide protection, reconnaissance, and logistics to the military campaign against the Islamic State, …

Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, His Policy toward Israel, and the German Responsibility for the Jewish People*

On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of German-Israeli diplomatic relations, we are pleased to present a younger scholar’s views on an important crisis in the relationship: the proposed German-Saudi …

Ukraine—Out of the Spotlight, Out of the West’s Interest? German and U.S. Viewpoints on the Resolution of the Ukrainian-Russian Conflict and Its Security Implications

For all of 2014 and well into 2015, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine over the hostile events in Crimea and the eastern provinces of Donetsk and Luhansk dominated German …

Bedingt Abwehrbereit? The German Debate about Cybersecurity and the Value of Intelligence

In today’s interconnected world, we can no longer keep our policy areas separate; what affects security policy also impacts an economy’s prosperity, and the decisions made can have ramifications on …

Will Michel Go to War for Marianne?

The reactions to the attacks in Paris have demonstrated the special character of the German-French relationship—but how far does this friendship go? The attacks in Paris have resulted in an …

Deutschland, Frankreich und das neue Europa

Die Terroranschläge in Paris verändern nicht allein das Leben der Menschen an der Seine, sie verändern Europa, sie verändern Deutschland. Der Terror ist nun auch dort angekommen, wo man ihn …

William G. Gray Receives DAAD Prize in German and European Studies

Congratulations to Dr. William G. Gray of Purdue University, the recipient of the 2015 DAAD Prize for Distinguished Scholarship in German and European Studies, for his outstanding academic work in …

Playing with Fire: Eventually, Extremism Burns

It’s difficult to ascertain the best course of action in dealing with the Islamic State. The Middle East and the actors are convoluted, at best. One certainty is that the …

Bypass Operation

On 18 June, during the annual St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, an agreement was signed to build a controversial new “Nord Stream 2” pipeline under the Baltic Sea that would …

The Next Generation: Remapping the German-American Relationship

Policy Report 63 This year’s Symposium is framed around the idea of “A New Transatlantic Generation.” We know that German-American relations have long been shaped by the personal connections that …

German Unification and European Security

How has German unity impacted the U.S. in terms of its policies and its expectations of Germany as part of that evolving Europe in which it has become so critically important? How have the following years impacted the shaping of U.S. foreign policy, its goals, and its application? What expectations emerged about the global role of the U.S. and our expectations of a unified Germany? The questions above are the ones on which AICGS has asked commentators in this series to reflect upon as the 25th anniversary of the unification of Germany approaches on October 3. They are all significant questions but, given the space constraints, I would like to limit this brief comment to one particular aspect on which I have some modest expertise: the extensive overlap between the process that yielded German unification and the process that yielded expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).