A Better Peace: The War Room Podcast

The Army is shifting from acquiring "widgets" to a holistic "6 plus 1" portfolio structure to deliver tech to the warfighter faster. Amanda Love joins Dan Harris & Bob Bradford to discuss the new era ...

David Zesinger joins Tom Spahr to discuss the "1492 moment" in space. From the moon's helium-3 resources to the contested nature of the domain, learn why space is the deciding factor in modern warfare...

Frank Sobchak, a retired Special Forces colonel and author of "Training for Victory: U.S. Special Forces Advisory Operations from El Salvador to Afghanistan," joins podcast editor Ron Granieri to disc...

From late 2024 to early 2025, numerous unidentified drones were reported over U.S. cities and military bases. While some of these "mystery craft" were later attributed to FAA-authorized research and o...

Whether putting pen to paper or fingers to the keyboard, writing clarifies and improves ideas while also allowing those thoughts to be shared with others. But the idea of publishing one's thoughts can...

The complex and evolving relationship between the military and the media has spanned various periods in U.S. history. In a discussion with War Room editor-in-chief JP Clark, Thomas Crosbie, author of ...

Cultural property encompasses both tangible artifacts and intangible heritage that shapes societies. Historian Matthias Rogg is back in the studio, this time with Laurie Rush, an archaeologist and ant...

Cultural property encompasses both tangible artifacts and intangible heritage that shapes societies. Historian Matthias Rogg and international law expert Lando Kirchmair delve into the critical issue ...

This week, we have one final episode in our "Back to School" series highlighting another special program at the U.S. Army War College. The Advanced Regional Studies (ARS) program offers opportunities ...

The Carlisle Scholars Program at the U.S. Army War College is a unique experience for a select seminar of students each academic year. After completing the majority of the academic requirements in an ...

Talent management is simple. All that is necessary is to match the many people in any particular rank and specialty who are moving at a given time to the right job that matches talent, enables profess...

When faced with a challenge, a soldier will always come up with some sort of solution to make the system, process or piece of equipment work. It may not be an elegant solution or a good use of time, b...

It's back-to-school time across the United States, and it's no different here at the U.S. Army War College. What's different this year is that the resident class of academic year 2024 will arrive at a...

In May 2023, the War College hosted the second annual Strategic Landpower Symposium. Bringing together students, scholars and practitioners, the symposium presented senior leaders with original resear...

Twelve years ago last week, on May 2, 2011, the U.S. military conducted a raid in Abbottabad, Pakistan that killed Usama bin Laden. Once the mission was accomplished, the SEAL team conducted sensitive...

When twins Derek and TJ Baird joined the Army in the '90s, neither of them had any idea what lay ahead. But 26 and 30 years later respectively, one is a colonel and the other a command sergeant major,...

It's time for part two of our Antarctica trip. In February 2023, Michele Devlin, Professor of Environmental Security at the U.S. Army War College, traveled to the Antarctica and took us along through ...

A crucial turning point in the American Revolutionary War, the Battle of Saratoga boosted the morale of the Continental Army; influenced the opinions of the French, Spanish and Dutch; and closed the d...

As part of our ongoing collaboration between A BETTER PEACE and the Army War College Civil-Military Relations Center, Celestino Perez joins podcast editor Ron Granieri for a wide-ranging discussion of...

There are multiple facets to the civil-military relationship. How the military interacts with the civil society, or other governmental agencies or the relationship between the military and the civilia...

The U.S. military is struggling to recruit and it's not just quality, it's quantity as well. The all volunteer force is at risk. Falling recruiting rates can be compensated for by higher retention rat...

It has been recognized since antiquity that victory in war often goes to those who best organize "the sinews of war" (money, equipment, and supplies). Yet at the U.S. Army War College the Defense Mana...

From 10-12 May 2022 the War College hosted the first annual Strategic Landpower Symposium. Bringing together students, scholars and practitioners the symposium displayed original research and presente...

From 10-12 May 2022 the War College hosted the first Annual Strategic Landpower Symposium. Bringing together students, scholars and practitioners the symposium displayed original research and presente...

Admit it. In your most self-aggrandizing dreams you're as charming as Sydney Bristow, as lethal as Jason Bourne, and as intuitive and intellectual as Jack Ryan. If Austin Powers was anywhere in that m...

To many people the U.S. Department of State (DOS) is as foreign as the countries in which our embassies are placed. Fortunately, we here at A BETTER PEACE know some people, and on this episode we welc...

A BETTER PEACE welcomes Chris Dougherty and Becca Wasser from The Gaming Lab at the Center for New American Security (CNAS). Chris and Becca join host Ken Gilliam in our special series the WARGAMING R...

What do you do when the training your organization requires you to accomplish doesn't actually prepare you for your mission or enhance your unit readiness. You create a board game, of course. A BETTER...

The Defense Acquisition System is the management process by which the Department of Defense provides effective, affordable, and timely systems to the users. -Department of Defense Directive Number 500...

When the local belligerents are still willing to fight and they've not stopped the war, dropping peacekeeping forces in the middle of that is not a recipe for immediate success. A BETTER PEACE welcome...

If you read a story and it sounds just too good to be true -- either good or bad -- open  up another window and look for the same topic from a different outlet. A BETTER PEACE welcomes Amanda Cronkhit...

The charter was...to look at preparation of the Navy for the defense of maritime security and the coasts In the early 1900's the U.S. Navy found itself creating strategy in an ad hoc manner in the mid...

We continue our Great Strategists series with an episode on the man whose works serve as a foundation of strategic thought about war. Thucydides (c. 460-400 BC) was a Athenian general in the Peloponne...

From the WAR ROOM Editorial Staff: What happens when a DBA from the Harvard Business School lands at the U.S. Army War College? There's the inevitable push-back against the formal dress code, but more...

For those that say 'I wish I would have started a little bit earlier but I didn't' -- don't despair. ... Start now! The demands on senior leaders can sometimes overwhelm their abilities to manage thei...

These two commanders, Scipio Africanus vs. Hannibal ... demonstrated [strategic leadership] to a great degree A BETTER PEACE continues the Great Captains series with the sequel to a previous episode o...

Fundamentally in asymmetric conflicts, the struggle is over information that comes from the [local] population. This is different from the traditional 'hearts and minds' view A BETTER PEACE welcomes J...

If you look at all the civil wars over the past two hundred years, you can document foreign fighters in more than a quarter of them Foreign fighters are "individuals who are not citizens of a state wh...

When military historians study battles or campaigns, what purpose does it serve? To immerse oneself deeply in the period and master the details, or to connect events of the past to the present? These ...

There is one thing for the event to occur; but the manner in which it was handled was more institutionally damning. In a follow-up to his article published in WAR ROOM in June, Richard Lacquement sits...

Stumbling block number one: You start to believe the hype. ... Two: You somehow start to think you deserve it, as opposed to think that you've still got to hustle. WAR ROOM welcomes Dr. Rebecca Johnso...

We tend to think about 'strategic leaders' as people who were successful.... But to me, it is the content of their goals that matter. WAR ROOM welcomes Dr. Sarah Sewall, former Undersecretary of State...

We as American citizens have to re-evaluate ... the information we're getting from social media to inform our understanding of foreign policy and world events. A constructive relationship between poli...

One in five people on the planet by 2050 will be an African. One in ten will be a Nigerian. You have tremendous potential. ... And it all depends on one thing. It's a question of governance. With Nort...

[VON STEUBEN] WAS THE RIGHT MAN AT THE RIGHT PLACE AND THE RIGHT TIME. In the next installment of in our Dusty Shelves series, "Building the Continental Army: Von Steuben's 'Blue Book'," Jack Giblin a...

This is a hand receipt unlike any other. … Imagine instead of signing for an office key or a computer, … you’ve just taken responsibility for the first atomic weapon. Military historian Con Crane tell...

War Room welcomes our distinguished guest, Brigadier General Emmaneul Kotia, Deputy Commandant of the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre (KAIPTC) in Ghana. BG Kotia stopped by while...

War Room welcomes special guest Martin Lacourt, the senior armed forces delegate to the International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) regional delegation to the US and Canada. In addition to discus...

Josh Kennedy and Buck Haberichter the popular but wrong perception that special operations forces are capable of resolving all national security dilemmas without the need for conventional forces. The ...