Stanford University

Foreign Policy

Lonjezo Frank

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Predoctoral Fellow
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Lonjezo Peter Mpinganjira Frank (formerly Lonjezo Hamisi) was a predoctoral fellow at CISAC for the 2011-2012 academic year. While at CISAC, he was a Ph.D. candidate in political science at Stanford. His doctoral dissertation focused on the diplomatic role of the United Nations Secretary-General since 1945 and used a variety of quantitative techniques to assess the autonomy of his Office vis-à-vis the U.N. member states, especially the powerful Security Council P5 states.

In 2004, Lonjezo earned an M.A. in Diplomacy & International Relations and also an MBA from Seton Hall University. At Stanford, Lonjezo has served as a teaching assistant in several international security and foreign policy classes, as well as assisted Prof. Kenneth Schultz with research on African boundary conflicts. 

Prior to enrolling at Stanford, Lonjezo worked in private sector consulting and academia. He also completed internships and developed affiliations with several public sector organizations, including, inter alia, the Office of the United Nations Under-Secretary-General and High Representative for the Least Developed Countries, Landlocked Developing Countries and Small Island Developing States; the Office of the Chairman of the Group of 77 and China, and the Office of Prof. Jeffrey Sachs, Director of Columbia University’s Earth Institute.

Last updated March 2024.

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Amy Zegart

CISAC
Stanford University
Encina Hall, E216
Stanford, CA 94305-6165

(650) 725-9754 (650) 723-0089
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Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Morris Arnold and Nona Jean Cox Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution
Senior Fellow at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI
Professor, by courtesy, of Political Science
amy zegart headshot.png PhD

Dr. Amy Zegart is the Morris Arnold and Nona Jean Cox Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution. The author of five books, she specializes in U.S. intelligence, emerging technologies, and national security. At Hoover, she leads the Technology Policy Accelerator and the Oster National Security Affairs Fellows Program. She also is an associate director and senior fellow at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI; a senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute; and professor of political science by courtesy, teaching 100 students each year about how emerging technologies are transforming espionage.

Her award-winning research includes the leading academic study of intelligence failures before 9/11: Spying Blind: The CIA, the FBI, and the Origins of 9/11 (Princeton, 2007) and the bestseller Spies, Lies, and Algorithms: The History and Future of American Intelligence (Princeton, 2022), which was nominated by Princeton University Press for the Pulitzer Prize. She also coauthored Political Risk: How Businesses and Organizations Can Anticipate Global Insecurity, with Condoleezza Rice (Twelve, 2018). Her op-eds and essays have appeared in Foreign Affairs, Politico, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal.

Zegart has advised senior officials about intelligence and foreign policy for more than two decades. She served on the National Security Council staff and as a presidential campaign foreign policy advisor and has testified before numerous congressional committees. Before her academic career, she spent several years as a McKinsey & Company consultant.

Zegart received an AB in East Asian studies from Harvard and an MA and a PhD in political science from Stanford. She serves on the boards of the Council on Foreign Relations, Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, and the American Funds/Capital Group.

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Nuclear Zero? Why Not Nuclear Infinity?

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Source: Wall Street Journal

The world would not be safer if the U.S. had no nuclear weapons.

The international Global Zero movement has captured the imagination of people around the world. Proponents argue that by cutting its nuclear arsenal dramatically, the U.S. can lead the way to a "world free of nuclear weapons."

In response, many of the world's leading strategic thinkers-both those skeptical of, and hopeful for, eventual global nuclear disarmament-have invested great time and energy imagining the possible advantages and disadvantages of living in a world with zero nuclear weapons.

To reframe the debate, I propose an alternate number as a possible size for the U.S. nuclear arsenal: infinity.

Imagining a world in which America possesses infinite nuclear weapons -- just as advocates of nuclear zero imagine the opposite -- it's hard not to conclude that having infinite weapons is preferable to having none.

The primary purpose of the U.S. nuclear arsenal is to deter our enemies and assure our friends. No adversary would be restrained by the fear of attack from a nonexistent nuclear arsenal. But the prospect of fighting an adversary with unlimited nuclear firepower would induce much more caution even in our most reckless enemies.

Many of our allies today worry that if we continue to cut the size of our arsenal, we won't have enough nuclear forces to extend the nuclear umbrella to them and retain a large enough reserve capacity to simultaneously deter challenges against ourselves. Drawing down to zero would greatly exacerbate those fears. Building to infinity would put them to rest.

Some claim that the primary reason to reduce our nuclear weapons is to convince leaders in other capitals that if we don't need nuclear weapons, they don't either. But building to infinity could also dissuade proliferation by convincing countries that they have no hope of ever achieving nuclear parity with the U.S.

Of course, building to infinity would strain the national budget, and maintaining the arsenal could present real security problems, especially regarding command and control. Nevertheless, if forced to choose, the United States would be more secure with infinite nuclear weapons than with none.

Let me be clear. I'm not advocating that the United States build an infinite number of nuclear weapons. That is an absurd and arbitrary goal. But so is zero.

Having dispensed with the extremes of the debate, it is time for serious strategists to get back to the hard work of deciding what roles and missions nuclear weapons ought to have in U.S. defense policy, and what nuclear force structure is appropriate for achieving them.

 

 

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CISAC announces its 2011-2012 Undergraduate Honors Students

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The Center for International Security and Cooperation is pleased to announce the selection of 13 rising seniors for participation in its Undergraduate Honors Program in International Security Studies. 

The program provides an opportunity for eligible students focusing on international security subjects in any field to earn an honors certificate.

Students selected intern with a security-related organization, attend the program's honors college in Washington, D.C. in September, participate in a year-long core seminar on international security research, and produce an honors thesis with policy implications.

 

Joshua Alvarez

International Relations, Minor in Economics

Identity and Security: Turkey's Grand Strategy in the Middle East

 

Keshia Bonner

International Relations, Minor in Economics

United States Policy Towards Hamas and Hezbollah as State Actors

 

Stephen Craig

Political Science

Security Issues and Domestic Constraints on European Integration

 

Noura Elfarra

Political Science

How does Regime Change and Revolution Affect the Secret Police?

 

Alison Epstein

International Relations

British and American Intelligence Cooperation: the Iraq Inquiry and the New Face of the Special Relationship

 

Peter Hong

Political Science

Recalibrating and Resolving Deficiencies in Multinational Nuclear Fuel Cycle Initiatives

 

Mohammad Islam

Electrical Engineering, Minor in International Relations

Domestic Terrorism Prevention Strategies in the US and UK

 

Suraya Omar

Materials Science and Engineering

North Korea's Ambitions for a Light Water Reactor

 

Clay Ramel

Science, Technology & Society – Energy Engineering Concentration

National Security Dimensions of Developing an Energy Secure United States 

 

Nick Rosellini

International Relations, Minor in Economics & Modern Languages

The NATO Strategic Concept: Evolution of a Nuclear Posture 1957-2010

 

Ram Sachs

Earth Systems, Minor in Modern Languages

Environmental Dimensions of Security - Yemen and Violent Extremism

 

Jeffrey Sweet

Materials Science and Engineering

The Effect of Public Perceptions of Diseases such as HIV, H1N1, SARS, and Anthrax on the Effectiveness of Controlling Epidemics

 

Reagan Thompson

International Relations, Minor in Chinese

The Chinese Influence in Africa: Case Studies of Ghana and Angola


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How China views US nuclear policy

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Article Highlights

  • Although Chinese academics and military officers praised some aspects of the 2010 Nuclear Posture Review, they continue to view US nuclear policy with suspicion.
  • The factors responsible for negative Chinese reactions include bad timing, concerns about China's deterrent capability, a lack of consultation, and cultural differences.
  • Improved dialogue between the US and China on security issues can help reduce the potential for misperception and mistrust.
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Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
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Thomas Fingar
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CISAC honors student awarded for "exceptional, tangible" intellectual achievement

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Anand Habib

Ten undergraduates recently received the 2011 Deans' Award for Academic Accomplishment, which honors extraordinary undergraduate students for "exceptional, tangible" intellectual achievements. Among them: CISAC honors student Anand Habib, a senior majoring in biology with honors in international security studies. He is completing an honors thesis focusing on health governance.

Habib sees his work as an intentional synthesis of scholarship and larger social commitments. He has lived this out in many ways at Stanford, including working on behalf of politically and medically disenfranchised people in India, Mexico and Guatemala. On campus, he has turned the Stanford tradition of the annual Dance Marathon into a vehicle dedicated to addressing the HIV/AIDS pandemic by engaging not only Stanford students but also local communities and corporations, raising more than $100,000. His exceptional work was recognized by his participation in the Clinton Global Initiative University Conference in April.

English Associate Professor Michele Elam described Habib as a "superb critical thinker" whose work is characterized by "creative genius" and "mature insights." She holds him up as a model for others, saying that "he exemplifies exactly the kind of deeply informed, pragmatic and caring leadership that the world needs and Stanford enables."

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Introduction: Reviewing the Nuclear Posture Review

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The Obama administration has argued that its efforts to reduce the role of nuclear weapons in US defense policy and work toward “a world free of nuclear weapons” will encourage other governments to strengthen the nuclear nonproliferation regime and support global nuclear disarmament. Does the evidence support this assertion? This essay describes the changes in US nuclear weapons and disarmament policies initiated by the Obama administration and outlines four potential pathways through which the United States might influence other governments' policies: by reducing nuclear threat perceptions, by changing global beliefs about what constitutes “responsible” nuclear behavior, by impacting domestic debates about disarmament in foreign capitals, and by creating new diplomatic negotiation dynamics.

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The Nonproliferation Review
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Scott D. Sagan
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Testimony of Robert Carlin before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, March 1, 2011

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"Ultimately, progress toward our goals in dealing with North Korea depends not so much on the weight of the force we bring to bear—sanctions, UN resolutions—but on how well we understand the North Korean regime and its views of domestic and foreign policy challenges.  If we fail to grasp that North Koreans believe they have their own national interests, then we fall into the trap of thinking we can force them, sweet talk them, or bribe them into doing what we want" says CISAC's Robert Carlin.

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Revisiting Pearl Harbor with Probabilistic Early Warning

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Abstract
I will begin this talk with a short discussion of the function of warning in the US national security community, and the analytic methodology used by US intelligence agencies (in 1941 and since) to address the problem of warning. I will then present a formal model for crisis warning consisting of a Partially Observable Markov Decision Process (POMDP) intended to assist an intelligence analyst in deciding when to issue an alert to a foreign policy principal decision maker such as the President. The lead time demanded by the principal is a key element in the model. I will spend the remainder of the talk illustrating this warning model in the context of the brewing crisis in the Pacific from July to December 1941, and present results from test runs of the model using historical raw intelligence data from that period. While a probabilistic approach to warning is not a new idea, this research addresses three outstanding issues left unresolved from past efforts to develop such an approach:

  1. The need to process multiple dependent signals in a manner that is combinatorially feasible;
  2. Incorporation of the time dimension in which intelligence data is received into the inference, and the effect of dynamics on a warning decision where a finite horizon is imposed;
  3. Consideration of the fact that the analyst serves as an advisor to the principal decision maker but is not completely aware of the principal’s preference set.

Together with my thesis advisor, Prof Elisabeth Pate-Cornell, I am currently writing a paper that covers the presented material, and I hope to incorporate feedback from this presentation into the paper. Because the paper is currently a work in progress, I am not distributing it at this time.

David Blum attends Stanford University, where he is a 3rd year Ph.D. student in the Department of Management Science & Engineering as well as a U.S. Department of Defense SMART Scholar. He is currently developing a probabilistic model of national security crises, with the goal of improving crisis early warning. His interests also include targeting in counter-terrorism, signatures of WMD proliferation, and models of decisions made by adversarial actors as games with incomplete information. He is a graduate intern in the Counter-Proliferation Operations-Intelligence Support program at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

Between 2004 and 2008 David worked at the U.S. Department of Defense as an operations research analyst. He deployed twice to Iraq, in 2007 and 2008, where,  as member of Multi-National Corps Iraq, he provided direct analytic support to conventional and special operations units. He received his Master's degree from MIT in political science, concentrating in security studies, and his Bachelor's degree from Columbia University in history and physics.

Reuben W. Hills Conference Room

David Blum Predoctoral Fellow, CISAC Speaker
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U.S. Preventative War in the Nuclear Age: A Reassessment

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Reuben W. Hills Conference Room

Francis Gavin Director, Robert S. Strauss Center for International Security & Law Speaker University of Texas at Austin
Mira Rapp-Hooper PhD Student Speaker Columbia University
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