Books & Reports
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The Kurds at a Crossroads: A Survey of Politics and Society
In the spring of 2026, the Center for the National Interest surveyed leading Kurdish intellectuals in Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Türkiye to try to gauge how Kurdish politics is evolving. The period leading up to the survey had witnessed some dramatic changes. The Syrian Transitional Government (STG) was consolidating authority over the formerly semi-autonomous Kurdish
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Standards at Sea: A Strategy for U.S. and Allied Leadership in Civil Maritime Nuclear Energy
The United States cannot win the maritime nuclear competition on construction volume, where China holds a structural advantage and Russia already operates commercial systems. In the near term, America’s more durable advantage lies in shaping the standards, licensing, and certification that will govern reactors, fuels, and port access in this market—and in doing so on
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Reassessing U.S.-Türkiye Relations: The View from Ankara
At the recent NATO Summit in Ankara, President Trump announced a new opening in U.S.-Turkish ties, with an end to the long-standing sanctions on defense sales. In the latest report from the Center for the National Interest’s Regional Perspectives series, Dr. Hasan Mesut Önder asserts that this is only the start of a process to
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The Case for Deeper U.S. Engagement with Afghanistan
In the nearly five years since the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the takeover by the Taliban, America has limited its engagement with the Afghan regime to securing the release of detainees and pursuing modest counter-terrorism cooperation. Kuchins proposes a pragmatic, step-by-step approach to interacting with officials in Kabul that could—in parallel with substantive collaboration
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Regional Perspectives | Nechirvan Barzani and the New Kurdish Diplomacy
The Center for the National Interest is pleased to share its first paper in a new series, Regional Perspectives. The series will aim to provide a venue for guest authors to present their views of what the world looks like from outside America’s borders. In the paper, “Nechirvan Barzani and the New Kurdish Diplomacy,” Dr.
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