Think Tanks
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Featured Stories
International Centre for Tax and Development: Take Part in Public Consultation on Minimum Standards for Tax Expenditure Reporting
BRIGHTON, England, Aug. 14 -- The International Centre for Tax and Development, an independent research centre that says it focuses on improving tax policy and administration in lower-income countries, issued the following news on Aug. l2, 2026:
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Take part in public consultation on minimum standards for tax expenditure reporting
The Coalition on Tax Expenditure Reform (COATE), co-founded by the International Centre for Tax and Development (ICTD), has launched a public consultation on draft voluntary minimum standards for tax expenditure reporting. COATE is inviting feedback from governments, ... Show Full Article BRIGHTON, England, Aug. 14 -- The International Centre for Tax and Development, an independent research centre that says it focuses on improving tax policy and administration in lower-income countries, issued the following news on Aug. l2, 2026: * * * Take part in public consultation on minimum standards for tax expenditure reporting The Coalition on Tax Expenditure Reform (COATE), co-founded by the International Centre for Tax and Development (ICTD), has launched a public consultation on draft voluntary minimum standards for tax expenditure reporting. COATE is inviting feedback from governments,international organisations, researchers, civil society organisations, and other stakeholders. Their input received will help shape the final set of principles and indicators, which will be published later this year.
Why tax expenditures? A USD 4 trillion blind spot in public finance
Tax expenditures are costly. Governments worldwide forgo close to a quarter of their tax revenues through tax expenditures, which include exemptions, deductions, credits, and reduced rates. In some countries, the costs of tax expenditures far exceed spending on health or education.
While these measures are designed to support investment, economic transformation, and social policies, they are often insufficiently scrutinised. The lack of reliable information on costs, beneficiaries, and impacts makes it difficult for governments to assess whether specific measures are actually achieving their intended objectives and should be maintained, whether they may need to be reformed, or whether they are wholly ineffective or detrimental and should be completely removed.
As governments around the world face tight fiscal space, rising debt, and growing demands for investment in development and climate priorities, tax expenditure reform is an important opportunity to strengthen domestic resource mobilisation.
"Tax expenditures can play an important role in supporting investment and broader policy objectives, but governments need reliable information to understand their costs and impacts," said Giovanni Occhiali, Senior Research Fellow at ICTD and member of the COATE steering group.
"These draft standards aim to provide a practical and achievable baseline for improving transparency, while recognising the very different capacities and starting points across countries. We look forward to hearing from governments and other stakeholders as we refine the framework through this consultation process," he added.
Consultation on voluntary minimum standards - open till 30 September
The consultation draft Voluntary Minimum Standards for Tax Expenditure Reporting: What Are They and Why Are They Important proposes voluntary standards to publish regular, comprehensive, and accessible information on tax expenditures and to ensure that these reports are integrated into national budgets.
The standards draw on the Global Tax Expenditures Transparency Index, and on years of experience by COATE partners working on tax expenditure reporting across countries. They seek to set a practical baseline that governments at any level of capacity can adopt.
Stakeholders are invited to comment on the draft standards, including whether the proposed four principles and 12 indicators are appropriately structured, ambitious, practical to implement, and likely to support greater transparency and accountability in tax expenditure reporting (view this page for some framing questions that might be useful (https://www.iisd.org/publications/brief/voluntary-minimum-standards-tax-expenditure-reporting).
The consultation is open until 30 September 2026 and comments should be submitted to tax@iisd.org.
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About COATE
COATE is a global initiative led by the Council on Economic Policies, German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS), ICTD, International Institute for Sustainable Development, and ODI Global. The coalition was launched as part of the Sevilla Platform for Action following the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development and is endorsed by several governments and organisations.
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Original text here: https://www.ictd.ac/news/take-part-in-public-consultation-on-minimum-standards-for-tax-expenditure-reporting/
[Category: ThinkTank]
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Take part in public consultation on minimum standards for tax expenditure reporting
The Coalition on Tax Expenditure Reform (COATE), co-founded by the International Centre for Tax and Development (ICTD), has launched a public consultation on draft voluntary minimum standards for tax expenditure reporting. COATE is inviting feedback from governments, ... Show Full Article BRIGHTON, England, Aug. 14 -- The International Centre for Tax and Development, an independent research centre that says it focuses on improving tax policy and administration in lower-income countries, issued the following news on Aug. l2, 2026: * * * Take part in public consultation on minimum standards for tax expenditure reporting The Coalition on Tax Expenditure Reform (COATE), co-founded by the International Centre for Tax and Development (ICTD), has launched a public consultation on draft voluntary minimum standards for tax expenditure reporting. COATE is inviting feedback from governments,international organisations, researchers, civil society organisations, and other stakeholders. Their input received will help shape the final set of principles and indicators, which will be published later this year.
Why tax expenditures? A USD 4 trillion blind spot in public finance
Tax expenditures are costly. Governments worldwide forgo close to a quarter of their tax revenues through tax expenditures, which include exemptions, deductions, credits, and reduced rates. In some countries, the costs of tax expenditures far exceed spending on health or education.
While these measures are designed to support investment, economic transformation, and social policies, they are often insufficiently scrutinised. The lack of reliable information on costs, beneficiaries, and impacts makes it difficult for governments to assess whether specific measures are actually achieving their intended objectives and should be maintained, whether they may need to be reformed, or whether they are wholly ineffective or detrimental and should be completely removed.
As governments around the world face tight fiscal space, rising debt, and growing demands for investment in development and climate priorities, tax expenditure reform is an important opportunity to strengthen domestic resource mobilisation.
"Tax expenditures can play an important role in supporting investment and broader policy objectives, but governments need reliable information to understand their costs and impacts," said Giovanni Occhiali, Senior Research Fellow at ICTD and member of the COATE steering group.
"These draft standards aim to provide a practical and achievable baseline for improving transparency, while recognising the very different capacities and starting points across countries. We look forward to hearing from governments and other stakeholders as we refine the framework through this consultation process," he added.
Consultation on voluntary minimum standards - open till 30 September
The consultation draft Voluntary Minimum Standards for Tax Expenditure Reporting: What Are They and Why Are They Important proposes voluntary standards to publish regular, comprehensive, and accessible information on tax expenditures and to ensure that these reports are integrated into national budgets.
The standards draw on the Global Tax Expenditures Transparency Index, and on years of experience by COATE partners working on tax expenditure reporting across countries. They seek to set a practical baseline that governments at any level of capacity can adopt.
Stakeholders are invited to comment on the draft standards, including whether the proposed four principles and 12 indicators are appropriately structured, ambitious, practical to implement, and likely to support greater transparency and accountability in tax expenditure reporting (view this page for some framing questions that might be useful (https://www.iisd.org/publications/brief/voluntary-minimum-standards-tax-expenditure-reporting).
The consultation is open until 30 September 2026 and comments should be submitted to tax@iisd.org.
* * *
About COATE
COATE is a global initiative led by the Council on Economic Policies, German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS), ICTD, International Institute for Sustainable Development, and ODI Global. The coalition was launched as part of the Sevilla Platform for Action following the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development and is endorsed by several governments and organisations.
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Original text here: https://www.ictd.ac/news/take-part-in-public-consultation-on-minimum-standards-for-tax-expenditure-reporting/
[Category: ThinkTank]
Ifo Institute: Companies in Germany Tend to Expect Salaries to Fall Due to the Use of Artificial Intelligence
MUNICH, Germany, Aug. 14 -- ifo Institute issued the following news release on Aug. 12, 2026:
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Companies in Germany Tend to Expect Salaries to Fall Due to the Use of Artificial Intelligence
Many companies in Germany tend to expect salaries to decline over the next five years as a result of the use of artificial intelligence (AI). Workers in particular with less than five years of professional experience can expect lower salaries, as reported by about half of the companies that already use AI. Among workers with at least five years of professional experience, around 40% expect pay cuts.
However, ... Show Full Article MUNICH, Germany, Aug. 14 -- ifo Institute issued the following news release on Aug. 12, 2026: * * * Companies in Germany Tend to Expect Salaries to Fall Due to the Use of Artificial Intelligence Many companies in Germany tend to expect salaries to decline over the next five years as a result of the use of artificial intelligence (AI). Workers in particular with less than five years of professional experience can expect lower salaries, as reported by about half of the companies that already use AI. Among workers with at least five years of professional experience, around 40% expect pay cuts. However,depending on the qualifications of their employees, a third to half of companies expect salaries to remain stable. "From the point of view of many companies, artificial intelligence will not affect salaries equally for all employees," says ifo researcher Anna Ruffert. "They are most likely to expect salaries to fall for less experienced workers." Service providers most frequently expect salaries to fall for their workers. Among employees with little work experience, 53.3% say that, while the figure for employees with more work experience is 44.2%. Among retailers, the figures are 47.9% and 41.3%, respectively, followed by the manufacturing sector at 46.5% and 38.9%. Construction companies are less likely to state that salaries are falling due to AI: 39% for those with less work experience and 31.3% for those with more. These figures refer to employees without a (technical) university degree.
For employees with a (technical) university degree, there is hardly any change in the expectations regarding a pay cut. However, they have the chance more often to see an increase in their salary, especially in conjunction with more work experience. For example, 26% of companies expect the use of AI to have a positive effect on salaries for this group, and even among those with little work experience, 16.3% still anticipate an increase in salary. By comparison, among low-skilled workers with little work experience, the share is only 5.9%. "For workers with formal degrees - especially in combination with extensive professional experience - companies more frequently consider it possible for AI to have a positive impact on salaries," says Ruffert.
In particular, companies in the construction industry that use AI expect salaries for higher-skilled workers to increase. The share is 24.0% for those with little work experience and 29.8% for those with more than five years of work experience. The figures are 14.9% and 27.3% among service providers, 15.9% and 24.9% in trade, and 15.6% and 24.2% in manufacturing.
The analysis is based on data from the June 2026 ifo Business Survey of over 3,000 companies in Germany that are already using AI.
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More Information
Survey (https://www.ifo.de/en/facts/2026-08-12/companies-germany-tend-expect-salaries-fall-due-use-artificial-intelligence)
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Original text here: https://www.ifo.de/en/press-release/2026-08-12/companies-germany-tend-expect-salaries-fall-due-use-artificial
[Category: ThinkTank]
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Companies in Germany Tend to Expect Salaries to Fall Due to the Use of Artificial Intelligence
Many companies in Germany tend to expect salaries to decline over the next five years as a result of the use of artificial intelligence (AI). Workers in particular with less than five years of professional experience can expect lower salaries, as reported by about half of the companies that already use AI. Among workers with at least five years of professional experience, around 40% expect pay cuts.
However, ... Show Full Article MUNICH, Germany, Aug. 14 -- ifo Institute issued the following news release on Aug. 12, 2026: * * * Companies in Germany Tend to Expect Salaries to Fall Due to the Use of Artificial Intelligence Many companies in Germany tend to expect salaries to decline over the next five years as a result of the use of artificial intelligence (AI). Workers in particular with less than five years of professional experience can expect lower salaries, as reported by about half of the companies that already use AI. Among workers with at least five years of professional experience, around 40% expect pay cuts. However,depending on the qualifications of their employees, a third to half of companies expect salaries to remain stable. "From the point of view of many companies, artificial intelligence will not affect salaries equally for all employees," says ifo researcher Anna Ruffert. "They are most likely to expect salaries to fall for less experienced workers." Service providers most frequently expect salaries to fall for their workers. Among employees with little work experience, 53.3% say that, while the figure for employees with more work experience is 44.2%. Among retailers, the figures are 47.9% and 41.3%, respectively, followed by the manufacturing sector at 46.5% and 38.9%. Construction companies are less likely to state that salaries are falling due to AI: 39% for those with less work experience and 31.3% for those with more. These figures refer to employees without a (technical) university degree.
For employees with a (technical) university degree, there is hardly any change in the expectations regarding a pay cut. However, they have the chance more often to see an increase in their salary, especially in conjunction with more work experience. For example, 26% of companies expect the use of AI to have a positive effect on salaries for this group, and even among those with little work experience, 16.3% still anticipate an increase in salary. By comparison, among low-skilled workers with little work experience, the share is only 5.9%. "For workers with formal degrees - especially in combination with extensive professional experience - companies more frequently consider it possible for AI to have a positive impact on salaries," says Ruffert.
In particular, companies in the construction industry that use AI expect salaries for higher-skilled workers to increase. The share is 24.0% for those with little work experience and 29.8% for those with more than five years of work experience. The figures are 14.9% and 27.3% among service providers, 15.9% and 24.9% in trade, and 15.6% and 24.2% in manufacturing.
The analysis is based on data from the June 2026 ifo Business Survey of over 3,000 companies in Germany that are already using AI.
* * *
More Information
Survey (https://www.ifo.de/en/facts/2026-08-12/companies-germany-tend-expect-salaries-fall-due-use-artificial-intelligence)
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Original text here: https://www.ifo.de/en/press-release/2026-08-12/companies-germany-tend-expect-salaries-fall-due-use-artificial
[Category: ThinkTank]
Hudson Institute Issues Commentary: Ukraine Military Situation Report on Aug. 12, 2026
WASHINGTON, Aug. 14 -- Hudson Institute, a research organization that says it promotes leadership for a secure, free and prosperous future, issued the following commentary on Aug. 12, 2026, by nonresident senior fellow Can Kasapoglu:
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Ukraine Military Situation Report | August 12
Executive Summary
* Battlefield assessment. Moscow sustained pressure on Ukraine through missile and drone warfare, while Kyiv expanded strikes on Russian logistics hubs.
* North Korean assistance. North Korea is preparing to deploy large troop contingents to Russia as the two countries deepen missile and logistics ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Aug. 14 -- Hudson Institute, a research organization that says it promotes leadership for a secure, free and prosperous future, issued the following commentary on Aug. 12, 2026, by nonresident senior fellow Can Kasapoglu: * * * Ukraine Military Situation Report | August 12 Executive Summary * Battlefield assessment. Moscow sustained pressure on Ukraine through missile and drone warfare, while Kyiv expanded strikes on Russian logistics hubs. * North Korean assistance. North Korea is preparing to deploy large troop contingents to Russia as the two countries deepen missile and logisticscooperation.
* Ukraine's air-defense challenges. Larger Russian missile salvos could overwhelm Ukraine's air defenses, which are already strained by depleted stocks of interceptors.
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1. Battlefield Assessment
Last week, long-range drone and missile warfare continued to shape the war's attritional character beyond the front lines.
Russian forces launched a mixed-strike package against Ukraine overnight on August 10-11. The attack included Zircon hypersonic anti-ship missiles targeting Kyiv and Zaporizhzhia. Russia also launched Iskander-M and North Korean KN-23 tactical ballistic missiles from Kursk, Rostov, and Voronezh regions.
Moscow's strike package also involved 120 unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), including Gerbera attack drones, Parodiya decoys, and Shahed one-way attack drones, some of which were reportedly jet-powered. Russian forces launched UAVs from Kursk, Millerovo, Oryol, and Primorsko-Akhtarsk, as well as from occupied Donetsk and occupied Crimea. Ukrainian air defenses reportedly intercepted, electronically suppressed, or otherwise neutralized 98 of the 120 drones launched by Russia.
That same night, Ukrainian drones struck logistics infrastructure operated by Wildberries, Russia's largest e-commerce platform, in Voronezh Oblast. The attack triggered fires across a large area. Wildberries confirmed that it had evacuated its personnel from an affected facility.
In this strike, Ukrainian forces targeted a major distribution hub in Aleksandrovka, Novousmansky District, Voronezh Oblast. Since July 18, Ukrainian forces have reportedly targeted around 20 Wildberries facilities across Russia, including warehouses in Elektrostal, Krasnodar, Nevinnomyssk, Yekaterinburg, and St. Petersburg. Ukrainian strikes have reportedly burned at least 14 Wildberries warehouses, damaging approximately 27 percent of the company's nationwide warehousing capacity.
Last week brought no significant changes in the ground war, except on the Sloviansk front. Visuals from the battleground showcased an increase in Russian first-person view (FPV) drone strikes. Some attacks took the form of "human safaris," in which Russia forces deliberately target civilians.
The recent increase in FPV drone activity in urban areas suggests that Russia is mounting a push deeper into Ukraine's defenses. Apart from the Sloviansk sector, increased combat activity and a heightened operational tempo characterized the overall battlespace. Pokrovsk and the Kostiantynivka sector remained the conflict's most active flashpoints.
New trends in drone warfare continued to emerge. Visuals from tactical engagements between Russia and Ukraine increasingly show UAVs operating from naval drones, highlighting the cross-domain character of robotic warfare. This report will continue to detail important innovations in drone warfare concepts of employment (CONEMP).
2. North Korea Prepares for Large-Scale Intervention in Ukraine and Deeper Integration with Russia
North Korea's contribution to Russia's war effort is evolving from arms transfers and geographically contained combat deployments into direct force integration. Open-source intelligence and Ukrainian military-intelligence reporting indicate that Russia began preparations in June to absorb an additional North Korean contingent in Voronezh Oblast. The region in western Russia is emerging as a principal Russian reception and integration node for the next phase of North Korean deployments.
Initially, Kyiv estimated that Moscow was seeking 30,000 additional personnel from Pyongyang but revised this assessment to a range between 30,000 and 50,000 troops. In parallel, North Korea is deploying a missile detachment comprising roughly 90 personnel to the region for attachment to the Russian 112th Missile Brigade. This formation may operate six launchers supported by as many as 120 KN-23 and KN-24 ballistic missiles.
Russia has likely received combat-deployable missiles assigned to the 112th Missile Brigade, two of which it has already employed against Ukrainian targets. This deployment would place North Korean personnel directly inside Russia's operational command-and-strike architecture. Such a dynamic could allow Pyongyang's troops to gain combat experience while supporting sustained missile pressure on Ukraine.
A North Korean deployment on the scale now under consideration could allow the Kremlin to free Russian formations for frontline service while using North Korean troops in more demanding roles. Such a deployment would mark a fuller and more integrated phase of Pyongyang's participation in the war, which could soon extend beyond Kursk Oblast into occupied Ukrainian territory, and potentially include offensive operations at critical flashpoints across the line of contact. Amid mounting Russian losses and Russian President Vladimir Putin's determination to sustain high-tempo combat operations, a large North Korean contingent could impose additional attrition on an already strained Ukrainian military across an overstretched battlefield. Pyongyang's tolerance for heavy casualties could further intensify pressure on Ukraine's forces.
North Korea already transferred thousands of troops to Russia's invasion forces in 2024. These soldiers helped Russian units repel the strategic Ukrainian salient in Kursk Oblast. A North Korean contingent roughly the size of one division may have remained in Kursk, although experts do not believe these troops are currently participating directly in combat operations. North Korea assigned a separate contingent of sappers and other military laborers to mine-clearance and reconstruction work in Kursk.
These personnel deployments rely on extensive logistical connections between Moscow and Pyongyang. North Korea has transferred millions of artillery and mortar rounds to Russia, along with 170mm-class Koksan heavy artillery, KN-23 and KN-24 tactical ballistic missiles, and multiple-launch rocket systems (MLRS). Additionally, four Russian cargo vessels conducted 64 voyages to North Korean ports between September 2023 and March 2025, moving nearly 16,000 ammunition containers to Russia.
Officials assess that North Korean deliveries provide roughly half of the ammunition Russian forces consume along some segments of the front lines in Ukraine. The supply lines connecting Moscow and Pyongyang have become a key structural enabler of Russia's attritional war. For the Kremlin, North Korean assistance is increasingly more than a temporary expedient to cover isolated shortages.
North Korea's emerging missile deployment to Russia represents a further escalation of this relationship. Russia first launched a North Korean ballistic missile against the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv in early 2024. Embedding a North Korean missile unit in Russia now would allow Pyongyang to observe launch operations, assess battlefield performance, refine targeting procedures, and use combat data to modify its weapons. Additional KN-23 and KN-24 salvos would increase pressure on Ukraine's limited inventory of Patriot surface-to-air missile (SAM) interceptors and strengthen Russia's capacity for sustained ballistic missile attacks against Ukrainian cities and critical infrastructure.
Analysis of open-source imagery further suggests that the Kremlin has accelerated road and customs infrastructure construction for the new bridge between Russia and North Korea. Open-source satellite imagery shows extensive concrete paving around the entrance to a new customs facility as well as roadwork advancing along the pavement between the customs complex and the bridge. The North Korean customs facility had appeared largely complete ahead of its originally scheduled June opening, but delays on the Russian side pushed the projected opening to September. Large stores of construction material and unfinished sections of the facility indicate that significant work remains.
The bridge carries strategic and symbolic significance. Once operational, the road connection between the two allies will add a more flexible overland channel to their existing rail and maritime network and facilitate the movement of personnel, military equipment, and ammunition.
The hostile nexus connecting Russia and North Korea also implicates the European and Indo-Pacific security theaters. Every North Korean weapon tested over Ukraine can provide Pyongyang with lessons applicable to future contingencies involving South Korea, Japan, the Philippines, or the United States. Pyongyang, therefore, is no longer merely replenishing Russian stocks but also using the war in Ukraine as a combat laboratory. At the same time, Moscow is using its North Korean connection as an increasingly important source of ammunition, missiles, specialist personnel, and potentially massed ground forces.
3. What to Look for in the Coming Weeks
As Ukraine confronts a critical shortage of air-defense interceptors, it will be important to track the size and composition of Russia's missile salvos. Robert "Magyar" Brovdi, the commander of Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces, assesses that Russia can now launch simultaneous salvos of up to 77 ballistic and cruise missiles and is seeking to increase the capacity to 200. Even partial progress toward that objective would significantly increase Russia's ability to saturate Ukrainian air defenses, deplete Kyiv's already limited interceptor stocks, and expose major Ukrainian cities to increasingly destructive ballistic missile attacks.
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At A Glance:
Can Kasapoglu is a nonresident senior fellow at Hudson Institute. His work at Hudson focuses on political-military affairs in the Middle East, North Africa, and former Soviet regions.
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Original text here: https://www.hudson.org/defense-strategy/ukraine-military-situation-report-august-12-can-kasapoglu
[Category: ThinkTank]
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Ukraine Military Situation Report | August 12
Executive Summary
* Battlefield assessment. Moscow sustained pressure on Ukraine through missile and drone warfare, while Kyiv expanded strikes on Russian logistics hubs.
* North Korean assistance. North Korea is preparing to deploy large troop contingents to Russia as the two countries deepen missile and logistics ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Aug. 14 -- Hudson Institute, a research organization that says it promotes leadership for a secure, free and prosperous future, issued the following commentary on Aug. 12, 2026, by nonresident senior fellow Can Kasapoglu: * * * Ukraine Military Situation Report | August 12 Executive Summary * Battlefield assessment. Moscow sustained pressure on Ukraine through missile and drone warfare, while Kyiv expanded strikes on Russian logistics hubs. * North Korean assistance. North Korea is preparing to deploy large troop contingents to Russia as the two countries deepen missile and logisticscooperation.
* Ukraine's air-defense challenges. Larger Russian missile salvos could overwhelm Ukraine's air defenses, which are already strained by depleted stocks of interceptors.
-
1. Battlefield Assessment
Last week, long-range drone and missile warfare continued to shape the war's attritional character beyond the front lines.
Russian forces launched a mixed-strike package against Ukraine overnight on August 10-11. The attack included Zircon hypersonic anti-ship missiles targeting Kyiv and Zaporizhzhia. Russia also launched Iskander-M and North Korean KN-23 tactical ballistic missiles from Kursk, Rostov, and Voronezh regions.
Moscow's strike package also involved 120 unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), including Gerbera attack drones, Parodiya decoys, and Shahed one-way attack drones, some of which were reportedly jet-powered. Russian forces launched UAVs from Kursk, Millerovo, Oryol, and Primorsko-Akhtarsk, as well as from occupied Donetsk and occupied Crimea. Ukrainian air defenses reportedly intercepted, electronically suppressed, or otherwise neutralized 98 of the 120 drones launched by Russia.
That same night, Ukrainian drones struck logistics infrastructure operated by Wildberries, Russia's largest e-commerce platform, in Voronezh Oblast. The attack triggered fires across a large area. Wildberries confirmed that it had evacuated its personnel from an affected facility.
In this strike, Ukrainian forces targeted a major distribution hub in Aleksandrovka, Novousmansky District, Voronezh Oblast. Since July 18, Ukrainian forces have reportedly targeted around 20 Wildberries facilities across Russia, including warehouses in Elektrostal, Krasnodar, Nevinnomyssk, Yekaterinburg, and St. Petersburg. Ukrainian strikes have reportedly burned at least 14 Wildberries warehouses, damaging approximately 27 percent of the company's nationwide warehousing capacity.
Last week brought no significant changes in the ground war, except on the Sloviansk front. Visuals from the battleground showcased an increase in Russian first-person view (FPV) drone strikes. Some attacks took the form of "human safaris," in which Russia forces deliberately target civilians.
The recent increase in FPV drone activity in urban areas suggests that Russia is mounting a push deeper into Ukraine's defenses. Apart from the Sloviansk sector, increased combat activity and a heightened operational tempo characterized the overall battlespace. Pokrovsk and the Kostiantynivka sector remained the conflict's most active flashpoints.
New trends in drone warfare continued to emerge. Visuals from tactical engagements between Russia and Ukraine increasingly show UAVs operating from naval drones, highlighting the cross-domain character of robotic warfare. This report will continue to detail important innovations in drone warfare concepts of employment (CONEMP).
2. North Korea Prepares for Large-Scale Intervention in Ukraine and Deeper Integration with Russia
North Korea's contribution to Russia's war effort is evolving from arms transfers and geographically contained combat deployments into direct force integration. Open-source intelligence and Ukrainian military-intelligence reporting indicate that Russia began preparations in June to absorb an additional North Korean contingent in Voronezh Oblast. The region in western Russia is emerging as a principal Russian reception and integration node for the next phase of North Korean deployments.
Initially, Kyiv estimated that Moscow was seeking 30,000 additional personnel from Pyongyang but revised this assessment to a range between 30,000 and 50,000 troops. In parallel, North Korea is deploying a missile detachment comprising roughly 90 personnel to the region for attachment to the Russian 112th Missile Brigade. This formation may operate six launchers supported by as many as 120 KN-23 and KN-24 ballistic missiles.
Russia has likely received combat-deployable missiles assigned to the 112th Missile Brigade, two of which it has already employed against Ukrainian targets. This deployment would place North Korean personnel directly inside Russia's operational command-and-strike architecture. Such a dynamic could allow Pyongyang's troops to gain combat experience while supporting sustained missile pressure on Ukraine.
A North Korean deployment on the scale now under consideration could allow the Kremlin to free Russian formations for frontline service while using North Korean troops in more demanding roles. Such a deployment would mark a fuller and more integrated phase of Pyongyang's participation in the war, which could soon extend beyond Kursk Oblast into occupied Ukrainian territory, and potentially include offensive operations at critical flashpoints across the line of contact. Amid mounting Russian losses and Russian President Vladimir Putin's determination to sustain high-tempo combat operations, a large North Korean contingent could impose additional attrition on an already strained Ukrainian military across an overstretched battlefield. Pyongyang's tolerance for heavy casualties could further intensify pressure on Ukraine's forces.
North Korea already transferred thousands of troops to Russia's invasion forces in 2024. These soldiers helped Russian units repel the strategic Ukrainian salient in Kursk Oblast. A North Korean contingent roughly the size of one division may have remained in Kursk, although experts do not believe these troops are currently participating directly in combat operations. North Korea assigned a separate contingent of sappers and other military laborers to mine-clearance and reconstruction work in Kursk.
These personnel deployments rely on extensive logistical connections between Moscow and Pyongyang. North Korea has transferred millions of artillery and mortar rounds to Russia, along with 170mm-class Koksan heavy artillery, KN-23 and KN-24 tactical ballistic missiles, and multiple-launch rocket systems (MLRS). Additionally, four Russian cargo vessels conducted 64 voyages to North Korean ports between September 2023 and March 2025, moving nearly 16,000 ammunition containers to Russia.
Officials assess that North Korean deliveries provide roughly half of the ammunition Russian forces consume along some segments of the front lines in Ukraine. The supply lines connecting Moscow and Pyongyang have become a key structural enabler of Russia's attritional war. For the Kremlin, North Korean assistance is increasingly more than a temporary expedient to cover isolated shortages.
North Korea's emerging missile deployment to Russia represents a further escalation of this relationship. Russia first launched a North Korean ballistic missile against the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv in early 2024. Embedding a North Korean missile unit in Russia now would allow Pyongyang to observe launch operations, assess battlefield performance, refine targeting procedures, and use combat data to modify its weapons. Additional KN-23 and KN-24 salvos would increase pressure on Ukraine's limited inventory of Patriot surface-to-air missile (SAM) interceptors and strengthen Russia's capacity for sustained ballistic missile attacks against Ukrainian cities and critical infrastructure.
Analysis of open-source imagery further suggests that the Kremlin has accelerated road and customs infrastructure construction for the new bridge between Russia and North Korea. Open-source satellite imagery shows extensive concrete paving around the entrance to a new customs facility as well as roadwork advancing along the pavement between the customs complex and the bridge. The North Korean customs facility had appeared largely complete ahead of its originally scheduled June opening, but delays on the Russian side pushed the projected opening to September. Large stores of construction material and unfinished sections of the facility indicate that significant work remains.
The bridge carries strategic and symbolic significance. Once operational, the road connection between the two allies will add a more flexible overland channel to their existing rail and maritime network and facilitate the movement of personnel, military equipment, and ammunition.
The hostile nexus connecting Russia and North Korea also implicates the European and Indo-Pacific security theaters. Every North Korean weapon tested over Ukraine can provide Pyongyang with lessons applicable to future contingencies involving South Korea, Japan, the Philippines, or the United States. Pyongyang, therefore, is no longer merely replenishing Russian stocks but also using the war in Ukraine as a combat laboratory. At the same time, Moscow is using its North Korean connection as an increasingly important source of ammunition, missiles, specialist personnel, and potentially massed ground forces.
3. What to Look for in the Coming Weeks
As Ukraine confronts a critical shortage of air-defense interceptors, it will be important to track the size and composition of Russia's missile salvos. Robert "Magyar" Brovdi, the commander of Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces, assesses that Russia can now launch simultaneous salvos of up to 77 ballistic and cruise missiles and is seeking to increase the capacity to 200. Even partial progress toward that objective would significantly increase Russia's ability to saturate Ukrainian air defenses, deplete Kyiv's already limited interceptor stocks, and expose major Ukrainian cities to increasingly destructive ballistic missile attacks.
* * *
At A Glance:
Can Kasapoglu is a nonresident senior fellow at Hudson Institute. His work at Hudson focuses on political-military affairs in the Middle East, North Africa, and former Soviet regions.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.hudson.org/defense-strategy/ukraine-military-situation-report-august-12-can-kasapoglu
[Category: ThinkTank]
Center of the American Experiment Issues Commentary: How the 2023 Trifecta Blew So Much Money So Fast the State Government Couldn't Keep Track
MINNETONKA, Minnesota, Aug. 14 -- The Center of the American Experiment, a civic and educational organization that says it creates and advocates policies, issued the following commentary by economist John Phelan:
* * *
How the 2023 trifecta blew so much money so fast the state government couldn't keep track
On Tuesday, based on reporting from KSTP, I wrote about how, in 2023, the state government voted to give $1.5 million of Minnesota taxpayers' money in grants to a company which wasn't even registered with the Secretary of State. The company has since received hundreds of thousands of dollars ... Show Full Article MINNETONKA, Minnesota, Aug. 14 -- The Center of the American Experiment, a civic and educational organization that says it creates and advocates policies, issued the following commentary by economist John Phelan: * * * How the 2023 trifecta blew so much money so fast the state government couldn't keep track On Tuesday, based on reporting from KSTP, I wrote about how, in 2023, the state government voted to give $1.5 million of Minnesota taxpayers' money in grants to a company which wasn't even registered with the Secretary of State. The company has since received hundreds of thousands of dollarsdespite not meeting reporting requirements.
* * *
Among several, one aspect of the story in particular caught my eye. KSTP reports that the:
"[Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development] DEED acknowledged it was responsible for a "historic" amount of funding that year - $1.8 billion in total, roughly 10 times more than normal. Officials said the funding surge required hiring and training additional staff, but maintained they are proud of the agency's overall response."
* * *
So part of this latest fiasco involving Minnesota taxpayers' money was the result of the sheer scale of spending undertaken by that "historic" trifecta in 2023; it simply overwhelmed the capacity of the state government to maintain appropriate safeguards.
* * *
This won't be a surprise to anyone who was up at the Capitol during that orgy of spending. Here is something I wrote at the time:
"This morning, HF2, the proposal for paid family and medical leave, sailed through its fifth House committee hearing. Perhaps one reason for its speedy passage is that it isn't weighted down by a fiscal note.
"Fiscal notes, according to the House Fiscal Analysis Department:
""...put a price tag on proposed legislation, and are very important in the legislative process. A fiscal note should be an objective opinion on the change in expenditures and revenues that will result from a bill. Legislators need this information to make informed decisions on proposed legislation. A fiscal note may influence if a bill passes, if it fails, or if changes need to be made to the bill to adjust the cost or revenue."
"And, today, without this vital information, HF2 passed the State and Local Government Finance and Policy committee, the very committee tasked with overseeing -- as the name indicates -- state and local government finance.
"HF2, remember, is a bill under which "as many as 400 new bureaucrats will be hired using an entirely new computer system: think MNLARS, or MNsure." How can the committee charged with overseeing state and local government finance possibly vote on this bill without knowing what the financial consequences will be?
"I would be tempted to call this the "Brewster's Millions" style of government, but that would be unfair to Monty Brewster: he knew how much money he was spending.
"Rep. Jim Nash (R) made the point that it was impossible for the State and Local Government Finance and Policy committee to make an informed vote on measures pertaining to state and local government finance without knowing what the financial costs of that measure would be. The committee chair, Rep. Ginny Klevorn (DFL), replied that with 1,500 bills introduced, the legislature is "overwhelmed" and so has no choice but to vote on them without fiscal notes: in other words, they are trying to do so much so quickly that they have no choice but to make uninformed decisions."
* * *
The 2023 session is often called "historic." Many things have been historic -- disco, the Black Death, that time Geraldo opened Al Capone's vault on live TV -- without being good. The sad truth is that the 2023 session was a badly managed bungle of epic proportions the consequences of which Minnesotans will be saddled with for years.
How bungled and epic? The session opened with a forecast budget surplus of $17 billion for the 2024-2025 biennium. As my colleague Martha Njolomole noted recently, it "raised general fund spending from $27 billion in 2023 to $35 billion in 2024 -- a staggering 26 percent increase after adjusting for inflation," and this, remember, without the proper safeguards either in legislative committees or at agencies like DEED. "In 2024," Martha continues, "Minnesota spent $4.7 billion more than it collected in revenue. The gap has shrunk, but the trend remains the same. Over the current forecast period, spanning 2026 to 2029, spending continues to outpace revenue by an average of $1.6 billion a year."
That is how the trifecta blew up Minnesota's budget.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.americanexperiment.org/how-the-2023-trifecta-blew-so-much-money-so-fast-the-state-government-couldnt-keep-track/
[Category: ThinkTank]
* * *
How the 2023 trifecta blew so much money so fast the state government couldn't keep track
On Tuesday, based on reporting from KSTP, I wrote about how, in 2023, the state government voted to give $1.5 million of Minnesota taxpayers' money in grants to a company which wasn't even registered with the Secretary of State. The company has since received hundreds of thousands of dollars ... Show Full Article MINNETONKA, Minnesota, Aug. 14 -- The Center of the American Experiment, a civic and educational organization that says it creates and advocates policies, issued the following commentary by economist John Phelan: * * * How the 2023 trifecta blew so much money so fast the state government couldn't keep track On Tuesday, based on reporting from KSTP, I wrote about how, in 2023, the state government voted to give $1.5 million of Minnesota taxpayers' money in grants to a company which wasn't even registered with the Secretary of State. The company has since received hundreds of thousands of dollarsdespite not meeting reporting requirements.
* * *
Among several, one aspect of the story in particular caught my eye. KSTP reports that the:
"[Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development] DEED acknowledged it was responsible for a "historic" amount of funding that year - $1.8 billion in total, roughly 10 times more than normal. Officials said the funding surge required hiring and training additional staff, but maintained they are proud of the agency's overall response."
* * *
So part of this latest fiasco involving Minnesota taxpayers' money was the result of the sheer scale of spending undertaken by that "historic" trifecta in 2023; it simply overwhelmed the capacity of the state government to maintain appropriate safeguards.
* * *
This won't be a surprise to anyone who was up at the Capitol during that orgy of spending. Here is something I wrote at the time:
"This morning, HF2, the proposal for paid family and medical leave, sailed through its fifth House committee hearing. Perhaps one reason for its speedy passage is that it isn't weighted down by a fiscal note.
"Fiscal notes, according to the House Fiscal Analysis Department:
""...put a price tag on proposed legislation, and are very important in the legislative process. A fiscal note should be an objective opinion on the change in expenditures and revenues that will result from a bill. Legislators need this information to make informed decisions on proposed legislation. A fiscal note may influence if a bill passes, if it fails, or if changes need to be made to the bill to adjust the cost or revenue."
"And, today, without this vital information, HF2 passed the State and Local Government Finance and Policy committee, the very committee tasked with overseeing -- as the name indicates -- state and local government finance.
"HF2, remember, is a bill under which "as many as 400 new bureaucrats will be hired using an entirely new computer system: think MNLARS, or MNsure." How can the committee charged with overseeing state and local government finance possibly vote on this bill without knowing what the financial consequences will be?
"I would be tempted to call this the "Brewster's Millions" style of government, but that would be unfair to Monty Brewster: he knew how much money he was spending.
"Rep. Jim Nash (R) made the point that it was impossible for the State and Local Government Finance and Policy committee to make an informed vote on measures pertaining to state and local government finance without knowing what the financial costs of that measure would be. The committee chair, Rep. Ginny Klevorn (DFL), replied that with 1,500 bills introduced, the legislature is "overwhelmed" and so has no choice but to vote on them without fiscal notes: in other words, they are trying to do so much so quickly that they have no choice but to make uninformed decisions."
* * *
The 2023 session is often called "historic." Many things have been historic -- disco, the Black Death, that time Geraldo opened Al Capone's vault on live TV -- without being good. The sad truth is that the 2023 session was a badly managed bungle of epic proportions the consequences of which Minnesotans will be saddled with for years.
How bungled and epic? The session opened with a forecast budget surplus of $17 billion for the 2024-2025 biennium. As my colleague Martha Njolomole noted recently, it "raised general fund spending from $27 billion in 2023 to $35 billion in 2024 -- a staggering 26 percent increase after adjusting for inflation," and this, remember, without the proper safeguards either in legislative committees or at agencies like DEED. "In 2024," Martha continues, "Minnesota spent $4.7 billion more than it collected in revenue. The gap has shrunk, but the trend remains the same. Over the current forecast period, spanning 2026 to 2029, spending continues to outpace revenue by an average of $1.6 billion a year."
That is how the trifecta blew up Minnesota's budget.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.americanexperiment.org/how-the-2023-trifecta-blew-so-much-money-so-fast-the-state-government-couldnt-keep-track/
[Category: ThinkTank]
Center of the American Experiment Issues Commentary to Thinking Minnesota: Stewardship and the Local School
MINNETONKA, Minnesota, Aug. 14 -- The Center of the American Experiment, a civic and educational organization that says it creates and advocates policies, issued the following commentary by policy fellow Josiah Padley to its Thinking Minnesota magazine:
* * *
Stewardship and the local school
Schools of all types benefit from local investment, stewardship, and community care
-
At the close of the 18th century, the French intellectual elite, the philosophes, produced documents proclaiming the universal rights of man. These proclamations of sweeping, abstract philosophical principles became the ... Show Full Article MINNETONKA, Minnesota, Aug. 14 -- The Center of the American Experiment, a civic and educational organization that says it creates and advocates policies, issued the following commentary by policy fellow Josiah Padley to its Thinking Minnesota magazine: * * * Stewardship and the local school Schools of all types benefit from local investment, stewardship, and community care - At the close of the 18th century, the French intellectual elite, the philosophes, produced documents proclaiming the universal rights of man. These proclamations of sweeping, abstract philosophical principles became thefoundation of a regime of blood and terror, with school curricula and structure, religious liberty, and personal political conscience all falling under the shadow of the guillotine.
In his work "Reflections on the Revolution in France," British philosopher Edmund Burke argued that the French philosophes had misunderstood human nature in attempting to proclaim sweeping philosophical concepts that purported to pertain to the whole of the French nation. The philosophes, Burke claimed, failed to see that principles governing society cannot originate at a national level. A national philosophy cannot be imposed top-down by a committee in the capital and taught by government emissaries in secular national schools. The philosophes misunderstood the basic principle that social stewardship is inherently localized. A society wherein each individual does their part for others is a society that ultimately provides universal respect and benefits for all. Burke writes:
To be attached to the subdivision, to love the little platoon we belong to in society, is the first principle (the germ as it were) of public affections. It is the first link in the series by which we proceed towards a love to our country and to mankind.
For Burke, every person must "tend their own garden" with care. A citizen's primary responsibility is not to overthrow, vote out, or vote in national figures, but to serve her neighbor. This is not a dismissal of national politics, but a more accurate identification of where change begins. Burke claims that humans learn to love one another through particulars. Faithfulness in local matters, he claims, will progressively lead to a strong society. The country with no broken windows will have no broken politics.
Burke's vision of local stewardship and "little platoons," so central to the development of Western conservatism, is reflected in the development of the American education system. Our system prioritizes local school district control in everything from hiring decisions to curriculum choice. The schools are designed with the assumption that there are "little platoons" to support them.
The Burkean vision of community-supported schools is lovely, but visions require action to become reality. Data from recent years suggests that local school involvement in America is strong, but waning. According to 2023 data published by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), only 36 percent of K-12 students had a parent or other family member who volunteered or served on a school committee. Generally, families were somewhat engaged, with 74 percent attending a school or class event, but the willingness to show up for a piano recital did not translate into a desire to volunteer. It also only occasionally translated into largesse: a 2025 EdChoice poll conducted by Morning Consult found that less than a third of parents made charitable monetary contributions, like a check for classroom supplies, to their child's K-12 schools. (On the bright side, of those who donated, most gave over $100, and a quarter gave over $500.)
Perhaps families simply do not want to navigate school bureaucracy -- NCES data suggest that parental satisfaction with their child's school is declining. In 2016, 54 percent of parents were "very satisfied" with their child's high school; in 2023, only 49 percent felt the same way. When more than half of all parents have an uneasy relationship with one of the primary entities tasked with launching their child into adulthood, it warrants attention.
Teachers are also feeling adrift. A 2026 EdChoice poll, conducted by pollster Morning Consult, found that only one in four teachers felt that public education was going well nationwide. Fifty-three percent of teachers felt that education was going poorly in their school district, alongside 45 percent of parents who felt that their school district was on the wrong track. Fewer than a third of teachers were positive about their students' academic progress. This isn't surprising, given that school leaders consistently report a lack of family support and connection.
In the face of such mounting discontent, some have argued that the proper solution is to withdraw from publicly funded schools altogether. In "The Benedict Option," Rod Dreher argues that Americans should self-segregate into a version of little platoons -- ones that sail like Noah's Ark to ride out what he views as a coming cultural storm until the world can be remade once more. Dreher is right that America's public school system is dysfunctional, and its inability to serve all students has rightly led many families to choose other educational options. However, the case for splintering into millions of locally enclosed escape pods is difficult to accept. This perspective is at odds with Burke's assessment that love for one's neighbor can transform society. The escapist vision also fails to value the accomplishments of America's public school system and does not recognize the hope for what it could be. Yes, perhaps Burke's idealist social vision has not yet come to fruition, but that means that policymakers should put more, not less, effort into parental engagement and involvement.
Why is America's priority of public education so unique?
Publicly funded, universally accessible schools are a recent historical social accomplishment. The assumptions of the ancient world were very different. Alexander the Great received an incredible education from his tutors (including Aristotle), but he was in the minority of wealthy aristocratic youth. The Greeks were the first to begin the great march toward the democratization of education, but the process would take millennia more to develop into modern mass education.
Learning without mass schooling
Societies that prized higher learning have not always required formal schooling for everyone. At the height of the monastic tradition in the Middle Ages, monasteries served as local centers of learning and preserved much of the West's intellectual heritage. In that sense, Thomas Cahill's claim that Irish monks "saved civilization" is not entirely overstated.
Even so, this was not popular education in the modern sense. Knowledge remained concentrated within a small, educated class rather than broadly shared across the population. Ireland and other European societies could not easily spare their young farmhands for scholarly study, which limited access to learning for ordinary people.
With time came new possibilities in education. The pursuit of knowledge could become decentralized, and theological and philosophical developments had concurred that large-scale education of the individual was desirable. Charity schools, then public schools, arose from Enlightenment principles entwined with Christian assumptions.
While the religious element would eventually pass away from America's educational consciousness in favor of religiously neutral schools, initial public education (including in Minnesota) was administered by the religiously devout. The first public school system in America came from Massachusetts Puritans, who required communities with 50 or more households to hire a schoolteacher to teach male and female students to read and write. The Puritans even raised a tax to fund these efforts. The Massachusetts Law of 1647 was nicknamed the "Old Deluder Satan Act," so named because literacy would empower students to avoid devilish pitfalls.
The democratic impulse of the Greeks flowered in the New World's priority of public education. A representative democracy like America is deeply reliant on social assumptions about personal responsibility and well-informed voting. The idealist favors publicly funded education because liberal education frees the mind and soul, while the cynic points out that smart people pay more taxes and foolish people cast foolish votes. Both the idealist and the cynic conclude that America's insistence on publicly funded, fully accessible schools is a social cornerstone and is in the best interest of all citizens of a democracy.
This brings us to the humble neighborhood school, once a one-room log cabin and now a school district governed by a locally elected school board. The schoolhouse is thought of as a partnership between parents and the government, which acts in loco parentis until the afternoon bell rings. But is a successful school district a product of local stewardship, or is it purely subject to the whims of national elections?
The answer is that both can matter. Contrary to what many might think, school reform previously had a significant bipartisan consensus. Although national policies carried differing levels of public support, 2002's No Child Left Behind Act and 2015's Every Student Succeeds Act were the product of across-the-aisle reformers.
America's national early aughts school reform increased real learning for students. When school reform began to make waves in the 1990s, national assessment scores in mathematics and reading were low. Between 2002 and 2015, as measured by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), the average American fourth grader increased their mathematics ability by 2.8 grade levels. Fourth-grade reading ability also increased by 0.9 grades. Eighth graders gained 2.2 grades of knowledge in math and 0.7 grades in reading. All that changed after 2015, and especially after the COVID-19 pandemic. The average eighth grader today scores similarly to that of a student in the late 1990s in mathematics and is at a many-decade low in reading.
There are many reasons for this decline, but one conclusion stands out: educational progress has been made and can be made again. Wise national policies come and go, but parents and community members are not powerless victims in the face of generalized trends.
What does local stewardship of a school look like?
Yes, state and national policy matter. But parents and communities can create strong little platoons in their school district, regardless of national elections.
A 2019 American Psychological Association review of 448 independent studies on parental involvement in schools found that parents really matter for a student's academic development. Parental involvement can enhance a child's academic motivation and engagement, and parental leadership in a child's academic world can signal that their education is both their responsibility and within their control. This contributes to academic achievement, school engagement, personal motivation, and emotional well-being. Family and parent involvement, from homework help to working as a classroom monitor, dramatically impacts a child's behavior, confidence, and academic achievement for the better. The ripple effects of that child's increased engagement and happiness reverberate across the school, improving the classroom environment for everyone.
Burke would argue that loving one's "little platoons" includes serving the local school district. There is no denying that local school involvement can be frustrating, but it is a necessary good, both for one's own child and for others. Service is a blessing, an act of virtue, and an assertion of an upright character. Donations, volunteer work on field trips, or time as a substitute teacher can bring significant value to a school and to the life of the volunteer.
Smart district policies and wise district leaders can make an enormous difference for students.
Eastern Carver County school district has a universal expectation of grade-level proficiency and has invested significant resources in data-driven, personalized learning. As measured by Harvard's 2025 Education Scorecard, students in the district now achieve almost half a grade's worth of learning higher than comparable peer districts in reading, and about 1.3 additional years in mathematics, despite statewide declines in actual math and reading learning. Unfortunately, chaotic district leadership also impacts the student experience. Minneapolis Public School District, currently facing a $50 million deficit for the upcoming school year, has had many high-profile leaders quit, be terminated, or otherwise face administrative discipline over the past few years. With leadership unable to create solutions to the decade-long problem of shrinking enrollment and subsequent empty buildings, mathematics state test proficiency scores have hovered at 35 percent, and the reading proficiency at around 40 percent since the COVID era. Compare Minneapolis with the much larger, much more diverse Dallas school district, which has been the birthplace of state reforms and has raised student test scores higher during the same time.
District leadership matters so much that parents should consider formal leadership in a local school. One way to do so is through a district advisory committee. All Minnesota school boards must establish an advisory committee to ensure active community participation in all phases of planning and in improving instruction and curriculum that affect state and district academic standards. Whenever possible, parents and other community residents must comprise at least 2/3 of advisory committee members. These committees tend to be understaffed, so parents will not have to campaign or advocate to join.
There is also service on a local school board, which requires election. School boards often make splashy headlines through flavor-of-the-week culture war issues, obscuring their essential nature. Local school board service ensures that a voice for students, not for national political causes, directs the district toward academic achievement. An October 2025 Fordham Institute paper found that school board members of all political affiliations tend to assess their school district as much higher than their community would rate it, perhaps because of institutional blindness. Students deserve fresh faces in leadership, devoted to a clear-eyed vision of academic success.
That paper also found that one-third of all students nationally have school boards that do not represent them politically. A high majority of students tend to be disproportionately represented by moderates, liberals, and/or Democrats, which is, of course, acceptable in left-leaning districts but illustrates a worrying lack of representation for other types of students.
Parents, community members, and current or future school board members should consider browsing American Experiment's School Board Toolkit or Parental Toolkit, online resources that direct would-be local stewards toward practical, simple policy measures that support academic achievement.
Schools of all types (including public, public charter, private, and microschools) benefit from local investment and stewardship. A rising tide lifts all boats.
Burke would be encouraged by the idea that Minnesotans take pride in loving their neighbor through self-sacrifice. The state is well prepared to invest in its schools, as Minnesota is known for its spirit of charity and volunteerism. As the nation celebrates its 250th birthday and the new school year slowly approaches, Minnesotans should consider how they can best steward their local school.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.americanexperiment.org/magazine/article/stewardship-and-the-local-school
[Category: ThinkTank]
* * *
Stewardship and the local school
Schools of all types benefit from local investment, stewardship, and community care
-
At the close of the 18th century, the French intellectual elite, the philosophes, produced documents proclaiming the universal rights of man. These proclamations of sweeping, abstract philosophical principles became the ... Show Full Article MINNETONKA, Minnesota, Aug. 14 -- The Center of the American Experiment, a civic and educational organization that says it creates and advocates policies, issued the following commentary by policy fellow Josiah Padley to its Thinking Minnesota magazine: * * * Stewardship and the local school Schools of all types benefit from local investment, stewardship, and community care - At the close of the 18th century, the French intellectual elite, the philosophes, produced documents proclaiming the universal rights of man. These proclamations of sweeping, abstract philosophical principles became thefoundation of a regime of blood and terror, with school curricula and structure, religious liberty, and personal political conscience all falling under the shadow of the guillotine.
In his work "Reflections on the Revolution in France," British philosopher Edmund Burke argued that the French philosophes had misunderstood human nature in attempting to proclaim sweeping philosophical concepts that purported to pertain to the whole of the French nation. The philosophes, Burke claimed, failed to see that principles governing society cannot originate at a national level. A national philosophy cannot be imposed top-down by a committee in the capital and taught by government emissaries in secular national schools. The philosophes misunderstood the basic principle that social stewardship is inherently localized. A society wherein each individual does their part for others is a society that ultimately provides universal respect and benefits for all. Burke writes:
To be attached to the subdivision, to love the little platoon we belong to in society, is the first principle (the germ as it were) of public affections. It is the first link in the series by which we proceed towards a love to our country and to mankind.
For Burke, every person must "tend their own garden" with care. A citizen's primary responsibility is not to overthrow, vote out, or vote in national figures, but to serve her neighbor. This is not a dismissal of national politics, but a more accurate identification of where change begins. Burke claims that humans learn to love one another through particulars. Faithfulness in local matters, he claims, will progressively lead to a strong society. The country with no broken windows will have no broken politics.
Burke's vision of local stewardship and "little platoons," so central to the development of Western conservatism, is reflected in the development of the American education system. Our system prioritizes local school district control in everything from hiring decisions to curriculum choice. The schools are designed with the assumption that there are "little platoons" to support them.
The Burkean vision of community-supported schools is lovely, but visions require action to become reality. Data from recent years suggests that local school involvement in America is strong, but waning. According to 2023 data published by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), only 36 percent of K-12 students had a parent or other family member who volunteered or served on a school committee. Generally, families were somewhat engaged, with 74 percent attending a school or class event, but the willingness to show up for a piano recital did not translate into a desire to volunteer. It also only occasionally translated into largesse: a 2025 EdChoice poll conducted by Morning Consult found that less than a third of parents made charitable monetary contributions, like a check for classroom supplies, to their child's K-12 schools. (On the bright side, of those who donated, most gave over $100, and a quarter gave over $500.)
Perhaps families simply do not want to navigate school bureaucracy -- NCES data suggest that parental satisfaction with their child's school is declining. In 2016, 54 percent of parents were "very satisfied" with their child's high school; in 2023, only 49 percent felt the same way. When more than half of all parents have an uneasy relationship with one of the primary entities tasked with launching their child into adulthood, it warrants attention.
Teachers are also feeling adrift. A 2026 EdChoice poll, conducted by pollster Morning Consult, found that only one in four teachers felt that public education was going well nationwide. Fifty-three percent of teachers felt that education was going poorly in their school district, alongside 45 percent of parents who felt that their school district was on the wrong track. Fewer than a third of teachers were positive about their students' academic progress. This isn't surprising, given that school leaders consistently report a lack of family support and connection.
In the face of such mounting discontent, some have argued that the proper solution is to withdraw from publicly funded schools altogether. In "The Benedict Option," Rod Dreher argues that Americans should self-segregate into a version of little platoons -- ones that sail like Noah's Ark to ride out what he views as a coming cultural storm until the world can be remade once more. Dreher is right that America's public school system is dysfunctional, and its inability to serve all students has rightly led many families to choose other educational options. However, the case for splintering into millions of locally enclosed escape pods is difficult to accept. This perspective is at odds with Burke's assessment that love for one's neighbor can transform society. The escapist vision also fails to value the accomplishments of America's public school system and does not recognize the hope for what it could be. Yes, perhaps Burke's idealist social vision has not yet come to fruition, but that means that policymakers should put more, not less, effort into parental engagement and involvement.
Why is America's priority of public education so unique?
Publicly funded, universally accessible schools are a recent historical social accomplishment. The assumptions of the ancient world were very different. Alexander the Great received an incredible education from his tutors (including Aristotle), but he was in the minority of wealthy aristocratic youth. The Greeks were the first to begin the great march toward the democratization of education, but the process would take millennia more to develop into modern mass education.
Learning without mass schooling
Societies that prized higher learning have not always required formal schooling for everyone. At the height of the monastic tradition in the Middle Ages, monasteries served as local centers of learning and preserved much of the West's intellectual heritage. In that sense, Thomas Cahill's claim that Irish monks "saved civilization" is not entirely overstated.
Even so, this was not popular education in the modern sense. Knowledge remained concentrated within a small, educated class rather than broadly shared across the population. Ireland and other European societies could not easily spare their young farmhands for scholarly study, which limited access to learning for ordinary people.
With time came new possibilities in education. The pursuit of knowledge could become decentralized, and theological and philosophical developments had concurred that large-scale education of the individual was desirable. Charity schools, then public schools, arose from Enlightenment principles entwined with Christian assumptions.
While the religious element would eventually pass away from America's educational consciousness in favor of religiously neutral schools, initial public education (including in Minnesota) was administered by the religiously devout. The first public school system in America came from Massachusetts Puritans, who required communities with 50 or more households to hire a schoolteacher to teach male and female students to read and write. The Puritans even raised a tax to fund these efforts. The Massachusetts Law of 1647 was nicknamed the "Old Deluder Satan Act," so named because literacy would empower students to avoid devilish pitfalls.
The democratic impulse of the Greeks flowered in the New World's priority of public education. A representative democracy like America is deeply reliant on social assumptions about personal responsibility and well-informed voting. The idealist favors publicly funded education because liberal education frees the mind and soul, while the cynic points out that smart people pay more taxes and foolish people cast foolish votes. Both the idealist and the cynic conclude that America's insistence on publicly funded, fully accessible schools is a social cornerstone and is in the best interest of all citizens of a democracy.
This brings us to the humble neighborhood school, once a one-room log cabin and now a school district governed by a locally elected school board. The schoolhouse is thought of as a partnership between parents and the government, which acts in loco parentis until the afternoon bell rings. But is a successful school district a product of local stewardship, or is it purely subject to the whims of national elections?
The answer is that both can matter. Contrary to what many might think, school reform previously had a significant bipartisan consensus. Although national policies carried differing levels of public support, 2002's No Child Left Behind Act and 2015's Every Student Succeeds Act were the product of across-the-aisle reformers.
America's national early aughts school reform increased real learning for students. When school reform began to make waves in the 1990s, national assessment scores in mathematics and reading were low. Between 2002 and 2015, as measured by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), the average American fourth grader increased their mathematics ability by 2.8 grade levels. Fourth-grade reading ability also increased by 0.9 grades. Eighth graders gained 2.2 grades of knowledge in math and 0.7 grades in reading. All that changed after 2015, and especially after the COVID-19 pandemic. The average eighth grader today scores similarly to that of a student in the late 1990s in mathematics and is at a many-decade low in reading.
There are many reasons for this decline, but one conclusion stands out: educational progress has been made and can be made again. Wise national policies come and go, but parents and community members are not powerless victims in the face of generalized trends.
What does local stewardship of a school look like?
Yes, state and national policy matter. But parents and communities can create strong little platoons in their school district, regardless of national elections.
A 2019 American Psychological Association review of 448 independent studies on parental involvement in schools found that parents really matter for a student's academic development. Parental involvement can enhance a child's academic motivation and engagement, and parental leadership in a child's academic world can signal that their education is both their responsibility and within their control. This contributes to academic achievement, school engagement, personal motivation, and emotional well-being. Family and parent involvement, from homework help to working as a classroom monitor, dramatically impacts a child's behavior, confidence, and academic achievement for the better. The ripple effects of that child's increased engagement and happiness reverberate across the school, improving the classroom environment for everyone.
Burke would argue that loving one's "little platoons" includes serving the local school district. There is no denying that local school involvement can be frustrating, but it is a necessary good, both for one's own child and for others. Service is a blessing, an act of virtue, and an assertion of an upright character. Donations, volunteer work on field trips, or time as a substitute teacher can bring significant value to a school and to the life of the volunteer.
Smart district policies and wise district leaders can make an enormous difference for students.
Eastern Carver County school district has a universal expectation of grade-level proficiency and has invested significant resources in data-driven, personalized learning. As measured by Harvard's 2025 Education Scorecard, students in the district now achieve almost half a grade's worth of learning higher than comparable peer districts in reading, and about 1.3 additional years in mathematics, despite statewide declines in actual math and reading learning. Unfortunately, chaotic district leadership also impacts the student experience. Minneapolis Public School District, currently facing a $50 million deficit for the upcoming school year, has had many high-profile leaders quit, be terminated, or otherwise face administrative discipline over the past few years. With leadership unable to create solutions to the decade-long problem of shrinking enrollment and subsequent empty buildings, mathematics state test proficiency scores have hovered at 35 percent, and the reading proficiency at around 40 percent since the COVID era. Compare Minneapolis with the much larger, much more diverse Dallas school district, which has been the birthplace of state reforms and has raised student test scores higher during the same time.
District leadership matters so much that parents should consider formal leadership in a local school. One way to do so is through a district advisory committee. All Minnesota school boards must establish an advisory committee to ensure active community participation in all phases of planning and in improving instruction and curriculum that affect state and district academic standards. Whenever possible, parents and other community residents must comprise at least 2/3 of advisory committee members. These committees tend to be understaffed, so parents will not have to campaign or advocate to join.
There is also service on a local school board, which requires election. School boards often make splashy headlines through flavor-of-the-week culture war issues, obscuring their essential nature. Local school board service ensures that a voice for students, not for national political causes, directs the district toward academic achievement. An October 2025 Fordham Institute paper found that school board members of all political affiliations tend to assess their school district as much higher than their community would rate it, perhaps because of institutional blindness. Students deserve fresh faces in leadership, devoted to a clear-eyed vision of academic success.
That paper also found that one-third of all students nationally have school boards that do not represent them politically. A high majority of students tend to be disproportionately represented by moderates, liberals, and/or Democrats, which is, of course, acceptable in left-leaning districts but illustrates a worrying lack of representation for other types of students.
Parents, community members, and current or future school board members should consider browsing American Experiment's School Board Toolkit or Parental Toolkit, online resources that direct would-be local stewards toward practical, simple policy measures that support academic achievement.
Schools of all types (including public, public charter, private, and microschools) benefit from local investment and stewardship. A rising tide lifts all boats.
Burke would be encouraged by the idea that Minnesotans take pride in loving their neighbor through self-sacrifice. The state is well prepared to invest in its schools, as Minnesota is known for its spirit of charity and volunteerism. As the nation celebrates its 250th birthday and the new school year slowly approaches, Minnesotans should consider how they can best steward their local school.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.americanexperiment.org/magazine/article/stewardship-and-the-local-school
[Category: ThinkTank]
CSIS Issues Critical Questions Q&A: After Iran - Scenario for Renewed Trump-Kim Summitry
WASHINGTON, Aug. 14 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following Critical Questions Q&A on Aug. 13, 2026, by Victor Cha, president of the Geopolitics and Foreign Policy Department:
* * *
After Iran: Scenario for Renewed Trump-Kim Summitry
U.S. President Donald Trump reportedly told South Korean President Lee Jae Myung on the sidelines of the June 2026 G7 meetings in France that he would restart diplomacy with North Korea. As if to accentuate the point, he later posted a picture on social media of his stroll with Kim Jong-un at the Capella Hotel in Singapore. During ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Aug. 14 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following Critical Questions Q&A on Aug. 13, 2026, by Victor Cha, president of the Geopolitics and Foreign Policy Department: * * * After Iran: Scenario for Renewed Trump-Kim Summitry U.S. President Donald Trump reportedly told South Korean President Lee Jae Myung on the sidelines of the June 2026 G7 meetings in France that he would restart diplomacy with North Korea. As if to accentuate the point, he later posted a picture on social media of his stroll with Kim Jong-un at the Capella Hotel in Singapore. DuringTrump's first term, he met with Kim three times in 2018 and 2019--in Singapore, Vietnam, and Panmunjom, within the Korean demilitarized zone--which produced one joint statement about peace and denuclearization on the Korean peninsula. The conventional policy wisdom is that Trump's enthusiasm for reengagement is not shared by the North Korean leader. But a unique set of drivers could spur a renewal of diplomacy.
Q1: Why would the North Korean leader be interested in more summits with Trump?
A1: The main driver relates to the extent to which Kim Jong-un is revisionist, and not status-quo oriented. If he is revisionist in his outlook, he would look to capitalize on any available opportunity to advance the core goal of cementing his status as a nuclear weapons state. Most experts believe the failed summitry of Trump's first term--ending with the U.S. president walking out of meetings in Hanoi--left Kim not only embarrassed but deterred from future encounters with the unpredictable Trump. Moreover, North Korea's pursuit of sanctions relief during the last round of summitry in 2018-2019 appears less of a motivation today for Pyongyang now that Russia has undermined the UN Security Council sanctions regime against North Korea by vetoing renewal of UNSCR 1874, which established the Panel of Experts monitoring organ for sanctions compliance. Any support from Moscow for UN sanctions has been replaced by North Korea's provision of billions of dollars in bountiful trade and military assistance for Vladimir Putin's war against Ukraine, stemming from Kim's supply of munitions, troops, missiles, and laborers. China has also greatly ratcheted down compliance with sanctions, boosted trade to pre-pandemic levels, and at the June 2026 summit with Kim, committed to expand cooperation across infrastructure, tourism, agriculture, and health. With all that Kim is getting from Putin and Xi Jinping, the risks associated with another meeting with Trump appear unattractive, pundits argue.
What is missed in this conventional analysis is whether revisionism, rather than the status quo, drives Pyongyang's foreign policy mindset. There is reason to believe it might, as was evident, for example, when North Korea emerged from the Covid-19 pandemic. Many believed that the leadership would remain focused on recovering and renewing trade with China after a three-and-a-half-year lockdown that devastated its economy. Instead, Kim saw an opportunity with Russia's need for ammunition and troops in the Ukraine war and proposed to Putin a military partnership that eventually led to billions in revenue and a new mutual defense treaty.
In a similar vein, Kim may see opportunities in reengaging with Trump. Aside from the U.S. president's expressed desires to meet, North Korea surmises that Trump's commitment to denuclearization as the premise of any negotiation is malleable at best as the president alternates between supporting such a goal and admitting that North Korea is a "nuclear power." Moreover, Pyongyang has learned from the Iran deal that the United States now operates in a "post-diplomacy" world where the primary deliverables take the form of grand but vaguely worded statements, coupled with the promise of follow-on negotiations without any real prospect of agreements. The other lesson from Iran for North Korea is that maintaining contact may be the best way to manage Trump's unpredictability and penchant to use military force.
If revisionist, Kim may target a meeting with Trump, potentially after a U.S. midterm election loss for the party in power, to reaffirm the basic tenets of the Singapore Declaration from their first meeting in 2018. They would likely avoid detailed denuclearization negotiations, leaving it to their teams to hash out over the next six months. Instead, Kim might push the conversation toward peace treaties, stopping U.S. military exercises, and ending the hostile state of relations between the United States and North Korea, appealing to Trump's resume-building for the Nobel Peace Prize. These tangible outcomes might seem modest, but they would be significant to the North Korean perennial goal of achieving de facto U.S. acceptance of the country as a nuclear weapons state.
Q2: Would that be enough for North Korea?
A2: No. If revisionism truly drives Pyongyang's mindset, it might also spur additional ambitions to reengage with Japan. North Koreans see Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi as a political maverick unafraid to do the unconventional, a defense hawk, and a beneficiary of strong public support. The best chance for engagement is with someone of Takaichi's ilk--a hawkish, not dovish, leader, creating a potential "only Nixon can go to China" opportunity. North Koreans have told the author of their disdain for the late Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Takaichi's mentor, because of his supporting role in former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's diplomacy with Kim Jong-il in 2002, only to turn hardline during his premiership. In this sense, Takaichi represents a clean break, even as her ties to Abe would protect her right flank domestically if she were to engage with North Korea. Japan has quietly moved away from its longstanding position of resolution of the abductions issue (kidnapping of, and accounting for Japanese citizens in the 1970s) as a precondition for talks.
Kim could seek a meeting with Takaichi to reaffirm the basic tenets of the 2002 Pyongyang Declaration, which could potentially bring billions of dollars into a normalization settlement. On this and the abductions issue, they could authorize negotiation teams to work out the details. Pyongyang's goal for such diplomacy is to achieve a position where the North Korean leader would have summits with both the United States and Japan--a feat not accomplished by any previous leader--as a nuclear weapons state, while dividing U.S.-Japan-South Korea trilateral cooperation (see below). What drives Pyongyang, however, may not drive Tokyo. Takaichi may justifiably see too much risk in such diplomacy. But she may also see opportunity in trying to reduce the threat of North Korean short-range missiles aimed at Japan when Trump cares only about long-range ballistic missiles targeted at the United States.
Q3: Would this spur opportunities for inter-Korean engagement?
A3: In this revisionist mindset, North Korea would not seek to engage South Korea as part of its diplomatic outreach. In 2024, North Korea swore off any further dialogue with the South. Rather than engage in peaceful coexistence as the Lee government has proposed, a revisionist diplomatic strategy that engages Washington and Tokyo while bypassing Seoul would be most attractive. It could divide the allies and isolate its southern rival, not unlike what South Korea did to North Korea in the 1990s at the end of the Cold War when it succeeded in establishing relations with Moscow and Beijing.
Q4: Wouldn't China oppose North Korean contacts with the United States?
A4: Under normal circumstances, China would not support U.S.-North Korea diplomacy. But for Beijing, today's circumstances are far from normal. The main driver for China in this scenario is whether Beijing wants to hedge against both Trump's unpredictability and Putin's ties to Kim.
Beijing usually has trepidations about U.S.-North Korea contacts that might harm its equities on the peninsula. Prior to Trump's first meeting with Kim in 2018, Xi Jinping held no meetings with Kim Jong-un, confident in China's influence over its smaller communist brethren. But once Trump's diplomacy started, Xi met five times with Kim to protect Chinese interests. This applies not just to the United States. After Trump's diplomacy with Kim failed, Xi stopped meeting Kim from 2019 to 2025; however, once summitry started between North Korea and Russia about cooperation in the Ukraine war, Xi met with Kim two times, including Xi's only overseas trip thus far in 2026 to Pyongyang in June.
Given the current constellations of geopolitical forces, however, China could promote a renewal of Trump-Kim diplomacy. This is largely because Beijing may want to ingratiate itself with Trump, but also subtly dilute Russia's growing influence over North Korea. China experts have told the author that Beijing is not supportive of the trajectory of Moscow-Pyongyang cooperation, but that any direct intervention could sour China's relations with both. Helping Trump meet Kim may be a more subtle way of achieving this goal. Media reporting coming out of the Trump-Xi summit suggests that the two leaders spent time discussing North Korea. It would not be surprising if during Xi's follow-on trip to Pyongyang, China conveyed a message of support for U.S.-North Korea diplomatic reengagement.
Should such geopolitical machinations come to fruition, they would generate flashy news headlines and achieve a superficial reduction in tensions, but none would address the fundamental issues of denuclearization or peace. But in a "post-diplomacy" world, this may be the best we can hope for.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.csis.org/analysis/after-iran-scenario-renewed-trump-kim-summitry
[Category: ThinkTank]
* * *
After Iran: Scenario for Renewed Trump-Kim Summitry
U.S. President Donald Trump reportedly told South Korean President Lee Jae Myung on the sidelines of the June 2026 G7 meetings in France that he would restart diplomacy with North Korea. As if to accentuate the point, he later posted a picture on social media of his stroll with Kim Jong-un at the Capella Hotel in Singapore. During ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Aug. 14 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following Critical Questions Q&A on Aug. 13, 2026, by Victor Cha, president of the Geopolitics and Foreign Policy Department: * * * After Iran: Scenario for Renewed Trump-Kim Summitry U.S. President Donald Trump reportedly told South Korean President Lee Jae Myung on the sidelines of the June 2026 G7 meetings in France that he would restart diplomacy with North Korea. As if to accentuate the point, he later posted a picture on social media of his stroll with Kim Jong-un at the Capella Hotel in Singapore. DuringTrump's first term, he met with Kim three times in 2018 and 2019--in Singapore, Vietnam, and Panmunjom, within the Korean demilitarized zone--which produced one joint statement about peace and denuclearization on the Korean peninsula. The conventional policy wisdom is that Trump's enthusiasm for reengagement is not shared by the North Korean leader. But a unique set of drivers could spur a renewal of diplomacy.
Q1: Why would the North Korean leader be interested in more summits with Trump?
A1: The main driver relates to the extent to which Kim Jong-un is revisionist, and not status-quo oriented. If he is revisionist in his outlook, he would look to capitalize on any available opportunity to advance the core goal of cementing his status as a nuclear weapons state. Most experts believe the failed summitry of Trump's first term--ending with the U.S. president walking out of meetings in Hanoi--left Kim not only embarrassed but deterred from future encounters with the unpredictable Trump. Moreover, North Korea's pursuit of sanctions relief during the last round of summitry in 2018-2019 appears less of a motivation today for Pyongyang now that Russia has undermined the UN Security Council sanctions regime against North Korea by vetoing renewal of UNSCR 1874, which established the Panel of Experts monitoring organ for sanctions compliance. Any support from Moscow for UN sanctions has been replaced by North Korea's provision of billions of dollars in bountiful trade and military assistance for Vladimir Putin's war against Ukraine, stemming from Kim's supply of munitions, troops, missiles, and laborers. China has also greatly ratcheted down compliance with sanctions, boosted trade to pre-pandemic levels, and at the June 2026 summit with Kim, committed to expand cooperation across infrastructure, tourism, agriculture, and health. With all that Kim is getting from Putin and Xi Jinping, the risks associated with another meeting with Trump appear unattractive, pundits argue.
What is missed in this conventional analysis is whether revisionism, rather than the status quo, drives Pyongyang's foreign policy mindset. There is reason to believe it might, as was evident, for example, when North Korea emerged from the Covid-19 pandemic. Many believed that the leadership would remain focused on recovering and renewing trade with China after a three-and-a-half-year lockdown that devastated its economy. Instead, Kim saw an opportunity with Russia's need for ammunition and troops in the Ukraine war and proposed to Putin a military partnership that eventually led to billions in revenue and a new mutual defense treaty.
In a similar vein, Kim may see opportunities in reengaging with Trump. Aside from the U.S. president's expressed desires to meet, North Korea surmises that Trump's commitment to denuclearization as the premise of any negotiation is malleable at best as the president alternates between supporting such a goal and admitting that North Korea is a "nuclear power." Moreover, Pyongyang has learned from the Iran deal that the United States now operates in a "post-diplomacy" world where the primary deliverables take the form of grand but vaguely worded statements, coupled with the promise of follow-on negotiations without any real prospect of agreements. The other lesson from Iran for North Korea is that maintaining contact may be the best way to manage Trump's unpredictability and penchant to use military force.
If revisionist, Kim may target a meeting with Trump, potentially after a U.S. midterm election loss for the party in power, to reaffirm the basic tenets of the Singapore Declaration from their first meeting in 2018. They would likely avoid detailed denuclearization negotiations, leaving it to their teams to hash out over the next six months. Instead, Kim might push the conversation toward peace treaties, stopping U.S. military exercises, and ending the hostile state of relations between the United States and North Korea, appealing to Trump's resume-building for the Nobel Peace Prize. These tangible outcomes might seem modest, but they would be significant to the North Korean perennial goal of achieving de facto U.S. acceptance of the country as a nuclear weapons state.
Q2: Would that be enough for North Korea?
A2: No. If revisionism truly drives Pyongyang's mindset, it might also spur additional ambitions to reengage with Japan. North Koreans see Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi as a political maverick unafraid to do the unconventional, a defense hawk, and a beneficiary of strong public support. The best chance for engagement is with someone of Takaichi's ilk--a hawkish, not dovish, leader, creating a potential "only Nixon can go to China" opportunity. North Koreans have told the author of their disdain for the late Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Takaichi's mentor, because of his supporting role in former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's diplomacy with Kim Jong-il in 2002, only to turn hardline during his premiership. In this sense, Takaichi represents a clean break, even as her ties to Abe would protect her right flank domestically if she were to engage with North Korea. Japan has quietly moved away from its longstanding position of resolution of the abductions issue (kidnapping of, and accounting for Japanese citizens in the 1970s) as a precondition for talks.
Kim could seek a meeting with Takaichi to reaffirm the basic tenets of the 2002 Pyongyang Declaration, which could potentially bring billions of dollars into a normalization settlement. On this and the abductions issue, they could authorize negotiation teams to work out the details. Pyongyang's goal for such diplomacy is to achieve a position where the North Korean leader would have summits with both the United States and Japan--a feat not accomplished by any previous leader--as a nuclear weapons state, while dividing U.S.-Japan-South Korea trilateral cooperation (see below). What drives Pyongyang, however, may not drive Tokyo. Takaichi may justifiably see too much risk in such diplomacy. But she may also see opportunity in trying to reduce the threat of North Korean short-range missiles aimed at Japan when Trump cares only about long-range ballistic missiles targeted at the United States.
Q3: Would this spur opportunities for inter-Korean engagement?
A3: In this revisionist mindset, North Korea would not seek to engage South Korea as part of its diplomatic outreach. In 2024, North Korea swore off any further dialogue with the South. Rather than engage in peaceful coexistence as the Lee government has proposed, a revisionist diplomatic strategy that engages Washington and Tokyo while bypassing Seoul would be most attractive. It could divide the allies and isolate its southern rival, not unlike what South Korea did to North Korea in the 1990s at the end of the Cold War when it succeeded in establishing relations with Moscow and Beijing.
Q4: Wouldn't China oppose North Korean contacts with the United States?
A4: Under normal circumstances, China would not support U.S.-North Korea diplomacy. But for Beijing, today's circumstances are far from normal. The main driver for China in this scenario is whether Beijing wants to hedge against both Trump's unpredictability and Putin's ties to Kim.
Beijing usually has trepidations about U.S.-North Korea contacts that might harm its equities on the peninsula. Prior to Trump's first meeting with Kim in 2018, Xi Jinping held no meetings with Kim Jong-un, confident in China's influence over its smaller communist brethren. But once Trump's diplomacy started, Xi met five times with Kim to protect Chinese interests. This applies not just to the United States. After Trump's diplomacy with Kim failed, Xi stopped meeting Kim from 2019 to 2025; however, once summitry started between North Korea and Russia about cooperation in the Ukraine war, Xi met with Kim two times, including Xi's only overseas trip thus far in 2026 to Pyongyang in June.
Given the current constellations of geopolitical forces, however, China could promote a renewal of Trump-Kim diplomacy. This is largely because Beijing may want to ingratiate itself with Trump, but also subtly dilute Russia's growing influence over North Korea. China experts have told the author that Beijing is not supportive of the trajectory of Moscow-Pyongyang cooperation, but that any direct intervention could sour China's relations with both. Helping Trump meet Kim may be a more subtle way of achieving this goal. Media reporting coming out of the Trump-Xi summit suggests that the two leaders spent time discussing North Korea. It would not be surprising if during Xi's follow-on trip to Pyongyang, China conveyed a message of support for U.S.-North Korea diplomatic reengagement.
Should such geopolitical machinations come to fruition, they would generate flashy news headlines and achieve a superficial reduction in tensions, but none would address the fundamental issues of denuclearization or peace. But in a "post-diplomacy" world, this may be the best we can hope for.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.csis.org/analysis/after-iran-scenario-renewed-trump-kim-summitry
[Category: ThinkTank]
CSIS Issues Commentary: Government Lending 2.0 - Putting a Price on Policy Risk
WASHINGTON, Aug. 14 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following commentary on Aug. 12, 2026, by Adam Frost, senior associate (non-resident) in the Economic Security and Technology Department, and former intern Jack Whitney:
* * *
Government Lending 2.0: Putting a Price on Policy Risk
The United States is increasingly using federal credit--direct loans, loan guarantees, and insurance--as a tool of industrial strategy. With grant funding constrained and bipartisan interest in financing strategic industries rising, federal agencies are relying more heavily on repayable ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Aug. 14 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following commentary on Aug. 12, 2026, by Adam Frost, senior associate (non-resident) in the Economic Security and Technology Department, and former intern Jack Whitney: * * * Government Lending 2.0: Putting a Price on Policy Risk The United States is increasingly using federal credit--direct loans, loan guarantees, and insurance--as a tool of industrial strategy. With grant funding constrained and bipartisan interest in financing strategic industries rising, federal agencies are relying more heavily on repayablepublic capital to support projects tied to national security and economic competitiveness.
This shift is visible across agencies. The Export-Import Bank of the United States, (EXIM), U.S. International Development Finance Corporation, Department of Commerce, Department of Energy, and the Department of Defense have applied or launched financing tools for critical minerals, semiconductors, energy infrastructure, advanced manufacturing, and other industries. The goals are to (1) reduce dependence on adversaries, (2) strengthen supply chains, (3) create opportunities for U.S. firms, (4) crowd in private capital, and (5) build economic partnerships abroad.
* * *
Figure 1: The Growing Scale of U.S. Strategic Government Lending
* * *
But greater scale does not solve the harder question: Which risks are worth taking with taxpayer exposure? The projects that policymakers view as most urgent are often the hardest to finance--projects with long timelines, uncertain revenues, and execution risk.
The government's problem is not only funding or political will, but also a coordination failure rooted in the absence of a consistent framework for comparing financial risk against policy value. As strategic lending moves from announcement to execution, agencies need a clearer way to price risk, allocate it across government, and explain why some risky projects merit public support while others do not.
The Coordination Gap: No Shared Language for Risk
U.S. government lenders that finance domestic and overseas projects face a structural constraint. By design, they step in where private capital is reluctant to go: projects with upfront capital intensity, uncertain revenues, country exposure, and execution risk--the same features that make the projects strategically important.
Under the Federal Credit Reform Act (FCRA), agencies must budget for the expected unreimbursed cost of a direct loan or guarantee, based on projected cash flows, default risk, recoveries, fees, and other deal terms. This framework helps ensure discipline. But it only measures expected credit losses, not strategic value such as supply chain resilience, geopolitical influence, and development impact.
This creates an allocation problem. The policy benefits of a transaction may accrue across government, but the credit exposure, budget cost, and default scrutiny sit with the lending agency. And lender caution is not irrational: High-profile setbacks, such as Solyndra during the Obama administration and EXIM loans to Enron-led projects in the 1990s, have reinforced scrutiny around public support for complex strategic projects.
Consider an illustrative $100 million U.S.-backed loan to a rare earths project in Namibia. A policy office may value the project because it diversifies supply away from China and supports a partner country's development. A lending program, meanwhile, will see a greenfield asset with execution risk, limited offtake, volatile commodity exposure, and residual sovereign or permitting risk--factors that reduce confidence in repayment and increase expected risks to taxpayer funds.
Neither perspective is wrong. And without a common risk-pricing vocabulary, agencies end up talking past one another: Policy offices emphasize strategic impact, while lenders emphasize repayment risk. The result is that high-impact projects may be delayed or dropped because the government lacks a disciplined way to compare policy value against credit risk. It also leaves agencies without a clear public rationale for how taxpayer exposure is being allocated across increasingly risky strategic projects, heightening the risk of public backlash if one fails.
So even as federal credit expands, the underlying allocation problem remains: How to direct scarce public risk capacity toward strategically important projects in a disciplined, transparent, and repeatable way.
A Market-Informed Fix: Putting a Price Tag on Risk
The underlying credit risks that make strategic sectors unattractive to private capital are real, and in many cases the right long-term fix involves macro policy adjustments--offtake guarantees, concessional capital structures, or the kind of de-risking architecture that multilateral development banks are positioned to provide. This paper is not about those solutions. It is about something narrower and more immediate: Policy offices that emphasize impact and lending agencies that talk credit risk will continue to talk past each other until they have a consistent framework for comparing financial risk against policy value.
One near-term component of such a framework is available without new legislation. Used carefully, market-informed risk metrics such as credit default swaps (CDS) can complement existing underwriting, development impact, and national security analysis, making strategic lending more disciplined, defensible, and effective.
A CDS is a financial instrument that pays the buyer if a borrower defaults on a loan, transferring default risk in exchange for a periodic premium, or spread. Where a liquid market exists, that spread gives a market-implied price for insuring against default: Widening spreads suggest rising risk, while tightening spreads suggest improving credit conditions. Applied to strategic lending, CDS pricing can do something that interagency memos often cannot: translate qualitative risk judgments into a concrete, dollar-denominated figure that policy agencies and lenders can evaluate together. In this way, market-based reference points could help agencies express risk in common units and ask whether the policy benefit is worth the implied cost.
To be clear, CDS are not a magic answer to interagency disagreements. In many strategic sectors, such as junior mining and emerging market infrastructure, there will be no liquid single-name CDS market. Thin trading, liquidity stress, or speculative activity can also distort spreads, creating the risk of misleading market signals. But a CDS is a useful example to demonstrate how explicit, market-informed risk pricing could lead to smarter interagency coordination around risk between lenders and policy agencies.
Return to the hypothetical Namibia example: If the market-implied CDS spread on the loan is 500 basis points (5 percent annually), the cost of insuring against default is approximately $5 million per year. That figure becomes a policy question: Is securing non-Chinese rare earth supply from Namibia worth an additional $5 million a year? That is a conversation that policy offices can engage in. It also forces genuine prioritization.
In some cases, an agency championing the policy objective could use appropriated funds, consistent with its authorities, to cover part of the incremental risk cost, purchase insurance, support a guarantee, or otherwise contribute to the transaction's credit subsidy. Requiring the policy sponsor to put budget resources behind its judgment gives it skin in the game and shifts the conversation from advocacy to co-investment.
What Implementation Looks Like
Implementation should be practical and use existing oversight mechanisms. Policy agencies should add a short risk-pricing annex to interagency memos that identifies country, sector, and project risks; shows which risks are mitigated through insurance, guarantees, offtake, collateral, or other tools; estimates the residual exposure using market signals where available; and makes clear which agency is bearing or funding that exposure. And these risk-pricing annexes should be reviewed by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) before any agency action to ensure compliance with FCRA and the appropriate OMB Circulars.
The point is not to turn policy agencies into hedge funds, but to give the government a shared, transparent way to compare risk cost against policy value before taxpayer capital is committed.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.csis.org/analysis/government-lending-20-putting-price-policy-risk
[Category: ThinkTank]
* * *
Government Lending 2.0: Putting a Price on Policy Risk
The United States is increasingly using federal credit--direct loans, loan guarantees, and insurance--as a tool of industrial strategy. With grant funding constrained and bipartisan interest in financing strategic industries rising, federal agencies are relying more heavily on repayable ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Aug. 14 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following commentary on Aug. 12, 2026, by Adam Frost, senior associate (non-resident) in the Economic Security and Technology Department, and former intern Jack Whitney: * * * Government Lending 2.0: Putting a Price on Policy Risk The United States is increasingly using federal credit--direct loans, loan guarantees, and insurance--as a tool of industrial strategy. With grant funding constrained and bipartisan interest in financing strategic industries rising, federal agencies are relying more heavily on repayablepublic capital to support projects tied to national security and economic competitiveness.
This shift is visible across agencies. The Export-Import Bank of the United States, (EXIM), U.S. International Development Finance Corporation, Department of Commerce, Department of Energy, and the Department of Defense have applied or launched financing tools for critical minerals, semiconductors, energy infrastructure, advanced manufacturing, and other industries. The goals are to (1) reduce dependence on adversaries, (2) strengthen supply chains, (3) create opportunities for U.S. firms, (4) crowd in private capital, and (5) build economic partnerships abroad.
* * *
Figure 1: The Growing Scale of U.S. Strategic Government Lending
* * *
But greater scale does not solve the harder question: Which risks are worth taking with taxpayer exposure? The projects that policymakers view as most urgent are often the hardest to finance--projects with long timelines, uncertain revenues, and execution risk.
The government's problem is not only funding or political will, but also a coordination failure rooted in the absence of a consistent framework for comparing financial risk against policy value. As strategic lending moves from announcement to execution, agencies need a clearer way to price risk, allocate it across government, and explain why some risky projects merit public support while others do not.
The Coordination Gap: No Shared Language for Risk
U.S. government lenders that finance domestic and overseas projects face a structural constraint. By design, they step in where private capital is reluctant to go: projects with upfront capital intensity, uncertain revenues, country exposure, and execution risk--the same features that make the projects strategically important.
Under the Federal Credit Reform Act (FCRA), agencies must budget for the expected unreimbursed cost of a direct loan or guarantee, based on projected cash flows, default risk, recoveries, fees, and other deal terms. This framework helps ensure discipline. But it only measures expected credit losses, not strategic value such as supply chain resilience, geopolitical influence, and development impact.
This creates an allocation problem. The policy benefits of a transaction may accrue across government, but the credit exposure, budget cost, and default scrutiny sit with the lending agency. And lender caution is not irrational: High-profile setbacks, such as Solyndra during the Obama administration and EXIM loans to Enron-led projects in the 1990s, have reinforced scrutiny around public support for complex strategic projects.
Consider an illustrative $100 million U.S.-backed loan to a rare earths project in Namibia. A policy office may value the project because it diversifies supply away from China and supports a partner country's development. A lending program, meanwhile, will see a greenfield asset with execution risk, limited offtake, volatile commodity exposure, and residual sovereign or permitting risk--factors that reduce confidence in repayment and increase expected risks to taxpayer funds.
Neither perspective is wrong. And without a common risk-pricing vocabulary, agencies end up talking past one another: Policy offices emphasize strategic impact, while lenders emphasize repayment risk. The result is that high-impact projects may be delayed or dropped because the government lacks a disciplined way to compare policy value against credit risk. It also leaves agencies without a clear public rationale for how taxpayer exposure is being allocated across increasingly risky strategic projects, heightening the risk of public backlash if one fails.
So even as federal credit expands, the underlying allocation problem remains: How to direct scarce public risk capacity toward strategically important projects in a disciplined, transparent, and repeatable way.
A Market-Informed Fix: Putting a Price Tag on Risk
The underlying credit risks that make strategic sectors unattractive to private capital are real, and in many cases the right long-term fix involves macro policy adjustments--offtake guarantees, concessional capital structures, or the kind of de-risking architecture that multilateral development banks are positioned to provide. This paper is not about those solutions. It is about something narrower and more immediate: Policy offices that emphasize impact and lending agencies that talk credit risk will continue to talk past each other until they have a consistent framework for comparing financial risk against policy value.
One near-term component of such a framework is available without new legislation. Used carefully, market-informed risk metrics such as credit default swaps (CDS) can complement existing underwriting, development impact, and national security analysis, making strategic lending more disciplined, defensible, and effective.
A CDS is a financial instrument that pays the buyer if a borrower defaults on a loan, transferring default risk in exchange for a periodic premium, or spread. Where a liquid market exists, that spread gives a market-implied price for insuring against default: Widening spreads suggest rising risk, while tightening spreads suggest improving credit conditions. Applied to strategic lending, CDS pricing can do something that interagency memos often cannot: translate qualitative risk judgments into a concrete, dollar-denominated figure that policy agencies and lenders can evaluate together. In this way, market-based reference points could help agencies express risk in common units and ask whether the policy benefit is worth the implied cost.
To be clear, CDS are not a magic answer to interagency disagreements. In many strategic sectors, such as junior mining and emerging market infrastructure, there will be no liquid single-name CDS market. Thin trading, liquidity stress, or speculative activity can also distort spreads, creating the risk of misleading market signals. But a CDS is a useful example to demonstrate how explicit, market-informed risk pricing could lead to smarter interagency coordination around risk between lenders and policy agencies.
Return to the hypothetical Namibia example: If the market-implied CDS spread on the loan is 500 basis points (5 percent annually), the cost of insuring against default is approximately $5 million per year. That figure becomes a policy question: Is securing non-Chinese rare earth supply from Namibia worth an additional $5 million a year? That is a conversation that policy offices can engage in. It also forces genuine prioritization.
In some cases, an agency championing the policy objective could use appropriated funds, consistent with its authorities, to cover part of the incremental risk cost, purchase insurance, support a guarantee, or otherwise contribute to the transaction's credit subsidy. Requiring the policy sponsor to put budget resources behind its judgment gives it skin in the game and shifts the conversation from advocacy to co-investment.
What Implementation Looks Like
Implementation should be practical and use existing oversight mechanisms. Policy agencies should add a short risk-pricing annex to interagency memos that identifies country, sector, and project risks; shows which risks are mitigated through insurance, guarantees, offtake, collateral, or other tools; estimates the residual exposure using market signals where available; and makes clear which agency is bearing or funding that exposure. And these risk-pricing annexes should be reviewed by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) before any agency action to ensure compliance with FCRA and the appropriate OMB Circulars.
The point is not to turn policy agencies into hedge funds, but to give the government a shared, transparent way to compare risk cost against policy value before taxpayer capital is committed.
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Original text here: https://www.csis.org/analysis/government-lending-20-putting-price-policy-risk
[Category: ThinkTank]