Nikolas K. Gvosdev

Former Carnegie Council Senior Fellow, U.S. Global Engagement Initiative (USGE); U.S. Naval War College

Nikolas K. Gvosdev was a senior fellow for the U.S. Global Engagement Initiative (USGE) at Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs.

He is also a professor of national security affairs at the U.S. Naval War College, the director of the Policy Analysis sub-course in the National Security Affairs Department, and the Captain Jerome E. Levy Chair in economic geography and national security.

Gvosdev was the editor of The National Interest and remains a senior editor at the magazine. In addition, he holds a non-residential senior fellowship at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. He is a co-author of U.S. Foreign Policy and Defense Strategy: The Evolution of an Incidental Superpower (2015). He previously published Russian Foreign Policy: Interests, Vectors and Sectors (with Christopher Marsh) in 2013.

Gvosdev is a frequent commentator on U.S. foreign policy and international relations, Russian and Eurasian affairs, and developments in the Middle East.

Featured Work

JAN 3, 2019 Article

Ethics and the Syria Withdrawal

Referencing an "Atlantic" article by Conor Fridersdorf, Nikolas Gvosdev goes over some important and overlooked ethical questions surrounding Trump's decision to withraw U.S. troops ...

DEC 13, 2018 Podcast

Global Ethics Weekly: Foreign Policy After the Midterms, with Nikolas Gvosdev

Carnegie Council Senior Fellow Nikolas Gvosdev and host Alex Woodson discuss the state of foreign policy after the midterm elections. How can newcomers like Alexandria ...

DEC 10, 2018 Article

Warren and Haley: Post-Trump Foreign Policies?

What will U.S. foreign policy look like post-Trump? Elizabeth Warren and Nikki Haley recently offered up their first drafts of what this could look ...

<a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Protest_against_U.S._military_attacks_in_Syria_(33919232325).jpg">Protest against U.S. military attacks on Syria, April 2017</a>. CREDIT: Fibonacci Blue via Wikimedia Commons

DEC 5, 2018 Article

Misconnecting with the U.S. Public: Narrative Collapse and U.S. Foreign Policy

For the past year, the U.S. Global Engagement program has focused its attention on the continuing strengths and weaknesses of the narratives that can ...

U.S.-Mexico border ahead. CREDIT: <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/wonderlane/3367611581">Wonderlane</a> (<a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/">CC</a>)

NOV 27, 2018 Article

Kerch and San Ysidro

What do the events in the Kerch Straits and on the U.S.-Mexico border have in common? In a world that may be shrinking ...

NOV 1, 2018 Article

Sanders' "Selective Engagement" versus Transactional Internationalism

As the Trump administration moves U.S. engagement to a form of "transactional internationalism," Senator Bernie Sanders has unveiled his vision of "selective engagement." Both ...

U.S. sailors assigned to Navy Cyber Defense Operations Command. CREDIT: <a href=http://archive.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=61310>U.S. Department of Defense (CC)</a>

OCT 10, 2018 Podcast

The Future of U.S. National Security, with Derek Reveron

"Is it still fair to say there are continuities in foreign policy two years into the Trump administration? I'm going to say yes, and I'll ...

OCT 3, 2018 Article

Empty Pews in the Church of Atlanticism

Timothy Garton Ash uses the image of "empty pews" to describe a declining commitment, not only on the part of the U.S. public, but ...

SEP 25, 2018 Podcast

Making Foreign Policy Relevant Again, with Asha Castleberry & Ali Wyne

Has a gap opened up between the U.S. national security community and the general public over foreign policy? If so, why? How can we ...

SEP 24, 2018 Article

The Ethics of the "Doorstep"

The "doorstep test" requires policymakers to be able to articulate how, and to what degree, something happening in the world connects to the day-to-day experience, ...