Publications by J. Michael Waller
When our allies arm our adversaries: What to do when diplomacy fails
The case of Spanish military sales to Venezuela
Publication Date: Tuesday, May 2, 2006
When diplomacy, treaties and laws fail to stop foreign defense firms from exporting military technology in ways that threaten US security interests, policymakers often find themselves wondering what to do.Other, simple instruments remain available but seldom utilized. In the global economy where US defense procurement necessarily depends on foreign military suppliers, Washington has a simple and non-coercive option: help the foreign manufacturer to choose sides. {read more}
Mexico's glass house
How the Mexican constitution treats foreign residents, workers and naturalized citizens
Publication Date: Thursday, April 6, 2006
Every country has the right and duty to restrict the quality and quantity of foreign immigrants entering or living within its borders. If American policymakers are looking for legal models on which to base new laws restricting immigration and expelling foreign lawbreakers, they have a handy guide: the Mexican constitution.The Mexican constitution bans foreign visitors and immigrants from public political discourse, denies them certain basic property rights, denies immigrants equal opportunity rights, bars them from serving in top government posts. It allows private citizens to make arrests of lawbreakers (such as illegal immigrants) and hand them to the authorities, and permits the government to expel immigrants from Mexico for any reason and without due process. But wait - there's more. {read more}
Making jihad work for America
Journal of International Security Affairs
Publication Date: Spring 2006
Words are among the most important tools in the war of ideas, and used well, they can make the difference between war and peace, victory and defeat. The Arabic language and traditional Islam contain many words and meanings that, defined properly, can be of immense advantage in the war on terrorists and other extremists. However, the US has used those terms poorly - to the point that it has embraced the enemy's distortion of language to the detriment of most of the Islamic world and to itself. {read more}
Ridicule: An instrument in the war on terrorism
Public Diplomacy White Paper No. 7
Publication Date: Thursday, February 9, 2006
Seventh in a series of White Papers about the transformation of American public diplomacy and strategic communication. This paper was featured in the March 23, 2006 issue of USA Today.U.S. strategy must include undermining the political and psychological strengths of adversaries and enemies by employing ridicule as a standard operating tool of national strategy. Ridicule is an under-appreciated weapon not only against terrorists, but against weapons proliferators, despots, and international undesirables in general. The opinions expressed are solely those of the author. {read more}
The American way of propaganda: Lessons from the founding fathers
Public Diplomacy White Paper No. 1
Publication Date: Friday, February 3, 2006
First in a series of White Papers about the transformation of American public diplomacy and strategic communication.The American Revolution showed that wars of ideas and battles for democracy are fought primarily as wars and not as diplomacy. And where public diplomacy plays a role, its tone is not necessarily positive or gentle. The founders’ message strategy was simple: Relentlessly tell the best about the American cause and the worst about the enemy. In a seamless garment the founders combined intelligence and military force with what today is known as diplomacy, public diplomacy, propaganda, counterpropaganda, political warfare and psychological warfare, a spectrum of statecraft that carried the day for the founding of the United States and for its future defense. {read more}
Information a vital weapon
USA Today
Publication Date: December 7, 2005
USA Today invited Professor Waller to write an opposing view of its December 7, 2005 editorial on the US military's practice of planting propaganda in Iraqi newspapers. {read more}
What to do about Venezuela: The case for a political and psychological strategy
Center for Security Policy
Publication Date: Friday, May 13, 2005
Hemispheric peace and security is in danger because of the increasing repression, militancy, and international adventurism of the consolidating Hugo Chavez dictatorship in Venezuela. This article states the case for a strategy of regime change in what had been one of Latin America's oldest and most stable democracies. {read more}
Russia: Death and resurrection of the KGB
Demokratizatsiya: The Journal of Post-Soviet Democratization
Publication Date: Summer 2004
Russia's reform policies of 1991 to 1999 strengthened the Chekists as the frustrated and demoralized Russian public viewed the former KGB as their best chance of liberation from the hardships and failures of disastrous economic reforms. {read more}
Introduction to dismantling a totalitarian secret police system
Demokratizatsiya: The Journal of Post-Soviet Democratization
Publication Date: August 2004
A scholar from the American Foreign Policy Council and an IWP professor edited a series of articles for Demokratizatsiya journal on the legacy of totalitarian secret police and lessons for present and future crises. {read more}
Tropical Chekists: The Sandinista secret police legacy in Nicaragua
Demokratizatsiya: The Journal of Post-Soviet Democratization
Publication Date: Summer 2004
Any attempt to dismantle the Sandinista secret police system was doomed from the start when President Violetta Chamorro defeated Daniel Ortega in the 1990 election because the incoming president feared her political opponents and feared showing her own weakness by asking for or accepting help. {read more}
