Hunter Stires

Big issue: Democrats need to make more of a home in their institutions for “hard” defense strategy. The think tanks that do respected defense work are either non/bipartisan or conservative/GOP aligned—none are expressly Dem. Who is Brent Sadler’s counterpart at @americanprogress.bsky.social?

They want to keep us afraid, and assume we cannot do math on how many polling places there are compared to ICE agents. They are trying to get us to simply not show up.

They literally threatened to arrest me yesterday and literally backed down instantly.

Greenland Is Strategic. Annexation Is Not As sea temperatures and geopolitical tensions simultaneously heat up, Greenland’s strategic importance increases. Against this backdrop, the specter of

Cooperation with Copenhagen and Nuuk may offer Washington more strategic leverage than ownership ever could, argues Spenser A. Warren.

Opinion | Something Is Rotten in the State of America

“If we break [our alliances] for pride and power and greed, then we don’t just break an alliance; we break our own character. We diminish ourselves in every way that matters, and no amount of newly sovereign frozen ground can obscure our national shame.”
www.nytimes.com/2026/01/15/o...

We're now living in the opening scene of Casablanca.

Two drunken Minnesota frat boys do a better job covering the ICE story than the New York Times.

Trump’s Military Buildup in Caribbean Limits His Options in Iran While no U.S. aircraft-carrier strike group is in the Middle East, officials insist there are sufficient military assets in the region to strike Iran.

In a sign of the Trump administration’s shifting priorities, the Pentagon now has 12 warships assigned to the waters around the Caribbean, versus only six in the Middle East, according to a Navy official. www.wsj.com/politics/nat...

One reason ICE’s lawlessness is personal for me: my grandfather lived through the rise of Nasser’s xenophobic and antisemitic fascist regime in Egypt. When he was forced into exile, it all started when a military police officer stopped him and demanded to see his papers.

YouTube video by Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation & Institute Christmas Day Radio Address to the Nation — 12/25/82

A reminder of what America means in the world from AO1 John Mooney, recounting USS Midway’s rescue of Vietnamese refugees in the South China Sea. Shared in @ronaldreagan.bsky.social’s 1982 Christmas and 1989 farewell addresses.
“Hello, America Sailor—hello, Freedom Man.”
youtu.be/KiWdKcsEgS8?...

Again, throwing Kyiv to the wolves in nothing more than a race to a Thanksgiving headline is profoundly wrong and, frankly, un-American.

The original article that prompted this discussion can be found here:

cimsec.org/maritime-sta...

Sea Control 591: Maritime Statecraft and Its Future with Steve Brock and Hunter Stires

In this latest episode of #SeaControl, I host Steve Brock and @hunterstires.bsky.social to discuss their recent @cimsec.bsky.social article, "Maritime Statecraft and Its Future."

open.spotify.com/episode/6FAb...

Don’t give up the shipyards Trump’s first shipbuilding deal must not derail America’s bipartisan strategy to revive the foundations of its seapower.

I’m pleased to share my latest article, “Don’t Give Up the Shipyards,” out now in @defenseone.bsky.social. Grateful to @navybook.bsky.social for bringing this work forward.
www.defenseone.com/ideas/2025/1...

A comprehensive strategy for maritime statecraft.

This is the strategy pursued by the prior SECNAV. For the first time, the authors offer an open discussion on its logic and path forward in @cimsec.bsky.social, authored by @hunterstires.bsky.social and Steve Brock:

cimsec.org/maritime-sta...

NEW: The Kremlin is attempting to use all available informational avenues to convince the US, Europe, and Ukraine to acquiesce to the Kremlin’s demands by convincing them that a Russian victory in Ukraine is certain when it is anything but.

More in tonight's assessment: isw.pub/UkrWar102025

South Korea is the ideal anchor for the first island chain Discussion of the first island chain largely overlooks South Korea, an ideal "anchor" that could prove decisive in a US-China conflict involving Taiwan.

My latest for the @atlanticcouncil.bsky.social.

BLUF: Peninsular stability is linked directly to Taiwan Strait stability. Military planners should approach the simultaneous threats of the #PRC and #DPRK with this fact in mind. #WriteFightWin

www.atlanticcouncil.org/in-depth-res...

The success of America’s maritime renaissance depends on sustained, long-term commitment—and the recognition that for a nation as immutably dependent on the sea as the United States, maritime strategy is grand strategy. 4/4

Now that Steve and I have completed our terms of government service in January and June respectively, this essay is the first time the strategy's architects have fully set out its underlying rationale and key lines of effort in print in a public forum. 3/4

This strategy to rebuild America's comprehensive maritime power, both commercial and naval, has made significant advances and has demonstrated notable intellectual staying power across the political transition. 2/4

I’m pleased to share my latest article, coauthored with @SteveVBrock in @CIMSEC, laying out the Maritime Statecraft strategy we designed and have been driving forward since 2022 under the leadership of Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro. 1/4
cimsec.org/maritime-sta...

Serious scholars have examined what happens when we change the number of H1-B visas issued.

Cities that get more H1-B immigrants subsequently see the wages of natives *rise* substantially.

Skilled immigrants bring new ideas, fill labor shortages and make us all more productive.

Last week, Boston received a letter from AG Bondi threatening to prosecute officials and withhold funds unless we cooperate with carrying out mass deportations.

The US Attorney General asked for a response by today, so here it is: stop attacking our cities to hide your administration’s failures.

To my 10th grade English teacher, who said, “Make the conclusion count.”

A warning to the young: just say no to AI The substitution of Large Language Models for genuine thinking is a generational threat. At stake is no less than the life of the mind.

Call me a Luddite but this piece captures how I feel about AI‘s threat to writing. Writing is how humans organize thought to exercise reason, which is at the core of philosophy and strategy. Outsourcing that function to an imitative machine is a mistake.
engelsbergideas.com/essays/a-war...

Cinema’s greatest scene: ‘Casablanca’ and ‘La Marseillaise’ Casablanca is widely remembered as one of the greatest films of all time, coming in at #2 on the AFI’s top 100 list and similarly regarded by many other critics. You can quibble with its exac…

When this scene was shot, Madeleine Lebeau, an actual French refugee who made it to the US, is singing the anthem of a nation that may never again exist.

seveninchesofyourtime.com/cinemas-grea...

I think a lot about how when Casablanca was filmed, nobody knew who would win WW2.

In the coming days, I will be launching the Maritime Strategy Group, a new venture for those who would like to seize the opportunity of the American maritime renaissance with insights from those who have brought it about. 6/6

I remain fully engaged in our shared work through my affiliations as a Fellow at the Naval War College, the Project Director of the U.S. Naval Institute's Maritime Counterinsurgency Project, and as Non-Resident Fellow with the Navy League's Center for Maritime Strategy. 5/6