For years, the media and the U.S. government have repeated a familiar refrain: that the regime of now-ailing Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez, however annoying, poses no serious threat to the national security of the United States. Compelling evidence, however, suggests otherwise. Under Chavez, Venezuela has systematically opposed U.S. values and initiatives throughout the Western Hemisphere and the world in general. It has tried to influence political events in other Latin American countries, sometimes successfully. It has supported guerrilla movements and terrorist organizations in other countries (most notably Colombia). And it has facilitated the activities of drug traffickers active in the region, even as it has destabilized the regional status quo through massive military purchases.

The most dangerous threat to the U.S. from Venezuela, however, results from its facilitation and encouragement of the penetration of the Western Hemisphere by the Islamic Republic of Iran. Since 2005, with Venezuela’s assistance, Iran has created an extensive regional network of economic, diplomatic, industrial and commercial activities, with significant effect. The sum total of Iran’s declared investments in the region now stands at some $20 billion, at a time when the Iranian economy itself is in exceedingly poor condition. The depths of Iran’s involvement in the Western Hemisphere are all the more surprising—and significant—given that there is no historical or cultural affinity whatsoever between Iran and the countries on this side of the Atlantic. Nevertheless, the Iranian regime in recent years has exhibited an unprecedented level of interest and involvement in the region, facilitated by its burgeoning strategic partnership with Caracas.

A year after the attacks of September 11th, then-Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, in contextualizing the terrorist threat facing the country, made a telling assessment. “Hezbollah may be the A-team of terrorists,” Mr. Armitage told an audience at the United States Institute of Peace in Washington, DC, “and maybe al-Qaida is actually the B-team.” The description was apt, and remains so. With a presence in an estimated forty countries on five different continents, the Lebanese Shi’ite militia represents one of the very few terrorist groups active today that possess a truly global presence and reach.

This footprint extends not only to the greater Middle East and Europe, but to the Western Hemisphere as well. Over the past quarter-century, Hezbollah has devoted considerable energy and resources to establishing an extensive network of operations throughout the Americas. Today, its web of activity in our hemisphere stretches from Canada to Argentina, and encompasses a wide range of illicit activities and criminal enterprises, from drug trafficking to recruitment to fundraising and training.

America's strategy toward Iran is faltering. Nearly seven years after the disclosure of the Iranian regime’s nuclear program, and a year-and-a-half after the start of “engagement” on the part of the Obama administration, Washington has yet to see a substantive diplomatic breakthrough in the deepening international impasse over the Iranian regime’s nuclear ambitions. To the contrary, mounting evidence suggests that Iran’s rulers have used the strategic pause aff orded by American outreach to forge ahead with their nuclear endeavor, adding permanence to Iran’s increasingly mature and menacing atomic effort.

Multilateral eff orts at sanctions, meanwhile, have failed to keep pace with these advances. Between 2006 and 2008, three rounds of international sanctions were authorized and enacted by the United Nations Security Council, with little perceivable impact on Iran’s nuclear decisionmaking. A fourth round of sanctions has just been finalized by the United States and other Permanent Security Council members. Yet already, there are clear signs that this effort, like its predecessors, will fall far short of applying the broad, comprehensive economic pressure necessary for Iran to begin to rethink its nuclear drive.

As a result, the United States and its allies in the international community will soon be confronted by the stark binary choice best outlined by French President Nicolas Sarkozy several years ago: an Iran with the bomb, or the bombing of Iran. If it hopes to avoid such a state of affairs, the United States will need to marshal a comprehensive economic warfare strategy toward the Islamic Republic — one that leverages the latent vulnerabilities inherent in the Iranian economy to ratchet up the cost of the regime’s nuclear endeavor. Such an approach starts by focusing on six discrete areas of economic activity that could be used to alter the Iranian regime’s behavior.

Winning the Long War is a trenchant examination of the past seven years of the Global War on Terror, the future battlegrounds that will confront the United States in the struggle against radical Islam in the years ahead, and how America can reclaim the initiative in what has become the defining struggle of the twenty-first century.

Taking on Tehran provides concrete solutions to the emerging Iranian global threat. With contributions from leading analysts and practitioners, Taking on Tehran examines the various approaches - economic, political and military - that can be taken by the United States and its allies to confront and defeat the contemporary challenge posed by the Islamic Republic. It offers practical, achievable guidance to policymakers and unique insight for students into how foreign policy is really made.

Dismantling Tyranny is the first significant study of how new democracies handled the legacy of the secret police of the previous totalitarian regimes. It contains chapters that study the cases of the Czech Republic, Estonia, the former East Germany, Lithuania, Nicaragua, Poland and Russia. This isn't just a history book, however. In the words of the publisher, "it is a guidebook designed to empower, inform, and guide future transitions toward democracy for those political leaders with the initiative and courage to embark upon such a visionary path."

Today, Iran constitutes the single greatest challenge to the United States and the War on Terror. In the Persian Gulf and Central Asia, Iranian policymakers are busy cobbling together alliances intended to marginalize the United States and its Coalition allies. Iran remains the world's most active sponsor of terrorism, fueling the activities of Hezbollah, al-Qaeda, and insurgents in Iraq. And, through its nuclear advances, Iran is gaining the capability to catastrophically alter the geopolitical balance of power far beyond its immediate neighborhood.

As evidence of this threat mounts, one thing remains crystal clear to Ilan Berman: "Washington is woefully unprepared to deal with this mounting peril." Berman's approach is hard-hitting, provocative and unflinchingly critical. Yet he takes the exploration of Iran's menace one step further, providing what has been missing so far in the foreign policy discourse regarding Iran -- practical policy prescriptions designed to contain Iran's strategic ambitions.

In December 2001, a new Russian law laying the basis for the peaceful territorial expansion of the Russian Federation went into effect. The entire country of Belarus-as well as parts of Georgia, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine-are the most likely candidates to join Russia. Should this largely ethnically-based expansion occur, Russia would grow by more than 20 million people, and the resultant rise in Russian nationalism might encourage further Russian territorial ambitions-especially those directed at Ukraine. Even if Russian expansion stops with all, or part, of these territories, however, it could breathe new life into the ethnically based border problems of other countries. A timely and prescient work, made all the more relevant by Russia's invasion of Georgia in August 2008.

The vast majority of Muslims word-wide are peaceable, law-abiding and hospitable people. Nevertheless, the West's reaction to atrocities such as 9/11 and 7/7, and the lack of a coherent understanding of our adversaries, is threatening relations with all Muslims. In Islam, Islamism and the West, British experts Baroness Caroline Cox and Dr. John Marks offer an exploration of the ideological roots of militant Islamism, and outline the challenge that it poses for Western societies at large.