Monday in Washington, December 15, 2014

THE FUTURE OF HOMELAND MISSILE DEFENSE: A FRESH LOOK AT PROGRAMS AND POLICY. 12/15, 9:00am-Noon. Sponsor: International Security Program, CSIS. Speakers: Vice Admiral James Syring, Director, Missile Defense Agency; Dr. Kathleen H. Hicks, Senior Vice President, Henry A. Kissinger Chair, and Director, International Security Program, CSIS; Dr. Michael O'Hanlon, Senior Fellow, Brookings Institution; Dr. James Miller, President, Adaptive Strategies, LLC; Dr. Robert Soofer, Professional Staff Member, Senate Committee on Armed Service; and more.

NATIONAL RECONCILIATION AND NEGOTIATION: THE PATH FORWARD IN IRAQ AND SYRIA. 12/15, 9:00am-2:00pm. Sponsor: Foreign Policy Institute, SAIS, Johns Hopkins; Middle East Institute; New America; Dean’s Office, SAIS, Johns Hopkins. Speakers: Harith Al-Qarawee, Fellow, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University; Abbas Kadhim, Senior Foreign Policy Fellow, School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University; Robert Ford, SAIS '83, Former U.S. Ambassador to Syria, Senior Fellow, Middle East Institute; Hind Kabawat, Senior Program Officer- Syria, United States Institute of Peace; Matthew Spence, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Middle East Policy; and more.

THE ESCALATING SHI’A-SUNNI CONFLICT: ASSESSING THE ROLE OF ISIS. 12/15, 9:30-11:00am. Sponsor: Stimson Center. Speakers: Joseph Bahout, Visiting Scholar, Middle East Program, Carnegie; Omar Al-Nidawi, Director for Iraq, Gryphon Partners LLC; Geneive Abdo (Moderator), Fellow, Middle East Program, Stimson.

RETIRING AROUND THE GLOBE: IS AMERICA’S SYSTEM THE BEST? 12/15, 10:00am-Noon. Sponsor: Financial Services Roundtable; OECD. Speakers: Senator Orrin Hatch R-UT; Pablo Antolin, lead author of OECD’s Pensions Outlook; Ed Farrington Executive Vice President of Natixis Global Asset Management; Jim McCaughan, CEO of Principal Global Investors; Edmund F. Murphy III, President of Empower Retirement.

THE FUTURE OF U.S. FOREIGN POLICY. 12/15, 11:00am-12:30pm. Sponsor: Center for American Progress (CAP). Speakers: James Mann, Scholar-in-Residence, Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, author of Fall 2014 American Prospect article, "On Realism"; Christopher Preble, Vice President for Defense and Foreign Policy Studies, Cato Institute; Kim Holmes, Distinguished Fellow, Heritage Foundation; and Brian Katulis, Senior Fellow, Center for American Progress; Author, Spring 2014 Democracy article "Against Disengagement"; Moderator: Lawrence Korb, Senior Fellow, Center for American Progress.

RUSSIAN-CHINESE INTEGRATION STRATEGIES FOR EURASIA: FORMING A NEW CONDOMINIUM? 12/15, Noon-1:30pm. Sponsor: East-West Center in Washington. Speakers: Dr. Vitaly Kozyrev, Visiting Asia Studies Fellow, East-West Center in Washington, DC; and Dr. William Norris, Stanton Fellow, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

MODERN TIMES IN NORTH KOREA: SCENES FROM ITS FOUNDING YEARS, 1945-1950. 12/15, 4:00-5:30pm. Sponsor: Wilson Center (WWC). Speaker: Author, Suzy Kim is Assistant Professor in the Department of Asian Languages & Cultures at Rutgers University.