Dr. Kenneth Dekleva served as a Regional Medical Officer/Psychiatrist (including 5 years at the U.S. Embassy Moscow, Russian Federation) with the U.S. Dept. of State during 2002-2016, and is currently Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Director, Psychiatry-Medicine Integration, UT Southwestern Medical Center. The views expressed are his own.
OPINION — The recent release by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence of its [unclassified] annual threat assessment is both welcome and fascinating. It clearly outlines the variety of threats faced by the United States and its allies over the coming years. These threats range from nation-state adversaries, such as China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea, to threats from pandemics, climate change, migration, and transnational criminal groups and terrorist groups. In this sense, the report has come to remind us of the annual updates – during the Cold War – as outlined in