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Space, Law, and National Security
No full textIn his address to the 2025 USSPACECOM Legal Conference, General Stephen Whiting underscores the indispensable role of legal professionals in shaping the future of military space operations and maintaining the rules-based international order in an increasingly contested domain. He outlines the rapid transformation of the space environment driven by commercial innovation, technological proliferation, and the accelerating threat landscape posed by adversaries such as China and Russia. The speech highlights U.S. Space Command’s three “moral responsibilities”: ensuring the delivery of space capabilities to the joint force and allies, protecting and defending critical space assets, and safeguarding the joint force from space-enabled attacks. General Whiting calls for creative and strategic legal thinking on issues such as commercial integration, the legality of counterspace operations, and the boundaries of lawful response under international law. Emphasizing that law and policy both constrain and empower military action, he concludes by urging space lawyers, policymakers, and industry leaders to act collectively to preserve security, stability, and legitimacy in the domain as humanity expands its presence beyond Earth
Enabling the Decisive Advantage
No full textIn her keynote address at the 2025 USSPACECOM Legal Conference, former Assistant Secretary of State Mallory Stewart argues that law, norms, and international cooperation are central to maintaining the United States’ “decisive advantage” in outer space. She emphasizes that rules and standards—far from constraining innovation or strategic flexibility—enhance predictability, reduce risk, and empower responsible competition. Stewart highlights the success of initiatives such as the Artemis Accords, the U.S. commitment to forgo destructive direct-ascent anti-satellite (ASAT) tests, and the global expansion of Space Situational Awareness (SSA) agreements as examples of how legal and normative frameworks reinforce stability and collaboration. She contends that risk-reducing laws and norms enable higher innovation tolerance, strengthen partnerships between government and industry, and help deter irresponsible behavior in space. Stewart cautions, however, against unverifiable or poorly defined legal prohibitions—such as those banning all “weapons” in space—that could undermine existing treaty architectures. Concluding, she calls on legal practitioners to sustain, adapt, and enforce the rules-based international order in space to ensure long-term security, sustainability, and leadership for the United States and its allies
Works of Love from Russia
No full textThis reflective artist’s statement by Alisa Gorshenina (Alice Hualice) intertwines autobiographical narrative with the creative context of four works produced during and after her politically forced displacement from Russia. Gorshenina recounts a lifelong pattern of resisting external pressures—from expectations to relocate for education and career advancement to demands that she flee Russia following the 2022 invasion of Ukraine. She frames her continued desire to live in her hometown of Nizhny Tagil as an act of personal agency and a “new language of resistance,” grounded not in state loyalty but in an authentic, non-nationalistic love of place. Increasing censorship, denunciations, canceled exhibitions, and eventual detention culminated in her involuntary exile. During nine days in a special detention center, she created three drawings that served as a means of psychological survival, seeking inner peace amid fear and uncertainty. Together with the accompanying photograph, these works document a moment of rupture while affirming the artist’s commitment to transforming personal experience into mythopoetic visual language. Her art becomes both testimony and resistance—asserting the enduring strength of love, memory, and self-determination under oppressive conditions
Fragments
No full textIn Fragments (شظايا), Najlaa Attaallah offers a poetic, intimate, and devastating meditation on exile, trauma, and the unrelenting violence endured by Palestinians in Gaza. Written from Reykjavík yet emotionally tethered to her homeland, Attaallah narrates the psychic rupture caused by witnessing war from afar—the guilt of safety, the suffocating pull of memory, and the sense of existing as “a body without certainty.” Across lyrical vignettes, she explores the collapse of ordinary life under the weight of collective horror: sleeplessness, paralysis, obsessive monitoring of news, and the disintegration of routine maternal roles. The text moves between present anguish and childhood recollections—family, pottery workshops, orchards, cousins who shaped her life—culminating in grief for Maha, a beloved cousin lost in Gaza. Throughout, Attaallah interrogates the absurdity of continuing to live normally while over a million Gaza children freeze, starve, or die; she articulates a profound fear that “home” itself is disappearing. The piece blends autobiography, political witnessing, and elegy, offering an unfiltered portrayal of the emotional architecture of war, displacement, and love for a place that continues to exist within her even as it is being destroyed
Balancing Health Information-Seeking through Retrieval-Augmented Generation-Based LLM Chatbot
No full textFamily caregivers play a vital role in supporting children with chronic health conditions, such as neonates diagnosed with hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy (HIE). However, navigating complex medical information can be overwhelming due to the quantity and quality of available literature. This study leverages Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG)-based Large Language Models (LLMs) to develop a chatbot that integrates peer-reviewed scientific literature and provides personalized, simplified summaries for caregivers. A user study involving six caregivers and five healthcare providers demonstrated the chatbot’s ability to enhance clarity, improve comprehension, and deliver essential medical information concisely. Our findings highlight the potential of RAG-based LLMs to enhance caregivers’ health literacy and support their information-seeking behavior, while also underscoring the importance of thoughtfully navigating the differing expectations of caregivers and healthcare providers regarding the type, depth, and presentation of medical information
Defending NATO’s Northern Flank: Power Projecting and Military Operations
No full textThis review evaluates Defending NATO’s Northern Flank: Power Projection and Military Operations, edited by Lon Strauss and Njord Wegge. The volume offers a comprehensive assessment of NATO’s evolving Arctic posture, combining doctrinal analysis, historical context, and alliance dynamics. Contributions examine Russia’s military strategy, U.S. Arctic policy, and intra-alliance complexities involving Denmark, Greenland, and the Faroe Islands. While the anthology provides valuable insights into NATO’s strategic challenges, it notably underrepresents Canada’s role. Overall, it stands as a timely and rigorous contribution to understanding Arctic security and NATO’s internal decision-making amid rising geopolitical competition.
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Happy Kids, Popular Kids? Life and School Satisfaction as Predictors of Popularity in Early Adolescents
No full textSociometric popularity measures how well-liked a person is among peers. Life satisfaction has been positively related to self-perception and social functioning, whereas school satisfaction has been linked to stronger peer ties. This study examined how life and school satisfaction affected change in popularity over the course of a school year and how self-perception moderates said relationship. Participants included 182 fifth- and sixth-graders in Montreal, who completed 13 surveys over the school year. Popularity was measured via peer nominations at T1 and T13. Satisfaction variables and self-perception were measured via self-reports at T2 and T13, respectively. A hierarchical regression indicated that 72% of the variance in popularity at T13 was accounted for by popularity at T1, with an additional 1% accounted for by life and school satisfaction. Additional regressions indicated that physical and social competence marginally significantly moderated the relationship. The novelty of the current study lies in its identification of school and life satisfaction as predictors of popularity, and in its examination of the moderating roles of physical and social competence. These results emphasize the importance of well-being and self-concept in shaping adolescents’ social standing and provide meaningful implications for research and interventions targeting peer relations and adjustmen
