Until recently, these territories were of little interest to the U.S. national security community unless – like the coca-growing areas of South America during the 1990s “war on drugs” – they generated problems for the United States that required action.

The recognition that the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 evolved out of al-Qaeda's formation in Afghanistan has led many national security experts to believe that the front lines of the war on terrorism are in these ungoverned territories.

The study says the U.S. government's main current focus is addressing specific problems that arise from ungoverned territories, such as terrorism, narcotics trafficking, illegal arms trafficking, and proliferation of chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear materials and weapons.

But the report recommends specific steps that include: re-evaluating development assistance as a tool; promotingKim Cragin, Theodore W. Karasik, Jennifer D.P. Moroney, and John E. Peters, all of RAND; Lt. Commander Steven Boraz, a U.S. Naval Fellow at RAND; and Kevin A. O'Brien, formerly of RAND.

In 2005, Dr. Manwaring wrote a monograph entitled Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, Bolivarian Socialism, and Asymmetric Warfare. It came at a time when the United States and Venezuela were accelerating a verbal sparing match regarding which country was destabilizing Latin America more. President Chavez shows no sign of standing down; he slowly and deliberately centralizes his power in Venezuela, and carefully and adroitly articulates his Bolivarian dream (the idea of a Latin American Liberation Movement against U.S. economic and political imperialism). Yet, most North Americans dismiss Chavez as a “nut case,” or—even if he is a threat to