Nick Rasmussen, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, says progress against the Islamic State may be slow to affect the terror attacks plaguing the West.

In Hiroshima, Obama plans to update his vision for ridding the world of nuclear weapons. Nuclear doves say they're underwhelmed with Obama's record on reducing the size of the U.S. nuclear stockpile.

Obama has sought to reduce the world's nuclear stockpile throughout his tenure. Yet he's also put the U.S. on course to spend some $1 trillion on upgrading its aging nuclear arsenal.

In this weekly story roundup, NPR reporters, editors and producers share what they have been reading. Today's mix explores life away from Earth, forgotten photos and fallen stars.

Republican presidential candidates, led by Donald Trump, claim President Obama has slashed defense spending and will leave his successor with a weaker force. We break it down.

The U.S. government objects to calling ISIS a state. But the military bombs the trappings of statehood: oil facilities, financial resources and "cabinet ministers."

American troops in Iraq are interrogating a leader of the Islamic State after capturing him in a special operations raid, according to national security officials in Washington.

The Pentagon will not say much about the ISIS leader, including his name, where in Iraq he was captured or what role he ...

The Pentagon has opened all jobs across the military to women, including once-closed posts in the infantry and special operations forces. The announcement in December came after a nearly three-year process, and with the acknowledgement that women had fought and died in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan.

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President Obama wants to finally make good on one of his signature campaign promises: closing the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The Republican-controlled Congress is unlikely to go along, but the debate has raised another question: If the prison closes, what would happen to the naval base itself?

The ...

Social networks have changed the world, but they make things very complicated for the CIA.

Facebook, Twitter and other services give the spy agency enormous amounts of new information about people of interest around the world, but they also open up huge new vulnerabilities.

For example, how should the CIA ...