Speaker biographies

Michael Rubin is a resident scholar in foreign policy studies at AEI, where he studies Arab democracy, Kurdish society, and domestic politics in Iran, Iraq, and Turkey. Prior to joining AEI, he served as a political advisor to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad from 2003 to 2004. Previously, he was a staff advisor for Iran and Iraq in the Office of the Secretary of Defense during 2002–2004. He is currently the editor of the Middle East Quarterly.

Thomas Donnelly is a senior adviser in the CSIS International Security Program. He is also a member of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, president of Strategic Education Associates, and a contributing editor for Armed Forces Journal. He has been a writer and expert on strategy and military affairs for nearly three decades, beginning his career as a journalist in 1978 at the Journal newspapers in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. Soon after, he joined the staff of Army Times and, in 1984, helped create Defense News, assuming the post of deputy editor. In 1987, he returned to Army Times as editor, a position he held through 1993. In 1994, Donnelly received a master’s degree in international relations from Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. After a brief stint as executive editor of the National Interest, he joined the staff of the House Armed Services Committee as director of the policy group. In addition to crafting legislation such as the laws directing the conduct of the 1997 and 2001 Quadrennial Defense Reviews, the reform of the Defense Department’s readiness reporting system, and a variety of initiatives aimed at better understanding the emerging challenge presented by the People’s Republic of China, he directed the committee’s oversight efforts, notably regarding military readiness, operations in the Balkans, and the Khobar Towers terrorist bombing of 1996. In 1999, he joined the Project for the New American Century as deputy executive director and served as principal author of Rebuilding America’s Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources for a New Century (2000). Donnelly joined the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) in 2002, after brief service as director of strategic initiatives for the Lockheed Martin Corporation. In 2004, he served as professor of national security studies at the Maxwell School of Public Administration at Syracuse University, and in 2005 he was nominated by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist to serve a two-year term on the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, an advisory panel to Congress. He became editor of Armed Forces Journal in September 2005 and assumed the role of contributing editor in August 2006. Donnelly is author or coauthor of four books: The Military We Need: Defense Requirements of the Bush Doctrine (2005); Operation Iraqi Freedom: A Strategic Assessment (2004); Clash of Chariots: A History of Armored Warfare (1996); and Operation Just Cause: The Storming of Panama (1991). His articles have appeared in Foreign Affairs, Orbis, the National Interest, the Weekly Standard, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, the Financial Times, and numerous other publications in the United States and abroad. He also has provided defense and national security commentary on television and radio to a variety of stations ranging from the major American networks, PBS, and NPR to Al Jazeera.

Danielle Pletka is the vice president for foreign and defense policy studies at AEI. Her research areas include the Middle East (including Iran, Iraq, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict), south Asia (India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan), terrorism, and weapons proliferation. While at AEI, Ms. Pletka has developed a conference series on rebuilding post-Saddam Iraq, a project on democracy for the Arab world, a roundtable of experts to discuss global energy security, and a project to develop bilateral relations between India and the United States. She recently served as a member of the congressionally mandated Task Force on the United Nations, established by the United States Institute of Peace. Before coming to AEI, she served for ten years as a senior professional staff member for the Near East and South Asia on the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. Ms. Pletka has also been a journalist based in Washington, D.C., and the Middle East.

Patrick Clawson is deputy director for research of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. His previous positions include five years as senior research professor at the National Defense University’s Institute for National Strategic Studies and four years each as senior economist at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund. Dr. Clawson has published op-ed articles in major newspapers including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post. In addition to his frequent appearances on television and radio, he has authored more than thirty scholarly articles on the Middle East in such journals as Foreign Affairs, International Journal of Middle East Studies, Middle East Journal, and Les Cahiers de l’Orient. He has also testified before congressional committees more than a dozen times. Currently serving as senior editor of Middle East Quarterly, he was previously editor of Orbis, a quarterly review of foreign affairs.

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