I am Associate Professor of Security Studies in the Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, as well as Non-Resident Senior Fellow in Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution. My research focuses on nuclear deterrence and escalation, civil-military relations, military strategy and operations, defense policy, and Persian Gulf security issues. My most recent book is ​The Dictator's Army: Battlefield Effectiveness in Authoritarian Regimes (Cornell University Press, 2015). I am on sabbatical from Georgetown during academic year 2019-2020, writing a book on the problem of nuclear escalation in conventional wars. Previously, I was a professor at The George Washington University, where I was also a member of the Institute for Security & Conflict Studies.

---

Header image:  children playing on a captured M41 in Hue, Vietnam