John Nagl
John A. Nagl is a counterinsurgency writer.
Biogrpahy
Education
According to the New York Times, Nagl 'graduated close to the top of his West Point class in 1988 and was selected as a Rhodes scholar.' He studied a Masters in International Relations for two years at Oxford before the 1991 Gulf War and then returned to Oxford to study a PhD at St. Antony's College. [1] At Oxford Nagl 'immersed himself in the classic texts of guerrilla warfare'. According to the New York Times, 'the book that most forcefully captured Nagl's imagination' was T.E. Lawrence's Seven Pillars of Wisdom. ref>Peter Maass, 'Professor Nagl's War', New York Times, 11 January 2004</ref> His research focus was on the 'counterinsurgy' operations in Malaya and Vietnam. His thesis was published in 1997 and titled, 'British and American Army Counterinsurgency Learning during the Malayan Emergency and the Vietnam War' [2] It was supervised by Professor Robert O'Neill, who was at that time director of the International Institute for Strategic Studies and Chichele Professor of the History of War at Oxford University. Nagl writes that O'Neill 'suggested the topic and saw it through to the end.' [3] In 2002 Nagl's thesis was published as a book titled Learning to Eat Soup With a Knife: Counterinsurgency Lessons From Malaya and Vietnam. The introduction to a recent edition of the book was written by Gen. Peter Schoomaker, at the time the Army's chief of staff. [4]
Active service
According to the Washington Post, 'Nagl led a tank platoon in the 1991 Persian Gulf war and served in Iraq in 2003 and 2004 as the operations officer for an Army battalion in Iraq's Anbar province.' [5] A contributor note in the December 2007 Rusi Journal states that Nagl commanded, 'the 1st (US) Battalion, 34th Armor at Fort Riley, Kansas' and 'served as the operations officer of Task Force Centurion in Al-Anbar in 2003 and 2004'. [6]
Retirement
In 2008 the Washington Post reported that Nagl, then 41, had 'decided to leave the service to study strategic issues full time' at the Center for a New American Security [7]
Affiliations
- Insurgency Research Group, has presented at a group seminar at King's College London.[9]
Notes
- ↑ Peter Maass, 'Professor Nagl's War', New York Times, 11 January 2004
- ↑ John A. Nagl, “British and American Army Counterinsurgency Learning during the Malayan Emergency and the Vietnam War,” Ph.D. Dissertation, Oxford: University of Oxford, 1997
- ↑ see Acknowledgments in John A. Nagl, Counterinsurgency lessons from Malaya and Vietnam: learning to eat soup with a knife (Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002)
- ↑ Thomas E. Ricks, 'High-Profile Officer Nagl to Leave Army, Join Think Tank', Washington Post, 16 January 2008
- ↑ Thomas E. Ricks, 'High-Profile Officer Nagl to Leave Army, Join Think Tank', Washington Post, 16 January 2008
- ↑ 'John Nagl reviews Here, Bullet By Brian Turner', RUSI Journal, Vol. 152, No. 6, December 2007, pp.94–108
- ↑ Thomas E. Ricks, 'High-Profile Officer Nagl to Leave Army, Join Think Tank', Washington Post, 16 January 2008
- ↑ Screengrab created 28 May 2009, 14:42
- ↑ King's College London Insurgency Research Group, accessed 27 may 2009
