The General's Guys
GENERAL PETRAEUS IS PUTTING TOGETHER A “BRAIN TRUST” TO ADVISE HIM ON THE WAR IN IRAQ.
General David H. Petraeus is assembling advisors who are Ph.D.s and have combat experience in Iraq. Army officers refer to them as “Petraeus guys.”
Colonel Michael J. Meese, the general’s chief economic advisor, has been a professor at the U.S. Military Academy and deputy head of the department of social sciences at West Point. From 2003-2004, he was assigned as the United States Military Academy Fellow at the National War College, where he taught national strategy, military policy and bureaucratic politics courses. He was a special advisor on political, economic and military issues to Petraeus in 2003 in Mosul, Iraq.
He is a graduate of the National War College, an honor graduate of the Command and General Staff College, a distinguished graduate from the U.S. Military Academy, and holds a Ph.D., M.P.A. and M.A. from the Woodrow Wilson school of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University. His dissertation was titled “Defense Decision Making under Budget Stringency: Examining Downsizing in the United States Army.”
An officer in the Australian Army, Lieutenant Colonel David Kilcullen is Petraeus’ chief advisor on counterinsurgency operations. He holds a Ph.D. in anthropology, for which he studied Islamic extremism in Indonesia. He wrote an essay in 2006 titled “Twenty-Eight Articles: Fundamentals of Company-Level Counterinsurgency.” He was most recently chief strategist for the State Department’s counterterrorism office, lent by the Australian government.
Colonel Herbert Raymond McMaster (better known as H. R. McMaster) is best known for commanding Eagle Troop of the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment at the Battle of 73 Easting in Operation Desert Storm. McMaster graduated from the United States Military Academy. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His doctoral thesis on the mistakes of the Vietnam War is detailed in the book “Dereliction of Duty.” McMaster served as a military history professor at West Point from 1994 to 1996. This year he is based at the International Institute for Strategic Studies. Lieutenant Colonel Douglas A. Ollivant is the chief of plans of the 1st Cavalry Division and previously served as the operations officer for the 1st Battalion, 5th Cavalry Regiment in Baghdad, Najaf, Fallujah and North Babil. He holds a doctorate in political science from Indiana University and is a graduate of the U.S. Army’s School of Advanced Military Studies. Ollivant won first prize last year in an Army counterinsurgency writing competition, sponsored by General Petraeus.
Colonel Peter R. Mansoor, who commanded a brigade of the 1st Armored Division in Baghdad from 2003 to 2004, will be executive officer in Baghdad. He is a distinguished graduate and received a Bachelor of Science degree from the United States Military Academy in 1982. He holds a master’s and doctorate in military history from The Ohio State University and a Master of Strategic Studies degree from the Army War College. His dissertation was on how U.S. Army infantry divisions were developed during World War II.
Professor Ahmed S. Hashim is a senior member of the Strategic Research Department of the Naval War College. He was a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, DC, where he co-authored two books. Dr. Hashim obtained a B.A. in politics and international studies from the University of Warwick, Coventry, England, and his M.A. and a Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. ♦