Eliot A. Cohen - Biography

Biography

Cohen received his B.A. in government at Harvard University in 1977. He went on to receive a Ph.D. from Harvard in 1982 in political science, and during his PhD training went through the Army ROTC program at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

He was an assistant professor of government and assistant dean at Harvard University from 1982 to 1985. Following this, he taught for four years at the Naval War College in the Department of Strategy, before a brief period in 1990 serving on the policy planning staff in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. In 1990, Cohen began his position at SAIS. Following the 1991 Persian Gulf War, he directed the U.S. Air Force's official four-volume survey, the Gulf War Air Power Survey, until 1993, for which he received the Air Force’s Exemplary Civilian Service Award. This analysis of the effect of U.S. air power was widely referenced in regards to the Revolution in Military Affairs concept.

In 1993, Paul Wolfowitz, who would later become prominent as the Deputy Secretary of Defense in the run-up to the Iraq war, became Dean of SAIS. During his brief stint at the defense policy planning staff, Cohen had worked under Wolfowitz but this was the first time they were in extended contact. In 1997, Cohen became a founding member of the Project for the New American Century, which became known as a center for prominent neoconservatives. He has been a member of the Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee, a committee of civilians and retired military officers that the U.S. Secretary of Defense may call upon for advice, since the beginning of the administration of President George W. Bush. He was put on the board after acquaintance Richard Perle put forward his name. Cohen has referred to the War on Terrorism as “World War IV”. In the run-up to the 2003 Invasion of Iraq, he was a member of Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, a group of prominent persons who pressed for an invasion.

On March 2, 2007, Cohen was appointed by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to serve as Counselor of the State Department, replacing Philip D. Zelikow.