David Kilcullen is Professor of Practice at the Center on the Future of War and the School of Politics and Global Studies at Arizona State University, a Senior Fellow at New America, and an author, strategist, and counterinsurgency expert. He served 25 years as an officer in the Australian Army, diplomat and policy advisor for the Australian and United States Governments, in command and operational missions (including peacekeeping, counterinsurgency and foreign internal defense) across the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and Europe. In the United States, he was Chief Strategist in the State Department’s Counterterrorism Bureau, and served in Iraq as Senior Counterinsurgency Advisor to General David Petraeus, before becoming Special Advisor for Counterinsurgency to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. He is the author of a number of influential books including The Accidental Guerrilla: Fighting Small Wars in the Midst of a Big One, Counterinsurgency, Out of the Mountains, and Blood Year: The Unraveling of Western Counterterrorism — based on an essay that received the Walkley Award, the Australian version of the Pulitzer Prize. His newest book is The Dragons and the Snakes: How the Rest Learned to Fight the West.
In today’s podcast, Dr. Kilcullen discusses the future of conflict, changing concepts of victory, and achieving decisive advantages. The following bullet points highlight key insights from our interview with him:
Stay tuned to the Mad Scientist Laboratory for our next episode of “The Convergence,” featuring Eli Dourado — an economist and Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Growth and Opportunity at Utah State University — discussing significant technology areas in the next decade, the economic impact of shifting technology trends, and their impact on global security on 4 February 2021!
If you enjoyed this episode, watch Dr. Kilcullen’s presentation on Sub-threshold conflict in a new age of Great-Power Competition in our Operational Environment and Conflict Over the Next Decade Webinar video and his associated slide deck.
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