Strategic Asia 2008-09: Challenges and Choices

About the Contributors

About the Contributors Richard K. Betts (PhD, Harvard University) is the Arnold A. Saltzman Professor and Director of the Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies at Columbia University. He has taught at Harvard University and at the Johns Hopkins University’s Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), and he was formerly Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and Director of National Security Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. Dr. Betts has served on the staffs of the original Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (the Church Committee) and the National Security Council. During the 1990s he served for six years on the National Security Advisory Panel of the Director of Central Intelligence, and in 1999–2000 he was a member of the National Commission on Terrorism. Dr. Betts has published numerous articles on U.S. foreign policy, military strategy, intelligence operations, security issues in Asia and Europe, and terrorism. He is the author of five books—Enemies of Intelligence (2007), Military Readiness (1995), Nuclear Blackmail and Nuclear Balance (1987), Surprise Attack (1982), and Soldiers, Statesmen, and Cold War Crises (1977 and 1991)—and is editor of several volumes including Conflict After the Cold War (3rd ed., 2007) and Paradoxes of Strategic Intelligence (co-edited with Thomas G. Mahnken, 2003). Dennis C. Blair holds the John M. Shalikashvili Chair in National Security Studies at The National Bureau of Asian Research (NBR). From 2003 to 2006 Admiral Blair was President and Chief Executive Officer of the Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA), a federally funded research and development center based in Alexandria, Virginia. Prior to retiring from the navy in 2002, he served as Commander in Chief, U.S. Pacific Command, which is the largest of the combatant commands. During his 34-year navy career, Admiral Blair served on guided missile destroyers in both the Atlantic and Pacific fleets and commanded the Kitty Hawk Battle Group. Ashore, he served as Director of the Joint Staff and as the first Associate Director of Central Intelligence for Military Support. He has also served in budget and policy positions on the National Security Council and on several major navy staffs. Admiral Blair has been awarded four Defense Distinguished 476 • Strategic Asia 2008–09 Service medals and has received decorations from the governments of Japan, Thailand, Korea, Australia, and Taiwan. Elizabeth Economy (PhD, University of Michigan) is C.V. Starr Senior Fellow and Director for Asia Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. Dr. Economy has taught at Columbia University, the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) at Johns Hopkins University, and the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington. She serves on the board of the China-U.S. Center for Sustainable Development and is a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on the Future of China. Dr. Economy’s most recent book, The River Runs Black (2004), won the 2005 International Convention of Asia Scholars award for best study in the field of social sciences. Her writings appear often in publications such as Foreign Affairs, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the International Herald Tribune, and she is a frequent radio and television commentator on U.S.-China relations. Dr. Economy regularly testifies before Congress and consults for U.S. government and corporations on Chinese environmental issues. Richard J. Ellings (PhD, University of Washington) is President and Co-founder of The National Bureau of Asian Research (NBR). He is also Affiliate Professor of International Studies at the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies, University of Washington. Prior to serving with NBR, from 1986–89 he was Assistant Director and on the faculty of the Jackson School, where he received the Distinguished Teaching Award. He served as Legislative Assistant in the United States Senate, office of Senator Slade Gorton, in 1984 and 1985. Dr. Ellings is the author of Embargoes and World Power: Lessons from American Foreign Policy (1985); co-author of Private Property and National Security (1991); co-editor (with Aaron Friedberg) of Strategic Asia 2003–04: Fragility and Crisis (2003), Strategic Asia 2002–03: Asian Aftershocks (2002), and Strategic Asia 2001–02: Power and Purpose (2001); co-editor of Korea’s Future and the Great Powers (with Nicholas Eberstadt, 2001) and Southeast Asian Security in the New Millennium (with Sheldon Simon, 1996); and the founding editor of the NBR Analysis publication series. He established the Strategic Asia Program and AccessAsia, the national clearinghouse that tracks specialists and...