Andrew Francis Krepinevich Jr. (born 13 February 1950) is a defense policy analyst who is a distinguished senior fellow at (and former longtime president of) the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

Army service

Born in

New York State New York, also called New York State, is a state in the northeastern United States. Bordered by New England to the east, Canada to the north, and Pennsylvania and New Jersey to the south, its territory extends into both the Atlantic Ocean and ...

, Krepinevich graduated from

West Point The United States Military Academy (USMA), commonly known as West Point, is a United States service academies, United States service academy in West Point, New York that educates cadets for service as Officer_(armed_forces)#United_States, comm ...

with a B.S. degree in 1972. He then spent 21 years as an officer in the

U.S. Army The United States Army (USA) is the primary land service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is designated as the Army of the United States in the United States Constitution.Article II, section 2, clause 1 of the United Stat ...

, serving on the personal staff of three Defense Secretaries and in the

Office of Net Assessment The Office of Net Assessment (ONA) was an agency of the United States Department of Defense created in 1973 by Richard Nixon to serve as the Pentagon's "internal think tank" that "looks 20 to 30 years into the military's future, often with the assi ...

, retiring in the rank of lieutenant colonel. While in the army, Krepinevich received an M.P.A. from the

Harvard Kennedy School The John F. Kennedy School of Government, commonly referred to as Harvard Kennedy School (HKS), is the school of public policy of Harvard University, a private university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Harvard Kennedy School offers master's de ...

in 1980 and then earned a Ph.D. at

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

in 1984 while teaching social sciences at the U.S. Military Academy. His doctoral thesis was entitled ''The Army concept and Vietnam: a case study in organizational failure''. He then published an influential book, ''The Army and Vietnam'', in 1986 in which he argued that the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

could have won the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (1 November 1955 – 30 April 1975) was an armed conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fought between North Vietnam (Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and South Vietnam (Republic of Vietnam) and their allies. North Vietnam w ...

had the Army adopted a small-unit pacification strategy in

South Vietnam South Vietnam, officially the Republic of Vietnam (RVN; , VNCH), was a country in Southeast Asia that existed from 1955 to 1975. It first garnered Diplomatic recognition, international recognition in 1949 as the State of Vietnam within the ...

's villages, rather than conducting

search and destroy Seek and destroy (also known as search and destroy, or S&D) is a military strategy which consists of inserting infantry forces into hostile territory and directing them to search and then attack enemy targets before immediately withdrawing. Fi ...

operations in remote jungles.Krepinevich, Andrew F., Jr
The Army and Vietnam
JHU Press, 1986, . While working for the Office of Net Assessment in 1992, Krepinevich authored "The Military-Technical Revolution: A Preliminary Assessment," an influential document in the development of thinking about the " Revolution in Military Affairs."

Civilian career

Following his retirement from the army, Krepinevich assumed his current position as director of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a non-profit

think tank A think tank, or public policy institute, is a research institute that performs research and advocacy concerning topics such as social policy, political strategy, economics, military, technology, and culture. Most think tanks are non-governme ...

focused on defense and national security issues. While at CSBA he has served on the National Defense Panel and

Defense Policy Board The Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee, also referred to as the Defense Policy Board (DPBAC or DPB), is a discretionary federal advisory committee to the United States Department of Defense. The objective of the DPB is to "provide independ ...

, and advised senior military and civilian policymakers. In 2005, he published an influential ''

Foreign Affairs ''Foreign Affairs'' is an American magazine of international relations and foreign policy of the United States, U.S. foreign policy published by the Council on Foreign Relations, a nonprofit organization, nonprofit, nonpartisan, membership or ...

'' article o
"How to Win in Iraq"
Informed by Krepinevich's previous research on Vietnam, the article called for the adoption of a population-centric

counterinsurgency Counterinsurgency (COIN, or NATO spelling counter-insurgency) is "the totality of actions aimed at defeating irregular forces". The Oxford English Dictionary defines counterinsurgency as any "military or political action taken against the ac ...

strategy much like the approach implemented during the "Surge" of U.S. forces two years later. In 2009 he published ''7 Deadly Scenarios: A Military Futurist Explores War in the 21st Century'', which presents seven hypothetical scenarios that would severely challenge the U.S. military. His recent work has frequently addressed the challenges posed by the modernization of China's military forces, Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons, and the proliferation of

precision-guided munitions A precision-guided munition (PGM), also called a smart weapon, smart munition, or smart bomb, is a type of weapon system that integrates advanced guidance and control systems, such as Global Positioning System, GPS, laser guidance, or Infrared ...

. Krepinivich has also served as an adjunct professor at

George Mason University George Mason University (GMU) is a Public university, public research university in Fairfax County, Virginia, United States. Located in Northern Virginia near Washington, D.C., the university is named in honor of George Mason, a Founding Father ...

, the

School of Advanced International Studies The School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) is a graduate school of Johns Hopkins University based in Washington, D.C. The school also maintains campuses in Bologna, Italy and Nanjing, China. The school is devoted to the study of int ...

Johns Hopkins University The Johns Hopkins University (often abbreviated as Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. Founded in 1876 based on the European research institution model, J ...

and

Georgetown University Georgetown University is a private university, private Jesuit research university in Washington, D.C., United States. Founded by Bishop John Carroll (archbishop of Baltimore), John Carroll in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic higher education, Ca ...

. Most recently, Krepinevich co-authored, with his CSBA colleague Barry Watts, ''The Last Warrior: Andrew Marshall and the Shaping of Modern American Defense Strategy'' (Basic Books, January 2015). Both authors had previously worked for

Andrew Marshall (foreign policy strategist) Andrew W. Marshall (September 13, 1921 – March 26, 2019) was an American foreign policy strategist who served as director of the United States Department of Defense's Office of Net Assessment from 1973 to 2015. Appointed to the position by Presi ...

at the

. Krepinevich's pending departure from CSBA was announced following a July 2015 meeting by the think tank's board of directors. In March 2016, he became a senior distinguished fellow at CSBA.

References

External links

Official CSBA Biography
* 1950 births Living people Place of birth missing (living people) United States Military Academy alumni Military personnel from New York (state) United States Army officers Harvard Kennedy School alumni United States Military Academy faculty Harvard University alumni American male non-fiction writers Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments George Mason University faculty Johns Hopkins University faculty Georgetown University faculty {{US-mil-hist-stub