U.S. Grand Strategy in the Middle East: Is There One?

Additional Speakers to be Announced

• • Chas W. Freeman Jr. - Speaker
    Chairman, Projects International

     

    Chas W. Freeman became Chairman of Projects International in 1995, after a distinguished thirty year career in U.S. diplomacy which included positions as Ambassador to Saudi Arabia and Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs. Over these years, Ambassador Freeman negotiated on behalf of the United States with over one hundred foreign governments in East and South Asia, the Middle East, Africa, Latin America, and both Western and Eastern Europe. He is active in supporting Projects International’s clients in all these regions of the world today.

• • William B. Quandt - Speaker
    Edward R. Stettinius Professor of Politics, University of Virginia

     

    In the fall of 1994, William B. Quandt joined the Department of Politics at the University of Virginia, where he holds the Edward R. Stettinius chair.  From 2000 to 2003, he also served as Vice Provost for International Affairs at the University.  He teaches courses on the Middle East and American Foreign Policy. Prior to this appointment, he was a Senior Fellow in the Foreign Policy Studies Program at the Brookings Institution, where he conducted research on the Middle East, American policy toward the Arab-Israeli conflict, and energy policy.

    Before going to Brookings in 1979, Dr. Quandt served as a staff member on the National Security Council (1972-1974, 1977-1979). He was actively involved in the negotiations that led to the Camp David Accords and the Egyptian-Israeli Peace Treaty. Dr. Quandt was also an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania, worked at the Rand Corporation in the Department of Social Science from 1968-1972, and taught at UCLA and MIT

• • Thomas Mattair - Moderator
    Executive Director, Middle East Policy Council

    Dr. Mattair has taught at Kent State University, the University of Southern California, the University of California at Riverside, and Cornell University. He also served as the director of research at the Middle East Policy Council from 1992 to 1995. From 1997 until 2003 he was a research scholar at the Emirates Center for Strategic Studies and Research, where he researched and wrote The Three Occupied UAE Islands: The Tunbs and Abu Musa. The book is a study that examines, among other topics, Iranian military capabilities and intentions in the Gulf. His most recent book, Global Security Watch — Iran: A Reference Handbook(Praeger Security International, 2008) is a comprehensive study of Iran's foreign relations. Choice Reviews Online calls it "a must read for policy makers, Middle East scholars and students, and those wishing to have a better understanding of the U.S.'s relationship with Iran."