About Robert Kaplan
Robert D. Kaplan, a correspondent for The Atlantic Monthly, is the best-selling author of ten books on international affairs and travel, translated into 20 languages. His latest and most important work, Imperial Grunts: The American Military on the Ground, the first of a series of books about the U.S. Military, was published by Random House in September 2005. A previous book, Warrior Politics: Why Leadership Demands a Pagan Ethos, about how ancient philosophy can improve critical thinking in business and foreign affairs in an age of terrorism and other non-conventional threats, was named a The New York Times “notable book” for the year. In the 1980s, Kaplan was the first American writer to warn in print about a future war in the Balkans. Former President Clinton and President George W. Bush are both readers of Kaplan’s books, and Kaplan has briefed President Bush in the White House.
Balkan Ghosts was chosen by The New York Times Book Review as one of the “best books” of 1993, and by Amazon.com as one of the best travel books of all time. The Arabists, The Ends of the Earth, An Empire Wilderness, Eastward to Tartary were also all chosen by The New York Times as “notable” books of the year. In addition, An Empire Wilderness was chosen by The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times as one of the best books of 1998.
Kaplan is also a provocative essayist. His article, “The Coming Anarchy,” in the February, 1994Atlantic Monthly, about how population rises, urbanization, and resource depletion is undermining governments, was hotly debated in foreign-language translations around the world. So was his December, 1997 Atlantic cover story, “Was Democracy Just A Moment?” According to U. S. News & World Report, “President Clinton was so impressed with Kaplan, he ordered an interagency study of these issues, and it agreed with Kaplan’s conclusions.”
New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman calls Kaplan among the four “most widely read” authors defining the post-Cold War (along with Francis Fukuyama, Harvard Prof. Samuel Huntington, and Yale Prof. Paul Kennedy).
Besides The Atlantic Monthly, Kaplan’s essays have appeared on the editorial pages of The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post. He has been a consultant to the U. S. Army’s Special Forces Regiment, the U. S. Air Force, and the U. S. Marines. He has lectured at military war colleges, the FBI, the National Security Agency, the Pentagon’s Joint Staff, major universities, the CIA, and business forums. Kaplan has delivered the Secretary of State’s Open Forum Lecture at the U. S. State Department. He has reported from nearly 80 countries. Two earlier books of his, Soldiers of God: With Islamic Warriors in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and Surrender or Starve: Travels in Ethiopia, Sudan, Somalia and Eritrea, have recently been re-issued.
Kaplan is the recipient of the 2001 Greenway-Winship Award for Excellence in international reporting. In 2002, he was awarded the State Department’s “Distinguished Public Service Award for outstanding contributions to international affairs.”