Skip navigation

Eliot A Cohen

Chair in Strategy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and Professor at Johns Hopkins University

Eliot A. Cohen is the Arleigh Burke chair in strategy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and the Robert E. Osgood professor at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies SAIS, where he has taught since 1990 and served as Dean. With his PhD degree from Harvard, Mr Cohen taught at his alma mater and the US Naval War College. His books include The Big Stick: The Limits of Soft Power and the Necessity of Military Force and Supreme Command: Soldiers, Statesmen, and Leadership in Wartime. Mr Cohen served in the US Army Reserve, was a director in the Defense Department’s policy planning staff, led the US Air Force’s multivolume study of the first Gulf War, and held various official advisory positions. From 2007 to 2009, he was Counselor of the Department of State, serving as Secretary Condoleezza Rice’s senior adviser on foreign policy and strategic issues. He is a contributing writer at The Atlantic.
Updated: April 12, 2023