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Biography
American

Frederick W. Kagan

1970

American military historian and policy analyst who was the principal architect of the 'surge' strategy in Iraq (2007) and a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. His books on military history and strategy — including Finding the Target (2006) and The End of the Old Order (2006) — combine historical analysis with contemporary policy advocacy. He is the son of the classicist Donald Kagan and brother of the neoconservative writer Robert Kagan.

Past sales0
PeriodContemporary
NationalityAmerican
1. Biography

A short life of the author

Frederick W. Kagan (born 1970) is an American military historian and defence policy analyst at the American Enterprise Institute. He is part of the prominent Kagan family of scholars and policymakers: his father Donald Kagan was a classicist and historian of the Peloponnesian War at Yale; his brother Robert Kagan is a foreign policy commentator; and his wife Kimberly Kagan founded the Institute for the Study of War.

Frederick Kagan is best known as the intellectual architect of the 2007 U.S. troop surge in Iraq, having co-authored (with retired General Jack Keane) the AEI report “Choosing Victory” that persuaded the Bush administration to increase troop levels.

Major Works

Finding the Target: The Transformation of American Military Policy (2006, Encounter Books) argued against the Rumsfeld-era emphasis on technology-driven transformation and in favour of traditional counterinsurgency principles.

The End of the Old Order: Napoleon and Europe, 1801–1805 (2006, Da Capo Press) is a detailed military history of the Napoleonic period.

Collecting Kagan

Kagan’s books are published by policy-oriented and academic presses. First editions bring $20–$40. They are collected by military historians and specialists in post-9/11 American foreign policy.