For Immediate Release: September 13, 2006
Contact: Marsha Mullan
(610) 328-8535
http://www.swarthmore.edu/news/

Panel of National Foreign Affairs and Counterterrorism Advisers at Swarthmore to Discuss 'National Security
and the Way Forward'

A group of distinguished foreign affairs and counterterrorism advisers will speak at Swarthmore College about U.S. foreign and defense policy on a panel titled "National Security and the Way Forward" on Monday, Sept. 18, at 3 p.m. The panelists are former National Security Council members Rand Beers and Richard Clarke, former Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs Anthony Lake, and former Director for Defense Policy and Congressional candidate (D. Pa.) Joe Sestak. Assistant professor of Political Science Dominic Tierney will moderate the discussion. The panel, in the Lang Performing Arts Center Cinema, is free and open to the public.

Rand Beers is a former American counterterrorism adviser who served on the National Security Council (N.S.C.) under Presidents Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush. He also served as Assistant Secretary of State for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs under both Clinton and George W. Bush. Beers resigned in protest from the N.S.C. in March 2003, five days before commencement of the U.S. invasion of Iraq.  He teaches a seminar in collaboration with Richard Clarke on national security issues at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, and serves as president of the National Security Network. He is a graduate of Dartmouth College and the University of Michigan.

Richard Clarke provided national security advice to four U.S. presidents: Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush, consulting on issues of intelligence and terrorism from 1973 to 2003. Until his retirement in 2003, Clarke was a member of the Senior Executive Service. Clarke's specialties are computer security, counterterrorism, and homeland security. He was the counterterrorism adviser on the U.S. National Security Council when the September 11, 2001, attacks occurred. He resigned in January 2003 to work on his book, Against All Enemies: Inside America's War on Terror—What Really Happened (Free Press, 2004). He was a member of the National Security Council from 1992 to 2003 and the Department of State from 1985 to 1992 as Assistant Secretary of State for Politico-Military Affairs and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence.

Anthony Lake is Distinguished Professor in the Practice of Diplomacy in the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. Lake most recently served as Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs during the Clinton administration. He joined the U.S. Foreign Service in 1962 and his State Department career included assignments as U.S. Vice Consul in Saigon and Hue, Special Assistant to the National Security Advisor, and Director of Policy Planning. He is the author of several books, including Somoza Falling and The "Tar Baby" Option: American Policy Toward Southern Rhodesia, and co-author of Our Own Worst Enemy: The Unmasking of American Foreign Policy. In addition, he edited After the Wars and was a contributing editor to Legacy of Vietnam: The War, American Society and the Future of U.S. Foreign Policy. Lake received his Ph.D. from Princeton University.

Joseph "Joe" Sestak Jr. of Springfield, a retired U. S. Navy vice admiral, is running for the U.S. House of Representatives as a Democrat in Pennsylvania's 7th congressional district. Most recently in his Naval career, (November 1994 to March 1997) Sestak was the Director for Defense Policy on the National Security Council staff at the White House, where he was responsible for national security and defense strategy, policies, programs, inter-agency and congressional coordination, and regional political-military advice. Sestak then directed the Chief of Naval Operation's Strategy and Policy Division. After the September 11, 2001 attacks, he became the first director of the Navy Operations Group, which sought to redefine strategic, operational, and budgetary policies in the Global War on Terrorism. Sestak's decorations include the Defense Distinguished Service Medal, Defense Superior Service Medal, two Legion of Merit awards, two Meritorious Service Medals, Joint Service Commendation Medal, three Navy Commendation Medals, and the Navy Achievement Medal. Sestak graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy with a B.S. in American Political Systems. Between tours at sea, Sestak earned a master's degree in Public Administration and a Ph.D. in Political Economy and Government from Harvard University.

Dominic Tierney completed his PhD in international politics at Oxford University in 2003 and was then a post-doctoral fellow at Ohio State University and Harvard University before coming to Swarthmore in 2005.  He has two forthcoming books, Failing to Win: Perceptions of Victory and Defeat in International Politics (Harvard University Press, 2006) and FDR and the Last Great Cause: U.S. Foreign Policy and the Spanish Civil War (Duke University Press, 2007). Tierney teaches classes on international politics and U.S. foreign policy, as well as a seminar on international security issues.

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