Colin Hackett Kahl
is an American political adviser and academic serving as the
under secretary of defense for policy
The United States under secretary of defense for policy (USDP) is a high level civilian official in the United States Department of Defense. The under secretary of defense for policy is the principal staff assistant and adviser to both the Unite ...
in the
Biden administration
Joe Biden's tenure as the 46th president of the United States began with his inauguration on January 20, 2021. Biden, a Democrat from Delaware who previously served as vice president under Barack Obama, took office following his victory ...
. Previously, Kahl served as the
national security advisor to the vice president
Assistant to the President and National Security Advisor to the Vice President role is to advise the Vice President on all matters of national security and provide input to the National Security Council and serves as the primary foreign policy ...
under then-Vice President
Joe Biden. After the Obama administration, Kahl served as a Steven C. Házy Senior Fellow at
Stanford University
Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...
.
[
In the Obama administration, Kahl was involved in the negotiations of the ]Iran nuclear deal
The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA; fa, برنامه جامع اقدام مشترک , barnāmeye jāme'e eqdāme moshtarak (, ''BARJAM'')), commonly known as the Iran nuclear deal or Iran deal, is an agreement on the nuclear program ...
. After leaving the administration, he was subject to disinformation campaigns, as well as private intelligence investigations by former Trump administration staff that targeted him, his wife and children.
Early life and education
Kahl was born in Michigan
Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and the ...
and raised in Richmond, California
Richmond is a city in western Contra Costa County, California, United States. The city was municipal corporation, incorporated on August 7, 1905, and has a Richmond, California City Council, city council. . He graduated from John F. Kennedy High School in 1989. Kahl earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science from the University of Michigan
, mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth"
, former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821)
, budget = $10.3 billion (2021)
, endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...
in 1993 and a PhD in political science from Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
in 2000. Under his advisors Robert Jervis
Robert Jervis (April 30, 1940 – December 9, 2021) was an American political scientist who was the Adlai E. Stevenson Professor of International Politics in the Department of Political Science at Columbia University. Jervis was co-editor of the ...
and Jack Snyder, Kahl's doctoral thesis was entitled ''States, scarcity, and civil strife in the developing world enya
Enya Patricia Brennan (; ga, Eithne Pádraigín Ní Bhraonáin; born 17 May 1961), known professionally by the mononym Enya, is an Irish singer, songwriter, and musician known for modern Celtic music. She is the best-selling Irish solo arti ...
'.
Career
From 1997 to 1998, he was a national security fellow at Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
. From 2005 to 2006, he was a Council on Foreign Relations
The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) is an American think tank
A think tank, or policy institute, is a research institute that performs research and advocacy concerning topics such as social policy, political strategy, economics, mi ...
International Affairs Fellow, working on stability operations policy at the Department of Defense. He has been a professor at the University of Minnesota
The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Tw ...
. Kahl has published in leading security studies
__NOTOC__
Security studies, also known as international security studies, is an academic sub-field within the wider discipline of international relations that studies organized violence, military conflict, national security, and international s ...
journals, such as ''International Security
International security, also called global security is a term which refers to the measures taken by states and international organizations, such as the United Nations, European Union, and others, to ensure mutual survival and safety. These meas ...
'' and ''Security Studies
__NOTOC__
Security studies, also known as international security studies, is an academic sub-field within the wider discipline of international relations that studies organized violence, military conflict, national security, and international s ...
'', as well as ''Foreign Affairs
''Foreign Affairs'' is an American magazine of international relations and U.S. foreign policy published by the Council on Foreign Relations, a nonprofit, nonpartisan, membership organization and think tank specializing in U.S. foreign policy and ...
.''
Obama administration
From 2009 to 2011, he was the deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East in the Barack Obama administration. In 2011, he was awarded the Secretary of Defense Medal for Outstanding Public Service by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates
Robert Michael Gates (born September 25, 1943) is an American intelligence analyst and university president who served as the 22nd United States secretary of defense from 2006 to 2011. He was originally appointed by president George W. Bush an ...
. In 2014, he became national security adviser to then-Vice President Joe Biden. In the Obama administration, Kahl was directly involved in negotiating the Iran Nuclear Deal
The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA; fa, برنامه جامع اقدام مشترک , barnāmeye jāme'e eqdāme moshtarak (, ''BARJAM'')), commonly known as the Iran nuclear deal or Iran deal, is an agreement on the nuclear program ...
, as well as publicly advocating for it.
In May 2018, it was revealed that aides to U.S. President Donald Trump
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.
Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...
had contracted with Israeli private intelligence firm Black Cube
Black Cube (BC Strategy Ltd) is a private intelligence agency based in London, Tel Aviv and Madrid, which drew widespread condemnation for its work surveilling and assisting with efforts to slander the reputations of women accusing Harvey Weinste ...
to find evidence to support unsubstantiated and false claims that Kahl was being enriched by Iran lobbyists and that either he or Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes were cheating on their wives.
Biden administration
In November 2020, Kahl was named a member of the Joe Biden presidential transition
The presidential transition of Joe Biden began on November 7, 2020 and ended on January 20, 2021. Unlike previous presidential transitions, which normally take place during the roughly 10-week period between the election in the first week o ...
Agency Review Team to support transition efforts related to the National Security Council
A national security council (NSC) is usually an executive branch governmental body responsible for coordinating policy on national security issues and advising chief executives on matters related to national security. An NSC is often headed by a na ...
.
Kahl was nominated by Biden to serve as the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy. His nomination was subject to controversy in the Senate, with the Republican Caucus unanimously opposing his confirmation due to his support for the Iran Nuclear Deal
The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA; fa, برنامه جامع اقدام مشترک , barnāmeye jāme'e eqdāme moshtarak (, ''BARJAM'')), commonly known as the Iran nuclear deal or Iran deal, is an agreement on the nuclear program ...
, as well as for his criticisms of Trump administration policies. Republicans also argued that Kahl had tweeted out classified information, demanding an FBI investigation into it; experts on classification told ''Politico
''Politico'' (stylized in all caps), known originally as ''The Politico'', is an American, German-owned political journalism newspaper company based in Arlington County, Virginia, that covers politics and policy in the United States and intern ...
'' the Republican accusations against Kahl appeared to be politically motivated, and that the tweets didn't appear to constitute a violation.
On March 4, 2021, the Senate's Armed Forces Committee held hearings on Kahl's nomination. The committee deadlocked on the nomination on March 24, 2021, therefore delaying his confirmation. The entire Senate voted to discharge Kahl's nomination from the committee in a 51-50 roll call vote; Vice President Kamala Harris
Kamala Devi Harris ( ; born October 20, 1964) is an American politician and attorney who is the 49th vice president of the United States. She is the first female vice president and the highest-ranking female official in U.S. history, as well ...
was needed to break the tie. On April 27, 2021, Kahl was confirmed by a vote of 49–45, thanks in part to the absence of many GOP Senators. He was sworn in the following day by Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin
Lloyd James Austin III (born August 8, 1953) is a retired United States Army four-star general who, since his appointment on January 22, 2021, has served as the 28th United States secretary of defense. He is the first African American to serv ...
.
Works
*''States, Scarcity, and Civil Strife in the Developing World'', Princeton, N.J.; Woodstock: Princeton University Press, 2008. ,
* Colin H. Kahl and Thomas Wright, ''Aftershocks: pandemic politics and the end of the old international order'', New York: St. Martin's Publishing Group, 2021. ,
References
External links
*
Colin Kahl, Author at War on the Rocks
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kahl, Colin
Year of birth missing (living people)
Living people
University of Michigan alumni
Columbia University alumni
Stanford University faculty
Obama administration personnel
Biden administration personnel
United States Under Secretaries of Defense for Policy
American political scientists
International relations scholars