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Gérard Chaliand (born 1934) is a French expert in geopolitics who has published widely on irregular warfare and
military strategy Military strategy is a set of ideas implemented by military organizations to pursue desired Strategic goal (military), strategic goals. Derived from the Greek language, Greek word ''strategos'', the term strategy, when first used during the 18th ...
. Chaliand's analyses of insurgencies in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East, mostly based on his field experience with insurgent forces, have appeared in more than 20 books and in numerous newspaper articles. Chaliand has spent more than five years as a visiting professor in the United States at
Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher lear ...
,
UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school then known as the southern branch of the C ...
and
UC Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after the Anglo-Irish philosopher George Berkele ...
. He has worked autonomously throughout his career, unconstrained by the perspectives of national governments and policy institutes. As a result, his work provides an independent perspective on many of the major conflicts characterized the 20th and 21st centuries. He is also a published poet.


Early life and education

Born in
Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...
to
Armenian Armenian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Armenia, a country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia * Armenians, the national people of Armenia, or people of Armenian descent ** Armenian diaspora, Armenian communities around the ...
parents and raised in
Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
, Chaliand attended the '' Lycée Henri IV'' in the Latin Quarter and spent nearly a year in
London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
and the
United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
. He travelled North Africa before entering the School of Oriental Languages and Civilisations (INALCO) in Paris, where his studies focused on the history and culture of non-western societies. During his youth he hitchhiked across North Africa, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan and India. He published his first book of poetry (''La Marche Têtue,'' Gallimard) in 1959. In 1960 he joined the clandestine struggle for Algerian Independence. After the Algerian independence, he worked during 1963-64 as an editor at the ''Revolution Africaine,'' a weekly in
Algiers Algiers is the capital city of Algeria as well as the capital of the Algiers Province; it extends over many Communes of Algeria, communes without having its own separate governing body. With 2,988,145 residents in 2008Census 14 April 2008: Offi ...
where he met many of the leaders of the national liberation movements of Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East. He received his PhD from Sorbonne University in Paris in 1975. His dissertation ''Mythes révolutionnaires du tiers monde,'' was published in 1976 and quickly translated into English: Revolution in the Third World, Myths and Propects, Viking Press,
Penguin Books Penguin Books Limited is a Germany, German-owned English publishing, publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers the Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the ...
, New York, 1977. Chaliand has been a participant-observer in various guerrilla conflicts: * Guinea Bissau, 1966 * North Vietnam, 1967 * Colombia, 1968/91 * Palestine/Israel, 1969/70/75/ 98/99 * Eritrea, 1977/91 * Afghanistan, 1980/82/2006-2012 * Iranian Kurdistan, 1980 * Salvador, 1982 * Angola, 1985 * Peru, 1985 * Philippines, 1987 * Nagorno-Karabakh, 1993 * Georgia (Ossetia), 1994/2006/08 * Burma, 1990/95 * Kashmir, 1999 * Sri Lanka, 1987/99/2007 * Iraqi Kurdistan, 1999-2008/2012-2015 * Iraq, 2003-2008 * Syria, 2014
He has conducted field studies for over four decades in: * Asia/Pacific * Caucasus and Central Asia * Central and South America * Middle East * Northern Africa * Russia * South and South East Asia * West, East and Southern Africa


Teaching

He taught in Paris, France, at the ''
École nationale d'administration The (; ENA; ) was a French ''grande école'', created in 1945 by the then Provisional Government of the French Republic, provisional chief of government Charles de Gaulle and principal co-author of the Constitution of France, 1958 Constitution M ...
'' (1980-1987) and at ''Ecole de Guerre'' (the French War College) from 1990 to 1995. Chaliand has spent more than five years as a visiting professor in the United States at
Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher lear ...
,
UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school then known as the southern branch of the C ...
and
UC Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after the Anglo-Irish philosopher George Berkele ...
. He delivered over five hundred lectures in major Universities and research centers, including the Rand Corporation and the US Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California. (1969-2009). He was also a visiting professor at the military academy, Bogota (Colombia), and Universities of
Cape Town Cape Town is the legislature, legislative capital city, capital of South Africa. It is the country's oldest city and the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. Cape Town is the country's List of municipalities in South Africa, second-largest ...
(South Africa),
Montréal Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...
( Québec),
Salamanca Salamanca () is a Municipality of Spain, municipality and city in Spain, capital of the Province of Salamanca, province of the same name, located in the autonomous community of Castile and León. It is located in the Campo Charro comarca, in the ...
(Spain),
Sussex Sussex (Help:IPA/English, /ˈsʌsɪks/; from the Old English ''Sūþseaxe''; lit. 'South Saxons'; 'Sussex') is an area within South East England that was historically a kingdom of Sussex, kingdom and, later, a Historic counties of England, ...
and
Manchester Manchester () is a city and the metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It had an estimated population of in . Greater Manchester is the third-most populous metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, with a population of 2.92&nbs ...
(United Kingdom),
Vladikavkaz Vladikavkaz, formerly known as Ordzhonikidze () or Dzaudzhikau (), is the capital city of North Ossetia–Alania, Russia. It is located in the southeast of the republic at the foothills of the Caucasus, situated on the Terek (river), Terek River. ...
( Northern Ossetia), Sulaymaniyah (Iraq), and
Ilia Chavchavadze Tavadi, Tavadi (Prince) Ilia Chavchavadze ( ka, ილია ჭავჭავაძე; 27 October 1837 – 12 September 1907) was a Georgians, Georgian journalist, publisher, writer and poet who spearheaded the revival of Georgian nationalism ...
(Georgia). He was senior visiting fellow at the Centre for Conflict and Peace Studies,
Kabul Kabul is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. Located in the eastern half of the country, it is also a municipality, forming part of the Kabul Province. The city is divided for administration into #Districts, 22 municipal districts. A ...
(Afghanistan) from 2005 to 2011. He taught a summer course at Nanyang University (Singapore) from 2004 to 2014 and Hawler University (
Erbil Erbil (, ; , ), also called Hawler (, ), is the capital and most populated city in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. The city is the capital of the Erbil Governorate. Human settlement at Erbil may be dated back to the 5th millennium BC. At the h ...
, Iraqi Kurdistan, since 2012). He has also lectured at Strategic Institutes in Washington D.C., London, Canberra, Beijing, Madrid, and Tokyo.


Miscellaneous

He was Director of the European Centre for the Studies of Conflicts ( Foundation for Strategic Research), Paris from 1997 to 2000. He was an independent adviser to the Centre for Analysis and Planning of the French Foreign Ministry from 1983 to 1994. He founded and was the Director of Minority Rights Group (France), from 1978 to 1987. He was the initiator of the cession of the Permanent People’s Tribunal that was dedicated to the genocide of the Armenian people whose jury comprised three Nobel Prize winners, including Mr. Sean Mc Bride, Founder of Amnesty International, and which took place at Sorbonne and saw the sentence towards the Turkish state delivered to the National Assembly. In addition, Chaliand has undertaken several maritime expeditions aboar
''La Boudeuse''
a three mast.


Selected bibliography

Chaliand is the author, the co-author or the editor of more than 50 books, over 20 of which have been translated into English.


Books in English

* ''A World History of War,'' UC Press Berkeley, 2014. * ''History of Terrorism: From Antiquity to al Qaïda'' (with Arnaud Blin), Berkeley, 2007. * ''Mirrors of a Disaster. The Spanish conquest of America,'' Transaction, Rutgers University Press. N.J. 2005 * ''Nomadic Empires, From Mongolia to the Danube,'' Transaction, Rutgers University Press, N.J. 2003. * ''The Penguin Atlas of Diasporas,'' New York, 1995. * ''The Art of War in World History,'' Berkeley, 1994. * ''The Kurdish Tragedy, Zed Press,'' London, 1994, Report to the sub-commission on Human Rights (UN) on the situation of the Kurds in the Middle East. * ''Strategic Atlas: A Comparative Geopolitics of the World's Powers,'' with J.P. Rageau, Harper & Row, New York 1987, 1990, updated edition 1992. * ''Minorities at the Age of Nation-States'' (ed) Pluto Press, London, 1988. * ''Terrorism,'' Saqi Books, London: 1987. * ''The Genocide of the Armenians,'' Zoryan Institute, Boston, Mass, 1986 * ''Guerrilla Strategy. A Historical Anthology From the ''Long March'' to Afghanistan,'' ed. Berkeley, 1982. * ''The Struggle for Africa. Great Power Strategies,'' Macmillan, London 1982. * ''Report from Afghanistan,'' Penguin Books, Baltimore, 1982. * ''A People without a country, The Kurds and Kurdistan,'' (Ed), Zed Books 1980, Olive Branch Press, 1993 * ''Revolution in the Third World: Myths and Prospects,'' Viking, New York 1977; updated edition, Penguin Books, 1989. * ''The Palestinian Resistance,'' Penguin Books, Baltimore 1972. * ''Peasants of North Vietnam,'' Penguin Books, Baltimore 1970. * ''Armed Struggle in Africa: With the guerrillas in Portuguese Guinea,'' Monthly Review Press, New York 1969.
Chaliand has also written a cookbook, ''Food without Frontiers,'' Pluto Press, London 1981 and two books of poems ''The Stubborn March,'' Crane Books, Watercrown, MA. 1990, and ''Lone Rider,'' bilingual edition, translated by André Demir, Paris, 2015. Many of his books have been translated in more than twelve languages.


Books in French


Political Analysis

* ''L'Algérie est-elle socialiste?,'' Maspéro, 1964 * ''Où va l’Afrique du Sud ?,'' Calmann-Lévy, 1986 * ''Etat de crise, vers les nouveaux équilibres mondiaux'' (avec J. Minces), Seuil, 1993 * ''Voyage dans le demi-siècle'' (avec Jean Lacouture), Complexe, 2001 * ''America is back, les nouveaux Césars du Pentagone,'' (avec Arnaud Blin), Bayard, 2003 * ''L'Amérique en guerre, Irak-Afghanistan,'' Editions du Rocher, 2007 * ''L'Impasse afghane,'' Éditions de l’Aube, 2011 * ''Vers un nouvel ordre du monde'' (avec Michel Jan), Le Seuil, 2013 * ''De l’Esprit d’aventure'' (avec P. Franceschi et J.C. Guilbert, J’ai lu, Arthaud,J’ai lu, 2011 * ''Le Regard du singe'' (avec Patrice Franceschi) Seuil 2014


Military strategy

* ''Atlas du nucléaire civil et militaire'' (avec Michel Jan), Payot, 1993 * ''Dictionnaire de stratégie militaire'' (avec Arnaud Blin), Perrin, 1998 * ''Les Guerres irrégulières,'' Folio Gallimard, 2008 * ''Le Nouvel Art de la guerre,'' l'Archipel, 2007, Pocket 2009


Geopolitical and Historical Atlases

* ''Atlas de la découverte du monde'' (avec J-P. Rageau), Fayard, 1984 * ''Atlas politique du XXème siècle'' (avec J-P. Rageau), Seuil, 1987 * ''Atlas des Européens'' (avec J-P. Rageau), Fayard, 1989 * ''Atlas des empires. De Baylone à la Russie Soviétique'' (avec JP Rageau), Payot, 1993 * ''Atlas historique des migrations'' (avec M. Jan et J-P. Rageau), Seuil, 1994 * ''Atlas historique du monde méditerranéen'' (avec J-P. Rageau) Payot, 1995 * ''Atlas de l’Asie orientale'' (avec M. Jan et J-P. Rageau), Seuil, 1997 * ''Atlas du millénaire, la mort des empires,'' 1900-2015 (avec J-P. Rageau), Hachette, 1998 * ''Atlas du nouvel ordre mondial, Laffont,'' 2003 * ''Géopolitique des empires, des pharaons à l'Imperium américain,'' (avec J-P. Rageau) Arthaud, 2010, Flammarion 2014


History

* ''Les Bâtisseurs d'histoire, Arléa,'' 1995, Edition augmentée, Agora 2005, Magellan, 2012 * ''2000 ans de chrétientés,'' (avec S. Mousset), Odile Jacob, 2000, 2003 * ''L'Héritage occidental,'' (avec S. Mousset), Odile Jacob, 2002,2015


Memoirs

* ''Mémoire de ma mémoire,'' Julliard, 2003 * ''Guérillas, du Vietnam à l’Irak,'' Hachette Pluriel, 2008 * ''La Pointe du couteau. Mémoires,'' Robert Laffont, 2011


Travel

* ''Los Angeles, Naissance d’un Mythe, '' Stock, 1991. * ''Aux confins de l’Eldorado,'' Le Seuil, 2006 * ''Le Guide du voyageur autour du monde'' (avec S. Mousset) Odile Jacob, 2007
Gerard Chaliand has also published three plays, four books for children and translations of Kautiliya’s ''Arthashastra'' (book seven), Guevara's ''La guerra de Guerillas,'' and a book of popular Turkish poetry (bilingual).


References


External links


New York Review of Books


April 2006 interview concerning the Iraqi insurgency
Gérard Chaliand : Terrorismes et contre-terrorismes ; de la Palestine à l'Irak
June 25, 2003 conference of ''L'Université de tous les savoirs'', published in ''
Le Monde (; ) is a mass media in France, French daily afternoon list of newspapers in France, newspaper. It is the main publication of Le Monde Group and reported an average print circulation, circulation of 480,000 copies per issue in 2022, including ...
'' (audio files available)
Groupes mafieux et globalisation du crime
(video), conference of the Université de tous les savoirs

June 9, 2006 interview in ''
Le Figaro () is a French daily morning newspaper founded in 1826. It was named after Figaro, a character in several plays by polymath Pierre Beaumarchais, Beaumarchais (1732–1799): ''Le Barbier de Séville'', ''The Guilty Mother, La Mère coupable'', ...
''
Le destin shakespearien de Saddam Hussein, dictateur sanguinaire et ambigu, par Gérard Chaliand
op-ed in ''
Le Figaro () is a French daily morning newspaper founded in 1826. It was named after Figaro, a character in several plays by polymath Pierre Beaumarchais, Beaumarchais (1732–1799): ''Le Barbier de Séville'', ''The Guilty Mother, La Mère coupable'', ...
'', January 1, 2007
Report before the French Senate
March 22, 2002

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chaliand, Gerard 1934 births French poets University of Paris alumni Guerrilla warfare theorists French military writers Living people French male poets French people of Armenian descent French male non-fiction writers Belgian emigrants to France French expatriates in the United Kingdom