US Army brigadier general H.R. McMaster led a roundtable discussion with Hoover Institution fellows and overseers at the Hoover Institution on Friday, March 23, 2012. McMaster, who is also a research fellow at the Institution, spoke on “Confronting the Interconnected Problems of Insurgency, Narcotics, and Organized Crime in Afghanistan and Future Armed Conflict: The Need for Integrated Military, Law Enforcement, and Influence Efforts.”
McMaster’s last assignment, as director of the Combined Joint Interagency Task Force (CJIATF)-Shafafiyat (Transparency) at the International Security Assistance Forces headquarters in Kabul, Afghanistan, makes him uniquely qualified to address security challenges inside Afghanistan and similar conflict zones. His remarks were followed by a back-and-forth discussion moderated by John Raisian, the Tad and Dianne Taube Director of the Hoover Institution. Much of the discussion focused on how best to assist the Afghans in creating a safe and secure civil society in the aftermath of the current conflict and the withdrawal of coalition forces. Participating Hoover fellows included George Shultz, retired Admiral Gary Roughead, Nobel laureate Gary Becker, Phillip Bobbitt, Stephen Krasner, Abe Sofaer, Amy Zegart, and the current class of national security affairs fellows, among others.
McMaster has served in numerous command and staff positions in armored and cavalry units in the United States and Germany, including deployments to both Iraq and Afghanistan. His military decorations include the Silver Star Medal, the Legion of Merit, the Bronze Star Medal with Oak Leaf Cluster, and the Purple Heart Medal .McMaster was a national security affairs fellow at Hoover (2002–3) and has been a research fellow since 2003. He received his BA from the United States Military Academy in 1984 and an MA and PhD in American history from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, turning his thesis into the award-winning book Dereliction of Duty: Lyndon Johnson, Robert McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam.
