Thomas A. Marks

Associate Scholar, Foreign Policy Research Institute
Center on Terrorism, Counter-Terrorism, and Homeland Security

Dr. Thomas A. Marks, Associate Scholar at FPRI’s Center on Terrorism, Counterterrorism, and Homeland Security, is head of the Irregular Warfare Department at the School for National Security Executive Education (SNSEE) of National Defense University (NDU) in Washington, DC and the author of Maoist People’s War in Post-Vietnam Asia (Bangkok: White Lotus, 2007), considered the current standard on the subject of “people’s war.” A former US government officer who is a member of the editorial board of Small Wars and Insurgencies (London), he previously served as the Oppenheimer Chair of Warfighting Strategy at the Marine Corps University (Quantico), where he taught “Insurgency and Operational Art.” He is an Adjunct Professor at the US Joint Special Operations University (JSOU, Hurlburt Field, FL) and for 2006 was awarded “Educator of the Year.”

He graduated from the United States Military Academy and in his Ph.D. work at the University of Hawaii focused on the relationship between popular upheaval and revolutionary crisis (published as Making Revolution: The Insurgency of the Communist Party of Thailand in Structural Perspective, Bangkok: White Lotus, 1994). In recent years, Dr. Marks has, in a variety of publications, for a variety of clients, analyzed conflicts as far-flung as those in Nepal, Sri Lanka, Colombia, Peru, Papua New Guinea, Laos, the Philippines, and Northern Ireland. His scholarly and journalistic works number in the hundreds. Among his other significant books are; Maoist Insurgency Since Vietnam (London, 1996), The British Acquisition of Siamese Malaya, 1896–1909 (Bangkok, 1997), and Counter-Revolution in China: Wang Sheng and the Kuomintang (London, 1997). His latest monographs, all published by the U.S. Army War College (Carlisle), are: Colombian Army Adaptation to FARC Insurgency (2002), Insurgency in Nepal (2003), and Sustainability of Colombian Military/Strategic Support for “Democratic Security” (2005). His most recent operational endeavor was service, in a contract capacity, as the operations consultant for a newly raised Saudi Arabian commando unit.

Tom Marks
Associate Scholar
Center on Terrorism, Counter-Terrorism, and Homeland Security
Foreign Policy Research Institute
1528 Walnut Street, Suite 610
Philadelphia, PA 19102 USA