UC Davis experts: U.S. agencies and global conflicts

The following University of California, Davis, faculty are available to comment on aspects of national politics and policy. If you need assistance on other topics, please call Claudia Morain, News Service, (530) 752-9841, cmmorain@ucdavis.edu or Julia Ann Easley, News Service, (530) 752-8248, jaeasley@ucdavis.edu.

National security and military affairs

Emily O. Goldman, a UC Davis political science associate professor, can provide comment on the threats to and vulnerabilities of U.S. security today. She is a consultant and researcher for the U.S. Department of Defense, analyzing the ways in which innovations in information technology will change how nations wage war. Goldman says our military and intelligence systems are set up to deal with threats like the Soviet Union. There is a real competition between the hierarchical way the military is organized and the non-hierarchical way terrorist networks work internally and with each other. Contact: Emily O. Goldman, Political Science and UC Davis Washington Program, (202) 974-6352, eogoldman@ucdavis.edu.

Intelligence history and spying

In fall 2002, assistant history professor Kathryn Olmsted published "Red Spy Queen: A Biography of Elizabeth Bentley," in which she details the history of America's most important Soviet spy as well as her role in triggering the Red Scare in the late 1940s. Olmsted can also talk about how English spy Kim Philby neutralized Bentley's importance to the FBI as a counterspy because of his close ties to the U.S. intelligence. Olmsted is a scholar of 20th century American intelligence history. She can talk about intelligence issues behind the Pearl Harbor attack, why the Watergate break-in and its aftermath was a constitutional crisis, and the history of the CIA and FBI. Contact: Kathryn Olmsted, History, (530) 752-2118, ksolmsted@ucdavis.edu.

National security and military response

Scott Sigmund Gartner, an associate professor of political science at UC Davis, is an expert in military decision making, military strategy, measuring progress in war, and the political impact of war and casualties. He wrote Strategic Assessment of War, which studies how military progress is evaluated in wartime, and has published many articles on war, strategy, the impact of casualties on public opinion and politics, and U.S. foreign policy. He is also a co-editor of "Historical Statistics of the United States." Gartner teaches classes on U.S. national security and foreign policy, war and the Vietnam War. Contact: Scott Gartner, Political Science, (530) 752-3065 , ssgartner@ucdavis.edu.

Peace movements

The growing peace movement promises to be more sophisticated than any of the past because it has learned from mistakes committed during the Vietnam and Gulf wars, says a 20th century American studies professor at UC Davis. Michael Smith, professor of American studies, says peace movements have changed from simply avoiding organized violence to seeking a more nuanced discussion in the public arena about alternatives to war. "The discussion of how to balance security and civil liberties always comes up in war times, and it's especially acute with cross-cultural misperceptions," Smith says. Contact: Michael Smith, American Studies, (530) 752-7196 or (530) 752-3377, mlsmith@ucdavis.edu.

Media contacts

Julia Ann Easley, News Service, (530) 752-8248, jaeasley@ucdavis.edu
Claudia Morain, News Service, (530) 752-9841, cmmorain@ucdavis.edu

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Last updated January 22, 2004