Paul Wolfowitz

Ambassador

• Born: December 22, 1943
• Place of Birth: Brooklyn, New York

DIPLOMAT, POLITICIAN, AND SCHOLAR

Wolfowitz is a central figure in the neoconservative movement. His position on the use of military power in a preemptive manner makes him one of the architects of the Bush Doctrine, which led to American interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan during the presidency of George W. Bush.

AREAS OF ACHIEVEMENT: Government and politics; economics; scholarship

Early Life

Paul Wolfowitz was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1943; however, he spent much of his youth in Manhattan. Wolfowitz’s father was born in Warsaw but fled Poland in 1920 when anti-Semitism forced him to leave. His mother also emigrated from Poland. The rest of the Wolfowitz family on his father’s side remained in Poland and perished in the Holocaust.

Wolfowitz’s family moved to Ithaca, New York, in 1951, when his father secured an appointment at Cornell University after teaching statistical theory at Columbia University. His father’s academic career would have a great influence on Wolfowitz’s life; for example, his father’s year as a visiting professor in Haifa, when Wolfowitz was fourteen, gave him the experience of living in Israel and sparked a lifelong commitment to the defense of the state of Israel.

Largely due to his father’s influence, Wolfowitz earned a bachelor’s degree in mathematics and chemistry from Cornell University in 1965. At Cornell, Wolfowitz joined the Telluride Association, a group of academically gifted students which included his future wife, Clare Selgin, whom he married in 1968.

Wolfowitz pursued political interests at the University of Chicago, earning a master’s degree and later a PhD in political science and economics in 1972. At Chicago, Wolfowitz became influenced by professors Leo Strauss and Albert Wohlstetter, who championed conservative political views and stressed the importance of defending democratic nations. Under Wohlstetter’s guidance, Wolfowitz wrote his dissertation in part on the danger of the spread of nuclear weapons in the Middle East, including Israel.

For a brief time, Wolfowitz pursued a purely academic career, lecturing in political science at Yale University from 1970 to 1973. However, he went to Washington after this short teaching career to work with Senator Henry “Scoop” Jackson, a senator from Washington State, on disarmament issues, interning at the newly created Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. His work with Jackson drew the attention of Harold Brown, who was preparing to serve as President Jimmy Carter’s secretary of defense.

Life’s Work

Wolfowitz began to have a more influential role in foreign policy development when he became a deputy secretary of defense in 1977 under the leadership of Brown. His work on the dangers of a Soviet seizure of Persian Gulf oil fields and the possibility of war between Iraq and its neighbors presaged many of the issues he would face during the Bush administration. When Carter was defeated in 1980, Wolfowitz briefly returned to teaching at Johns Hopkins University in the Nitze School of Advanced International Studies.

His unhappiness with Carter’s foreign policy led Wolfowitz to drift to association with the Republican Party. In 1981, he joined the newly formed Reagan administration as the head of the State Department’s Policy Planning staff. His central belief in the defense of democratic states around the world, shaped largely by his experiences at the University of Chicago, led Wolfowitz to clashes with colleagues over early American associations with Saddam Hussein in Iraq and the Palestine Liberation Organization. In this, Wolfowitz continued his strong support of the state of Israel. During the Reagan years, Wolfowitz served in two major positions in the State Department: assistant secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs from 1983 to 1986 and then ambassador to Indonesia until 1989.

When President George H. W. Bush appointed Wolfowitz undersecretary of defense in 1989, his close association with then Defense Secretary Dick Cheney and a former student, Lewis “Scooter” Libby, shaped his involvement in the decision to defend Kuwait against invasion by Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. Following the war, Wolfowitz began to champion a position that would eventually be called the “Wolfowitz doctrine,” a belief in unilateral action by the United States in a series of preemptive actions aimed at creating a more proactive defense strategy to replace the traditional policy of containment. When Bill Clinton was elected president, Wolfowitz returned to teaching at Johns Hopkins.

The election of George W. Bush as president returned Wolfowitz to national politics in 2001 when he accepted the position of deputy defense secretary under Donald Rumsfeld, a position he would hold until 2005. The attack on September 11, 2001, led Wolfowitz to advocate strongly for military action against the Taliban government in Afghanistan and a unilateral, preemptive strike against Iraq to prevent what he believed would be future aggression by Saddam Hussein.

President Bush appointed Wolfowitz to the presidency of the World Bank in 2005. His presidency focused on two major issues facing the organization: eliminating corruption and making efforts to develop the sub-Saharan region of Africa. However, shortly after accepting the position, Wolfowitz was accused of being romantically involved with a World Bank senior communications officer, Shaha Riza, following a separation from his wife. Many believed the relationship was in violation of ethics codes concerning potential conflicts of interest in relationships between managers and staff members. Wolfowitz volunteered to remove himself from decisions relating to Riza’s job, but the World Bank ethics committee rejected his proposal and ultimately concluded, after a lengthy investigation, that Wolfowitz had engaged in questionable behavior. When the board of executive directors of the World Bank threatened to fire him in 2007, Wolfowitz resigned his position. After leaving the World Bank, Wolfowitz joined the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, as a visiting scholar, and he became the chair of the US-Taiwan Business Council. In 2015 he acted as an advisor to Jeb Bush's ultimately unsuccessful campaign for the Republican presidential nomination. In 2017 Wolfowitz wrote and opinion piece for the New York Times in which he criticized President Trump's views on immigration.

Significance

Wolfowitz has been a leading academic voice in foreign policy debates, often contributing editorials and presenting speeches on issues of development and the use of military force. The neoconservative foreign policy of preemptive and unilateral action remains the dominant foreign policy view in many conservative circles, and Wolfowitz is often considered to have the experience to serve ably on any president’s cabinet. In 2023, the President of the Republic of China, Tsai Ing-wen, awarded Wolfowitz with the Order of Brilliant Star in recognition of his significant contributions to the country.

Bibliography

Cassidy, John. “The Next Crusade.” New Yorker 83.7 (2007): 36-47. Print.

Mann, James. Rise of the Vulcans: A History of Bush’s War Cabinet. New York: Viking Penguin, 2004. Print.

Milne, David. “Intellectualism in U.S. Diplomacy: Paul Wolfowitz and His Predecessors.” International Journal 62.3 (2007): 667-80. Print.

"Paul Wolfowitz." American Enterprise Institute. AEI, 2016. Web. 25 Apr. 2016.

Pillar, Paul R. Intelligence and U.S. Foreign Policy: Iraq, 9/11, and Misguided Reform. New York: Columbia UP, 2011. Print.

Rafferty, Andrew. "Iraq War Questions Dog Jeb Bush at Iowa State Fair." MSNBC. NBC Universal, 14 Aug. 2015. Web. 25 Apr. 2016.

Robinson, Peter. "Paul Wolfowitz on the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars and a Life of Foreign Policy." National Review, 17 May 2024, www.nationalreview.com/corner/paul-wolfowitz-on-the-afghanistan-and-iraq-wars-and-a-life-in-foreign-policy/. Accessed 2 Sept. 2024.

Woodward, Bob. Bush at War. Reprint. New York: Simon, 2003. Print.

Woodward, Bob. Plan of Attack. Reprint. New York: Simon, 2004. Print.