Fred M. Kaplan | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Kaplan in 2016 | |
| Born | (1954-07-04)July 4, 1954 (age 71) |
| Occupation | Author, journalist |
| Alma mater | Oberlin College Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| Spouse | Brooke Gladstone (m. 1983) |
| Children | 2 |
Fred M. Kaplan (born July 4, 1954) is an American author andjournalist. His weekly "War Stories" column forSlate magazine coversinternational relations andU.S. foreign policy.
Kaplan was born inHutchinson, Kansas, to Julius E. and Ruth (Gottfried) Kaplan.[1] He received abachelor's degree (1976) fromOberlin College and aMaster of Science (1978) andPh.D. (1983) inpolitical science from theMassachusetts Institute of Technology.[1] From 1978 to 1980, he was a foreign and defense policy adviser toU.S. CongressmanLes Aspin (D,Wisconsin).
Before writing forSlate, Kaplan was acorrespondent at theBoston Globe, reporting fromWashington, D.C.;Moscow; andNew York City. In 1982, he contributed to "War and Peace in the Nuclear Age," a SundayBoston Globe Magazine special report on the U.S.–Sovietnuclear arms race that received thePulitzer Prize for National Reporting in 1983. He has also written for other publications, includingThe New York Times,The Atlantic,The New Yorker andScientific American.
Kaplan has authored several books on military strategy. His 1983 book on the individuals who created American nuclear strategy in the late 1940s and '50s,The Wizards of Armageddon, won theWashington Monthly Political Book of the Year award. He publishedDaydream Believers in 2008,[2] a work which analyzes theGeorge W. Bush administration's use ofCold War tactics in post-9/11 military activities. He criticizes the administration for pursuing policies he believes to be unilateral and violate prohibitions on pre-emptive warfare. In late 2012, Kaplan publishedThe Insurgents: David Petraeus and the Plot to Change the American Way of War,[3] which examines how GeneralDavid Petraeus attempted to implement new thinking in Afghanistan and Iraq regarding the traditionalclear-and-hold counter-insurgency strategy, and the shortcomings of this strategy, its intellectual underpinnings, and the individuals who defined it.[4] The book was a finalist for thePulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction in 2014.[5]
In 2009, Kaplan published1959: The Year Everything Changed.[6] The book argues that the course of world history was not changed by the counter-culture movements of the 1960s but rather by artistic, scientific, political and economics events occurring in the year 1959.
Kaplan is an enthusiast ofhigh-end audio and video equipment, and has reported from theConsumer Electronics Show on new technologies in this area,[7] as well as penning shopping-advice columns on which new televisions offer the best value.[8]
He has authored articles coveringjazz andhi-fi equipment for the magazineStereophile.[9]
Kaplan marriedBrooke Gladstone, a journalist, author and media analyst, in 1983. The couple has twin daughters.
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