Gregorian, Raffi 1964–

PERSONAL:

Born January 15, 1964; son of Vartan Gregorian; married Bernadette Dawson, January 13, 1990. Education: University of Washington, B.A., 1986; King's College, University of London, M.A., 1989; John Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, Ph.D., 1998.

ADDRESSES:

Home—VA. Office—Office of the High Representative Brussels, Office of the EU Special Representative for BiH, Council of the European Union, 133 Rue Froissart, 1040 Brussels, Belgium; Brcko Final Award Office (BFAO), Musala bb, 76100 Brcko, Brcko District, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

CAREER:

Historian, supervisor, and writer. U.S. Army Center for Military History in Washington, DC, historian, 1986-88; Science Applications International Corporation, San Diego, CA, senior analyst, 1990-98; U.S. Department of Defense senior adviser on the Interagency Task Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans, 1999; senior adviser and chief of staff in the Office of the Special Adviser to the President and Secretary of State for Kosovo and Dayton Implementation and acting director of the Kosovo Implementation office, 2001; U.S. Department of Defense BiH section in the United States Department of State, director, 2001-04; cochair of the Defense Reform Commission of Bosnia and Herzegovina, 2005; NATO Brcko Final Award Office (BFAO), Brcko, Bosnia and Herzegovina, supervisor and deputy high representative. Military service: U.S. Naval Reserve, commissioned officer.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Superior Honour Awards, U.S. State Department; Joint Service Commendation Medals, for military service in Kosovo and in BiH; Joint Service Achievement Medal, for service on the Joint Staff.

WRITINGS:

The British Army, the Gurkhas, and Cold War Strategy in the Far East, 1947-1954, Palgrave (New York, NY), 2002.

Contributor to books; contributor to scholarly journals, including SAIS Review.

SIDELIGHTS:

Raffi Gregorian is a historian and has worked internationally with the U.S. Department of State and with NATO, including assignments in Sarajevo and Kosovo. Gregorian's extensive experience in the Balkan region includes serving as the senior civilian in NATO Headquarters Sarajevo and as the NATO cochair of the Defense Reform Commission. He also served as special advisor to the President and Secretary of State for Kosovo and Dayton Implementation, as well as acting director of the Kosovo Implementa- tion Office. In addition to this work with the State Department, he was a Department of Defense senior advisor to the Interagency Task Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans. Gregorian is also the author of numerous scholarly articles and government publications.

In his first book, The British Army, the Gurkhas, and Cold War Strategy in the Far East, 1947-1954, the author examines the defense strategies that the British used against the Soviet Union in the Far East for nearly a decade and argues that postwar Britain's imperial overextension was exaggerated. In his book, the author contends that the British avoided imperial overextension by deploying Imperial, Gurkha (indigenous people from Nepal and parts of North India), and Commonwealth forces only where vital British interests appeared to be threatened. In the meantime, they shifted responsibility for key wartime missions to British allies. The author notes that the British were especially successful at adapting in order to meet the strategic and resource challenges presented by the Far East during the 1947-1954 time period.

The author begins by discussing the British development of their future defense policy from 1945 to 1948. He then writes about the British National Service, the Gurkhas, and the reorganization of the British Army over the periods from 1946 to 1948. Covering the years of 1948 to 1950, the author explores the Australian FARELF (Far East Land Force) combat unit and the Malayan emergency, as well as the defense of Hong Kong. Chapter six focuses on Britain's Cold War strategy from 1950 through 1954 followed by chapters further examining of how the British handled their interests in Hong Kong and Malaysia. Gregorian goes on to discuss the British limited liability approach to the defense of Southeast Asia.

Overall, the author describes how events on the ground in the late 1940s were the primary influence in how the British developed their Cold War strategy to fight off communist uprisings and insurgencies. The British, according to the author, initially hoped that they could lessen their forces in the Middle East because of the defeat of Japan in World War II and a China that was in turmoil. However, the communist insurgency in Malaysia beginning in 1948 and the Chinese communist victory in 1949 led Britain to ultimately commit more resources to the Far East, which they considered to have important political and strategic value in the ongoing battle with communism in the Cold War. The book includes tables, figures, a glossary of abbreviations, notes, and an index.

Writing in Albion, David W. Clayton noted that The British Army, the Gurkhas, and Cold War Strategy in the Far East, 1947-1954 "will be of much interest to international historians and, hopefully, to policy-makers." Clayton went on to write in his review that the author "argues that British military strategies and diplomatic policies complemented each other, because committing military resources allowed Britain to forge strategic alliances. Consequently, Britain did not … suffer from imperial over-stretch in the early post-war decades." Clayton also noted that the author argues persuasively that the British used their military resources efficiently in the Far East. Clayton went on to write that the author presents "a well researched guide to strategic decision-making in the British Army, and [has] left scholars with many thought provoking questions to be addressed by further research."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Albion, winter, 2004, David W. Clayton, review of The British Army, the Gurkhas, and Cold War Strategy in the Far East, 1947-1954, p. 721.

New York Times, January 14, 1990, "Raffi Gregorian Wed in Australia to Miss Dawson."

Reference & Research Book News, November, 2002, review of The British Army, the Gurkhas, and Cold War Strategy in the Far East, 1947-1954, p. 220.

SAIS Review, June 22, 1996, Raffi Gregorian, "British Counterinsurgency in the Post-Imperial Era," p. 192.

ONLINE

Office of the High Representative Web site,http://www.ohr.int/ (March 9, 2006), "High Representative Appoints Raffi Gregorian as New Brcko Supervisor"; author's curriculum vitae.

Sarajevo School of Science and Technology,http://ssst.edu.ba/ (April 7, 2008), brief biography of author.