Herspring, Dale R. 1940- (Dale Roy Herspring)

PERSONAL:

Born September 28, 1940, in Oakland, CA; son of Frank E. (a police officer) and Ruby F. Herspring; married Maureen Catherine Phillip, June 11, 1965; children: Larissa, Kurt, Kyle. Education: Stanford University, A.B., 1965; Georgetown University, M.A., 1967; University of Southern California, Ph.D., 1972.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Manhattan, KS. Office—Department of Political Science, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66506. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

U.S. Department of State, Washington, DC, foreign service officer, 1971-91, including assignments as arms control specialist for Bureau of Politico-Military Affairs, consular officer at U.S. embassy in Warsaw, Poland, political-military affairs officer at U.S. embassy in Moscow, USSR (now Russia), deputy director of Office of East European Affairs, director of Office of Security Analysis, senior staff member of Policy Planning Council of the secretary of state, and senior advisor for Soviet and academic affairs to the chief of naval operations; National War College, professor, 1991-93; Kansas State University, Manhattan, professor of political science, 1993—, head of department, 1993-98. Georgetown University, adjunct professor, 1982-93; University of Maryland—College Park, adjunct professor, 1988-89; Columbia University, adjunct professor at Harriman Institute for the Advanced Study of the Soviet Union, 1990-91; George Washington University, adjunct professor, 1992-93; University of Kansas, visiting professor, 1998—, and fellow of Center for Russian and East European Studies. Military service: U.S. Navy; retired as captain.

MEMBER:

International Institute for Strategic Studies, American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies, Council on Foreign Relations (permanent member), Inter-University Seminar on the Armed Forces and Society, Phi Kappa Phi.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Fulbright fellow, 1969-71; U.S. Department of State, Superior Honor Award, 1983, Meritorious Honor Award, 1988; grant from U.S. Institute of Peace, 1991-92; senior fellow, Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars, 1991-92; Outstanding Academic Title, Choice magazine, for The Kremlin & the High Command.

WRITINGS:

East German Civil-Military Relations: The Impact of Technology, 1949-1972, Praeger (New York, NY), 1973.

(Editor, with Ivan Volgyes) Civil-Military Relations in Communist Systems, Westview Press (Boulder, CO), 1978.

(With Robin Laird) The Soviet Union and Strategic Arms, Westview Press (Boulder, CO), 1984.

The Soviet High Command, 1964-1989: Politics and Personalities, Princeton University Press (Princeton, NJ), 1990.

Russian Civil-Military Relations: Past and Present, Indiana University Press (Bloomington, IN), 1996.

Requiem for an Army: The Demise of the East German Military, Rowman & Littlefield (Totowa, NJ), 1998.

Soldiers, Commissars, and Chaplains: Civil-Military Relations from Cromwell to the Present, Rowman & Littlefield (Totowa, NJ), 2001.

(Editor and contributor) Putin's Russia: Past Imperfect, Future Uncertain, Rowman & Littlefield (Totowa, NJ), 2002, 3rd edition, 2006.

The U.S. Military and Civilian Control, Rowman & Littlefield (Totowa, NJ), 2003.

The Pentagon and the Presidency: Civil-Military Relations from FDR to George W. Bush, University Press of Kansas (Lawrence, KS), 2005.

(With Howard J. Wiarda and Esther M. Skelley) Development on the Periphery: Democratic Transitions in Southern and Eastern Europe, Rowman & Littlefield (Lanham, MD), 2006.

The Kremlin & the High Command: Presidential Impact on the Russian Military from Gorbachev to Putin, University Press of Kansas (Lawrence, KS), 2006.

Rumsfeld's Wars: The Arrogance of Power, University Press of Kansas (Lawrence, KS), 2008.

Contributor to books, including The German Democratic Republic: The Changing Order and Orderly Change, edited by Lyman Letgers, Westview Press (Boulder, CO), 1977; Policy and Politics in Gierek's Poland: Trends in Political Participation, edited by Roger Kanet and Maurice Simon, Westview Press, 1980; The Soviet Calculus of Nuclear War, edited by Ellen Mickiewicz and Roman Kolkowicz, Lexington Books (Lexington, MA), 1984; Soviet Military Doctrine from Lenin to Gorbachev, edited by Willard Frank and Philip Gillette, Greenwood Press (Westport, CT), 1991; and U.S. Foreign Policy and Strategic Policy in the Post-Cold War Era, edited by Howard J. Wiarda, Greenwood Press (Westport, CT), 1995. Contributor of more than 150 articles and reviews to periodicals, including Problems of Communism, Diplomacy and Statecraft, Newsnet, European Security, Foreign Service Journal, and Arms Control Today. Guest editor, Studies in Comparative Communism, 1978; member of editorial board, Communist and Post-Communist Studies and Russian-American Journal of Advanced Law and Policy.

SIDELIGHTS:

Dale R. Herspring was educated at Stanford University, Georgetown University, and the University of Southern California. A former captain in the U.S. Navy, now retired, he spent many years working as a foreign service officer for the U.S. Department of State, and he is an expert on the militaries of the Soviet bloc, having spent time in Warsaw, Poland, and at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow during the Soviet era. An educator and writer, Herspring has taught political science at a number of universities, including Georgetown, Columbia, and George Washington University, and has contributed articles to numerous journals and periodicals. Herspring has written and/or edited a number of books on politics and the military, both in the United States and those of Russia and former Soviet-satellite countries.

In Russian Civil-Military Relations: Past and Present, Herspring addresses the relationship between the military and the civilian population, looking specifically at the smaller nations once held by the Warsaw pact and considering how the relationship altered through the decades. Mark Kramer, writing for American Political Science Review, observed: "Despite the brevity of Herspring's book, it provides a cogent and well-informed point of departure for those hoping to understand the role of the army in Russia's post-Communist transformation."

The Pentagon and the Presidency: Civil-Military Relations from FDR to George W. Bush looks at the relationship between the executive branch and the military since World War II. Because the military leaders are in effect looking to a civilian for their guidance, there is always the danger of strife between the two. However, Herspring shows that, despite disagreements in most administrations between the president and the military commanders with whom he worked, the relationship has continued to remain effective. Jonathan M. House, in a review for History: Review of New Books, remarked: "Herspring has performed a real service for historians and political scientists alike, weaving a series of incidents into a careful analysis of American civil-military relations." Naval War College Review contributor Gregory D. Foster observed that "Herspring offers a welcome shot of intellectual adrenalin to an enduringly important, if temporarily moribund, topic."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

American Political Science Review, September, 1998, Mark Kramer, review of Russian Civil-Military Relations: Past and Present, p. 731.

History: Review of New Books, summer, 2005, Jonathan M. House, review of The Pentagon and the Presidency: Civil-Military Relations from FDR to George W. Bush, p. 133.

Naval War College Review, spring, 2006, Gregory D. Foster, review of The Pentagon and the Presidency, p. 172.