Status
Research Professor
Department
National Security Affairs
Contact
thjohnso@nps.edu
Research Interests
Afghanistan; South and Central Asia; Terrorism; WMD proliferation; Peace operations and peacekeeping; Modeling and simulation |
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Biography
Professor Johnson was appointed to the faculty of the Naval Postgraduate School’s National Security Affairs Department in December 2003. At NPS, Johnson is teaching courses on Afghanistan, Central Asian crises, politics, terrorism, and security. He also regularly contributes to the Regional Security Education Program and the Leadership Development and Education for Security and Peace Program at NPS where he briefs deploying troops on subjects such as Afghanistan, Iraq, WMD proliferation, and the global jihad.
Professor Johnson also serves as a Senior Research Associate for NPS’ Center for Contemporary Conflict where he has conducted research on Afghanistan, Central Asia, the jihad, and Terrorism.
Professor Johnson serves as a member of the U.S. delegation to the NATO WMD Warning and Reporting Panel and serves as co-chairman of the NATO sub panel of NBC Communication and Information System Interoperability and Integration.
Before joining the NPS faculty, Johnson was a Principal Senior Analyst with the Research Institute of the Illinois Institute of Technology (IITRI) and Director of the Modeling and Simulation Technical Research Institute, a collaborative research and educational organization between IITRI and the University of Virginia. Before coming to IITRI, Prof. Johnson was a member of the research faculty of the Institute of Public Policy, George Mason University.
For two decades, Johnson has conducted research and written on Afghanistan and South Asia. He has directed major research efforts for the United States Government on Afghanistan and U.S. policy towards this country. He has written and published numerous studies on Afghanistan and its politics, culture, and anthropology. He is a member of the Afghanistan Editorial Board of the National Security Archive.Johnson has also published in the areas of Central Asia and Afghanistan, insurgencies, foreign policy analysis, peace research/conflict resolution, and political and defense economics modeling and simulation.
His most recent publications include: “Rethinking Afghanistan: Echoes of Ulster and the IRA?,” Policy Options 29, No. 6 (June 2008): 14-22, with Richard English; “No Sign until the Burst of Fire: Understanding the Pakistan-Afghanistan Frontier,” International Security 32, No. 4 (Spring 2008): 41-77, with M. Chris Mason; “Afghanistan: The Challenges Ahead,” FrontLine Defence, Issue 2 (March 2008): 14-17, with Alec Metz; “Afghanistan's Post -Taliban Transition: State Building”, in Interim Governments, ed. Karen Guttieri and Jessica Piombo (Washington: U.S. Institute of Peace, 2007), 287-317; “The Taliban Insurgency and an Analysis of Shabnamah (Night Letters),” Small Wars and Insurgencies 18, No. 3 (Sept. 2007): 317-344; “On the Edge of the Big Muddy: The Taliban Resurgence in Afghanistan,” China and Eurasian Forum Quarterly 5, No. 2 (2007): 93-129; “The Taliban Insurgency and an Analysis of Shabnamah (Night Letters),” Small Wars and Insurgencies 18, No. 2 (Spring 2007, forthcoming); “ Understanding the Taliban and Insurgency in Afghanistan,” with M. Chris Mason, Orbis: A Journal of World Affairs 51, No. 1, 2007; “Terrorism, Insurgency and Afghanistan,” with M. Chris Mason, in James JF Forrest, ed., Counter Terrorism in the 21st Century, Volume III: Lessons Learned From the Fight Against Terrorism (New York, Praeger, forthcoming, 2007); “Afghanistan’s Post-Taliban Transition: The State of State-Building after War,” Central Asian Survey 25, No. 1-2 (March-June 2006), 1–26; “The Origins and Financing of Afghan Terrorism: Thugs, Guns, Drugs, Interlopers, and Creative Movements of Money,” in Harold A. Trinkunas and Jeanne Giraldo, eds., Terrorist Financing and State Responses: Comparative Perspective (Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press, forthcoming, 2006); “Democratic Nation Building in the Arc of Crisis: The Case of the Presidential Election in Afghanistan,” in James A. Russell, ed., Critical Issues Facing the Middle East Security: Security, Politics, and Economics (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006), 125-146; “Central Asian Terrorism: A Problem in Search of Definition and Policy,” with Colin Lober in Global Terrorism: Genesis, Implications, Remedial and Countermeasures (Islamabad, Pakistan: Aziz-ul-Haque Institute of Regional Studies, 2006), 186-219; “A Hard Day’s Night?: The United States and the Global War on Terror," with James A. Russell, Comparative Strategy 24, No. 2, 2005, 127-151, reprinted in Countering Modern Terrorism: History, Current Issues and Future Threats (Gesamtherstellung, Germany: W. Bertelsmann Verlag, GmbH, 2005), 239-271. His earlier works have appeared in such journals as the American Political Science Review, the Journal of Politics, the Brown Journal of World Affairs, Strategic Review, Politikon: South African Journal of Political Science, Journal of Modern African Studies, and in numerous edited volumes and scholarly texts.
Professor Johnson has taught at the University of Southern California, George Mason University, and the Foreign Service Institute, and frequently lectures at Service Academies and the National Defense University. He is a past recipient of the Charles E. Merriam Award for Outstanding Public Policy Research from the University of Illinois.
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