Intelligence and National Security

William McRaven, former University of Texas System chancellor and retired U.S. Navy four-star admiral, joined the school as a professor in national security in 2018. As chancellor, he oversaw 14 institutions that educate 221,000 students and employ 20,000 faculty and more than 80,000 health care professionals, researchers and staff. As the commander of U.S. Special Operations Command, Adm. McRaven led a force of 69,000 men and women and was responsible for conducting counter-terrorism operations worldwide. He is a recognized national authority on U.S. foreign policy and has advised presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama and other U.S. leaders on defense issues.

Adm. McRaven oversaw the 2011 Navy SEAL raid in Pakistan that killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. His book Spec Ops: Case Studies in Special Operations Warfare: Theory and Practice, published in several languages, is considered a fundamental text on special operations strategy. He has received the Republic of France's Legion d'Honneur, the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association's National Award and the National Intelligence Award. In 2016, he was named the recipient of the Ambassador Richard M. Helms Award by the Central Intelligence Agency Officers Memorial Foundation.

Listen to Adm. McRaven with then-LBJ School Dean Angela Evans on the "Policy on Purpose" podcast in September 2018.

Jaganath "Jay" Sankaran [Juh-guh-nat San-ka-ran] is an assistant professor in the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at The University of Texas at Austin and a non-resident fellow in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution. He works on problems at the intersection of international security and science & technology.   

Dr. Sankaran spent the first four years of his career as a defense scientist with the Indian Missile R&D establishment. Dr. Sankaran’s work in weapons design and development led to his interests in missile defenses, space weapons, nuclear weapons, military net assessment, and arms control. 

The current focus of his research is the growing strategic and military competition between the major powers. In particular, Dr. Sankaran studies the impact of emerging technological advances on weapons systems deployed by these states. Dr. Sankaran has recently written on the military capabilities of China and the counter-military balancing undertaken by the United States, Japan, India, and other states. He has also written about the U.S.-Russian disagreements over missile defenses and nuclear arms control. 

Dr. Sankaran’s forthcoming book is tentatively entitled “Bombing to Provoke: Rockets, Missiles, and Drones as Instruments of Fear and Coercion.” Drawing heavily from the literature on emotions (fear) in IR, the book theorizes and determines how states employ aerospace weapons to coerce and fight their adversaries. The book argues that rockets, missiles, and drones weaponize fear and intimidate and panic an adversary. The fears amplify the political vulnerabilities of the target state. The fears and political vulnerabilities coerce the target state to divert substantial military resources away from other vital missions, consequently damaging the war’s broader strategic aims.  

Dr. Sankaran has held fellowships at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University, and the RAND Corporation. He has held visiting positions at the School of Advanced Air and Space Studies (SAASS) at the U.S. Air University, Tsinghua University, and the National Institute for Defense Studies (Tokyo). 

Dr. Sankaran has served on study groups of the National Academies of Sciences (NAS) and the American Physical Society (APS) Panel on Public Affairs examining missile defenses and strategic stability. He has published in International Security, Contemporary Security Policy, Journal of Strategic Studies, Journal of East Asian Studies, Asian Security, Strategic Studies Quarterly, Arms Control Today, Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, and other outlets. The RAND Corporation and the Stimson Center have also published his research.

Stephen Slick was appointed in January 2015 as director of The University of Texas at Austin's Intelligence Studies Project and clinical professor at the LBJ School of Public Affairs. Before moving to Austin, he served for 28 years in the CIA's clandestine service, including five assignments abroad. Between 2005 and 2009, he was a special assistant to the president and the senior director for intelligence programs and reform on the staff of the National Security Council. He received a B.A. from The Pennsylvania State University, a J.D. from the University of California, Los Angeles, School of Law and a Master in Public Policy degree from Princeton University's School of Public and International Affairs.

James "Paul" Pope is a professor of practice in the LBJ School of Public Affairs and a senior fellow in the Intelligence Studies Project, which is sponsored by the Strauss and Clements Centers. He retired from the CIA after multiple foreign tours, service as chief of station and assignments as a chief, deputy chief and chief of operations in the Directorate of Operations' three largest components. As chief of the Tradecraft and Training Division, Pope was responsible for DO training, capturing "lessons learned," and adapting training and tradecraft to emerging technical challenges and mission imperatives. He was assistant deputy director of National Intelligence for Strategic Partnership and later acting assistant director of National Intelligence for Partner Engagement for almost a year.

Pope served as head of delegation to NATO's Civilian Intelligence Committee and as the DNI/DCIA representative to commander, U.S. Pacific Command and its component commands. Prior to the NCS, he served on the National Intelligence Council for the Near East and South Asia and led an analytic branch in the Directorate of Intelligence. Pope was an Army officer, with service on the Army General Staff after twice commanding at the company level, including command of the only active firebase in the Army on the Korean DMZ. He received his M.A. With Distinction from the Naval Postgraduate School and B.S. from the United States Military Academy at West Point. Pope is a distinguished graduate of Command and General Staff College, a graduate of the National War College's CAPSTONE course and a graduate the Pinnacle Course for senior executives at the Kellogg School of Northwestern University.