Mara Karlin
Nonresident Senior Fellow, Security and Strategy - Foreign Policy, Center for 21st Century Security and Intelligence
Mara Karlin is a nonresident senior fellow in the Center for 21st Century Security and Intelligence in the Foreign Policy program at Brookings. She is Associate Professor of the Practice of Strategic Studies at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), where she also serves as associate director of the school’s Strategic Studies Program and is executive director of The Merrill Center for Strategic Studies. Karlin has served in national security roles for five U.S. secretaries of defense, advising on policies spanning strategic planning, defense budgeting, future wars and the evolving security environment, and regional affairs involving the Middle East, Europe, and Asia.
Most recently, she served as the deputy assistant secretary of defense for strategy and force development. In that role, her office crafted strategies for navigating the future of international security—including through the analysis of future wars—as a means to guiding the development of a prepared, capable, and effective U.S. military. She oversaw and implemented the overarching policy and strategy guidance that shapes the department's more than $550 billion budget. Karlin was a key architect of several mission-critical strategies, including the 2014 Quadrennial Defense Review, the president’s 2015 National Security Strategy, the counter-ISIL strategy, two classified secretary of defense-signed strategies on long-term global challenges, and three Defense Planning Guidance. She led three reviews on strategic portfolios focused on power projection, which guided more than $20 billion in investments and directed a groundbreaking study assessing the current policy and implications of lethal autonomous weapons. She inaugurated the first three initiatives to shape close allies’ defense strategies and budgets, and oversaw the first formal efforts to actively assess the defense strategy.
Previously, Karlin served in a variety of policy positions in the Department of Defense. As special assistant to the under secretary of defense for policy, she facilitated the under secretary’s efforts on hundreds of national security-related actions with an emphasis on Middle East security affairs. As Levant director, she formulated U.S. policy on Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, and Israel-Palestinian affairs. This included inaugurating a program to build the Lebanese military, coordinating nascent defense relations between the United States and Lebanon, deepening defense cooperation with Jordan, expanding security sector reform in the Palestinian arena, and a wide range of efforts involving Syria and Iran. As South Asia country director, she formulated U.S. policy on India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, and Bangladesh, focusing on terrorism, governability, security sector reform, and nonproliferation.
Over the last decade, she has taught courses in Strategic Studies, Middle East Affairs, and U.S. Foreign Policy at Johns Hopkins University and on Semester at Sea (through Colorado State University). Her first book, “Building Militaries in Fragile States: Challenges for the United States,” will be published by University of Pennsylvania Press in 2017.
She received her bachelor's, summa cum laude, in political science from Newcomb College, Tulane University; her master's with distinction in strategic studies, Middle East studies, and economics from Johns Hopkins SAIS; and doctorate in international relations from Johns Hopkins SAIS. Karlin has been awarded Department of Defense Medals for Meritorious and Outstanding Public Service, among others.
Affiliations:
Center for a New American Security, Future Force Advisory Council
Council on Foreign Relations, term member
Gerson Lehrman Group
War on the Rocks, columnist
Mara Karlin is a nonresident senior fellow in the Center for 21st Century Security and Intelligence in the Foreign Policy program at Brookings. She is Associate Professor of the Practice of Strategic Studies at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), where she also serves as associate director of the school’s Strategic Studies Program and is executive director of The Merrill Center for Strategic Studies. Karlin has served in national security roles for five U.S. secretaries of defense, advising on policies spanning strategic planning, defense budgeting, future wars and the evolving security environment, and regional affairs involving the Middle East, Europe, and Asia.
Most recently, she served as the deputy assistant secretary of defense for strategy and force development. In that role, her office crafted strategies for navigating the future of international security—including through the analysis of future wars—as a means to guiding the development of a prepared, capable, and effective U.S. military. She oversaw and implemented the overarching policy and strategy guidance that shapes the department’s more than $550 billion budget. Karlin was a key architect of several mission-critical strategies, including the 2014 Quadrennial Defense Review, the president’s 2015 National Security Strategy, the counter-ISIL strategy, two classified secretary of defense-signed strategies on long-term global challenges, and three Defense Planning Guidance. She led three reviews on strategic portfolios focused on power projection, which guided more than $20 billion in investments and directed a groundbreaking study assessing the current policy and implications of lethal autonomous weapons. She inaugurated the first three initiatives to shape close allies’ defense strategies and budgets, and oversaw the first formal efforts to actively assess the defense strategy.
Previously, Karlin served in a variety of policy positions in the Department of Defense. As special assistant to the under secretary of defense for policy, she facilitated the under secretary’s efforts on hundreds of national security-related actions with an emphasis on Middle East security affairs. As Levant director, she formulated U.S. policy on Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, and Israel-Palestinian affairs. This included inaugurating a program to build the Lebanese military, coordinating nascent defense relations between the United States and Lebanon, deepening defense cooperation with Jordan, expanding security sector reform in the Palestinian arena, and a wide range of efforts involving Syria and Iran. As South Asia country director, she formulated U.S. policy on India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, and Bangladesh, focusing on terrorism, governability, security sector reform, and nonproliferation.
Over the last decade, she has taught courses in Strategic Studies, Middle East Affairs, and U.S. Foreign Policy at Johns Hopkins University and on Semester at Sea (through Colorado State University). Her first book, “Building Militaries in Fragile States: Challenges for the United States,” will be published by University of Pennsylvania Press in 2017.
She received her bachelor’s, summa cum laude, in political science from Newcomb College, Tulane University; her master’s with distinction in strategic studies, Middle East studies, and economics from Johns Hopkins SAIS; and doctorate in international relations from Johns Hopkins SAIS. Karlin has been awarded Department of Defense Medals for Meritorious and Outstanding Public Service, among others.
Affiliations:
Center for a New American Security, Future Force Advisory Council
Council on Foreign Relations, term member
Gerson Lehrman Group
War on the Rocks, columnist
University of Pennsylvania Press
Political instability is a time-honored tradition in Lebanon. The bigger questions would be what does this instability mean for the Lebanese military? Is it still using materiel appropriately and in line with efforts to ascertain government sovereignty? Is it still taking on bad actors?
"Done well, [the NDS] surfaces really difficult debates about expectations for the future, the types of wars the U.S. might engage in, and how to allocate hundreds of billions of dollars."
"Ultimately, it's critical to assess the future security environment and use that as a lens through which to examine the types of conflict that the U.S. military may be called upon to engage in, and then to build a future military accordingly. And given our pretty terrible history of predicting future conflicts, hedging and betting is essential.”
