William E. Odom

Lieutenant General William E. Odom, U.S. Army (Ret.), is a Senior Fellow at Hudson Institute's Washington, D.C. office. He is also a visiting professor at Georgetown University and a Fellow at Berkeley College, Yale University. As Director of the National Security Agency from 1985 to 1988, he was responsible for the nation's signals intelligence and communications security. From 1981 to 1985, he served as Assistant Chief of Staff for Intelligence, the Army's senior intelligence officer. 

From 1977 to 1981, General Odom was Military Assistant to the President's Assistant for National Security Affairs, Zbigniew Brzezinski. As a member of the National Security Council staff, he worked upon strategic planning, Soviet affairs, nuclear weapons policy, telecommunications policy, and Persian Gulf security issues. 

Odom graduated in 1954 from West Point with a Bachelor of Science and from Columbia University with both a Masters Degree and a Doctor of Philosophy in 1970. 

Odom is currently Chairman of the Board of Directors at the V-ONE Corporation of Rockville, MD, and has served on the board since 1996. He is also Chairman of the Board at American Science & Engineering of Billerica, MA, where he has served as both an officer and director since September 1996. 

He is a member of the Board of Directors of the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy and an adjunct faculty member in the Security Studies Program of the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. 

According to Media Transparency, in 1990, 1991, 1992, and 1998, Odom's research on military and security studies was funded by both the Smith Richardson Foundation and the John M. Olin Foundation.


 * International Advisory Board, World Security Network

War on terrorism / War in Iraq
On Friday, April 9, 2004, Odom described the attack on Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein as "one of the great strategic errors of the post-Cold War era." 

On April 28, 2004, the Wall Street Journal reported: "General William E. Odom warms that a military occupation will never produce a 'friendly democracy' in Iraq and argues that the Bush administration should removed US forces from the region as soon as possible. Gen. Odom puts it bluntly: 'We have failed.'"

On NBC's "Today" show Thursday, April 29, 2004, Odom said "We have already failed ... Staying in longer makes us fail worse ... I think we've passed the chances not to fail. And now we are in the situation where we have to limit the damage." 

In September 2005 Odom, "a Vietnam veteran, said the invasion of Iraq alienated America's Middle East allies, making it harder to prosecute a war against terrorists. The U.S. should withdraw from Iraq, he said, and reposition its military forces along the Afghan-Pakistani border to capture Osama bin Laden and crush al Qaeda cells. "The invasion of Iraq I believe will turn out to be the greatest strategic disaster in U.S. history," he said. Also see Operation Iraqi Freedom: Military and Political Dissent.

Published Works by William E. Odom

 * America's Inadvertant Empire (2004 book), Yale University Press (March 10, 2004), ISBN 0300100698
 * Fixing Intelligence: For a More Secure America (2003 book), Yale University Press (March 2003), ISBN 0300103042 ; 2nd Printing, April 2004.

In 1998, Odom wrote 1998 The Collapse of the Soviet Military published by Yale University Press, "which won the Marshall Shulman Prize. He also has written America's Military Revolution: Strategy and Structure After the Cold War (American University Press, 1993); Trial After Triumph: East Asia After the Cold War (Hudson Institute, 1992); On Internal War: American and Soviet Approaches to Third World Clients and Insurgents (Duke University Press, 1992); and The Soviet Volunteers (Princeton University Press, 1973). He coauthored Commonwealth or Empire? Russia, Central Asia, and the Transcaucasus'', with Robert Dujarric (Hudson Institute, 1995).

"He has published articles in Foreign Affairs, World Politics, Foreign Policy, Orbis, Problems of Communism, The National Interest, The Washington Quarterly, Military Review, and many other publications. A frequent radio and television commentator, General Odom has appeared on programs such as "McNeil/Lehrer News Hour," CNN's "Crossfire", ABC's "Nightline", NBC News, and BBC's "The World Tonight." He also is a periodic contributor the op-ed pages of The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and others."

Related SourceWatch Resources

 * Bush regime
 * Exit Strategy from Iraq
 * McCain doctrine
 * Rumsfeld and the Generals
 * stay the course

Profiles

 * William E. Odom, namebase.org, accessed May 3, 2004.
 * "William E. Odom: Senior Fellow Hudson Institute, Washington, D.C. Office", accessed November 2005.

Articles by William E. Odom

 * Recent Foreign Affairs articles: William E. Odom.
 * "John J. McCloy Roundtable with Lt. General William Odom" Roundtable on "Setting the National Security Agenda", Council on Foreign Relations, February 12, 2004.
 * "The Commander and Intelligence" Roundtable Meeting, Council on Foreign Relations, April 14, 2004.
 * "Victory Is Not an Option. The Mission Can't Be Accomplished -- It's Time for a New Strategy," Washington Post, February 11, 2007.

Testimomy

 * S. Hrg. 107-562. A Review of the Relationship Between a Department of Homeland Security and the Intelligence Community. Hearings before the Committee on Governmental Affairs, U.S. Senate, 107th Congress, Second Session, June 26 and 27, 2002. Testimony by William E. Odom, pages 19-22.

Articles & Commentary about William E. Odom

 * Evan Lehman, "Retired general: Iraq invasion was 'strategic disaster'", The Lowell Sun, September 30, 2005.
 * "Ret. Army General William Odom: U.S. Should "Cut and Run" From Iraq", ''Democracy Now!, October 4, 2005.