Iklé, Fred (1924–)

Prominent security analyst and a high-ranking official in the administrations of Presidents Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. From 1973 to 1977, Iklé headed the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. He served as undersecretary of defense for policy from 1981 to 1988. In the late 1980s, he cochaired the bipartisan Commission on Integrated Long-Term Strategy. In 1975 and 1987, Iklé received the highest civilian award of the Department of Defense, the Distinguished Public Service Medal.

Iklé is generally seen as a proponent of relatively hawkish and conservative policies and was a high-profile opponent of the expansion eastward of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) after the fall of communism in the 1990s. Iklé was one of the founders of the Project for the New American Century, a neo-conservative group that has pushed for the United States to be more willing to use military power to further its aims. Outside of government, his career has included stints as a professor of political science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, as head of the Social Science Department of the RAND Corporation, and as a distinguished scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Iklé is the author of several influential books and numerous articles on defense, foreign policy, and arms control, including Every War Must End (1971) and The Social Impact of Bomb Destruction (1958). His 1964 book, How Nations Negotiate, is viewed as a pioneer work in the modern study of international methods of negotiation. Iklé is also known for a seminal 1961 article about arms control published in the journal Foreign Affairs. In the article, Iklé questioned the ability of the international community to police violators of arms-control agreements.