Ms. Linda Robinson

Linda Robinson is a senior international and defense researcher at the RAND Corporation. Her current research centers on assessing the U.S. national security strategy, strategy and campaign to counter the Islamic State in Iraq and the Syria (ISIS), political warfare by state and non-state actors, and special operations forces. She conducted eight months of field research in the Middle East in 2016-17, testified before the U.S. Congress on ISIS and US counterterrorism strategy, served as a speaker at a RAND conference on The Evolving Terrorist Threat: Implications for Global Security. Her recent RAND publications include Making Victory Count After Defeating ISIS: Stabilization Challenges in Mosul and Beyond; Assessment of the Politico-Military Campaign to Counter ISIL and Options for Adaptation; Improving Strategic Competence: Lessons from 13 Years of War; U.S. Special Operations Forces in the Philippines, 2001–2014. Other publications include a Council on Foreign Relations special report on the future of special operations forces (2013) and trade books including: One Hundred Victories: Special Ops and the Future of American Warfare (2013); Tell Me How This Ends: General David Petraeus and the Search for a Way Out of Iraq (2008), a New York Times Notable Book, and the best-selling Masters of Chaos: The Secret History of the Special Forces(2004). She serves as an unpaid government-appointed member of the Board of Visitors of the National Defense University. Robinson earned her B.A. in political science from Swarthmore College.