Zalmay Khalilzad

Zalmay Khalilzad
Zalmay Khalilzad at the 2008 annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Switzerland
26th United States Ambassador to the United Nations
Incumbent
Assumed office 17 April 2007
President	George W. Bush
Preceded by	Alejandro Daniel Wolff
United States Ambassador to Iraq
In office 2005 – April 17, 2007
President	George W. Bush
Preceded by	John Negroponte
Succeeded by	Ryan Crocker
United States Ambassador to Afghanistan
In office 2003–2005
President	George W. Bush
Preceded by	Robert Finn
Succeeded by	Ronald E. Neumann
Personal details
Born	(1951-03-22) March 22, 1951 Mazari Sharif, Afghanistan
Political party	Republican
Spouse	Cheryl Benard
Children	Alexander Maximilian
Alma mater	American University of Beirut University of Chicago
Profession	Academic and Diplomat

Zalmay Mamozy Khalilzad (Nastaliq: زلمی خلیلزاد - Zalmay Khalīlzād) (born: 22 March 1951) is the permanent United States Ambassador to the United Nations. He has been involved with U.S. policy makers at the White House since the early 1980s, and is the highest-ranking Afghan American and Muslim in the Administration of U.S. President George W. Bush. Khalilzad's previous assignments in the Administration include U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq.

Early history and personal life

Zalmay Khalilzad was born in the city of Mazari Sharif in northern Afghanistan. Khalilzad's father (Khalilullah Khalilzad) was a government official under the monarchy of Mohammed Zahir Shah. He is reported to be of Pashtun ethnic origin, although his mother tongue is Persian and, apperantly, he seems to have only a very limited knowledge of Pashto.

Zalmay Khalilzad began his education at the public Ghazi Lycée school in Kabul. He immigrated to the United States as a high school exchange student, but attained his Bachelor's and Master's Degrees from the American University of Beirut in Lebanon. Khalilzad received his PhD at the University of Chicago, where he studied closely with strategic thinker Albert Wohlstetter, a prominent nuclear deterrence thinker and an opponent to the disarmament treaties, who provided Zalmay with contacts in the government and with RAND.

From 1979 to 1989, Zalmay Khalilzad worked as an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs. During that time he worked closely with Zbigniew Brzezinski, the Carter Administration's architect of the policy supporting the Mujahideen resistance to the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan. (See also: Operation Cyclone.)

Zalmay Khalilzad is married to Cheryl Benard, who is an author and political analyst with the RAND Corporation. Khalilzad and Benard have two sons, Alexander and Maximilian.

Career history

In 1984 Khalilzad accepted a one-year Council on Foreign Relations fellowship to join the State Department, where he worked for Paul Wolfowitz, then the Director of Policy Planning.

From 1985 to 1989, Khalilzad served in President Ronald Reagan's Administration as a senior State Department official advising on the Soviet war in Afghanistan and the Iran–Iraq War. During this time he was the State Department's Special Advisor on Afghanistan to Undersecretary of State Michael H. Armacost. In this role he developed and guided the international program to promote the merits of a Mujahideen-led Afghanistan to oust the Soviet occupation. From 1990-1992, Khalilzad served under President George H. W. Bush in the Defense Department as Deputy Undersecretary for Policy Planning.

Dr. Zalmay Khalilzad presents President George W. Bush an Afghan ballot from the first democratic election in Afghanistan on 18 October 2004.

Zalmay Khalilzad and Donald Rumsfeld listen to the remarks of Afghan President Hamid Karzai and U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney during a press conference at the Presidential Palace in Kabul, Afghanistan, on December 7, 2004.

Khalilzad with Dr. Ashraf Ghani standing at the American Corner in Kabul University on February 12, 2005.

Between 1993 and 2000, Khalilzad was the Director of the Strategy, Doctrine, and Force Structure at the RAND Corporation. During this time, he helped found RAND's Center for Middle Eastern Studies as well as "Strategic Appraisal," a periodic RAND publication. He also authored several influential monographs, including "The United States and a Rising China" and "From Containment to Global Leadership? America and the World After the Cold War." While at RAND, Khalilzad also had a brief stint consulting for Cambridge Energy Research Associates, which at the time was conducting a risk analysis for Unocal, now part of Chevron, for a proposed 1,400 km (890 mile), $2-billion, 622 m³/s (22,000 ft³/s) Trans-Afghanistan gas pipeline project which would have extended from Turkmenistan to Afghanistan and further proceeding to Pakistan. He acted as a special liaison between UNOCAL and the Taliban regime. As one of the original members of Project for the New American Century, Khalilzad was a signatory of the letter to President Bill Clinton sent on January 26, 1998, which called for him to accept the aim of "removing Saddam Hussein and his regime from power" using "a full complement of diplomatic, political and military efforts."

In 2001, President George W. Bush asked Khalilzad to head the Bush-Cheney transition team for the Department of Defense and Khalilzad briefly served as Counselor to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. In May 2001, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice announced Khalilzad's appointment as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Southwest Asia, Near East, and North African Affairs at the National Security Council. In December 2002 the President appointed Khalilzad to the position of Ambassador at Large for Free Iraqis with the task of coordinating "preparations for a post-Saddam Hussein Iraq."

After the terrorist attacks of 9/11, President Bush came to rely on Khalilzad's Afghanistan expertise. Khalilzad was involved in the early stages of planning to overthrow the Taliban and on December 31st, 2001 was selected as Bush's Special Presidential Envoy for Afghanistan. He served in that position until November 2003, when he was appointed to serve as U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan.

Khalilzad held the position of U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan from November 2003 until June 2005. During this time, he oversaw the drafting of Afghanistan's constitution, was involved with the country's first elections, and helped to organize the first meeting of Afghanistan's parliament (the Loya Jirga). It was rumored by some that Afghan President Hamid Karzai was very reliant on Khalilzad's guidance, including rumors that Khalilzad pressured some candidates in the election to drop out, leaving Karzai with fewer opponents. However, Khalilzad denied this. During 2004 and 2005 he was also involved in helping with the establishment of the American University of Afghanistan (AUAF), which is the first western-style higher learning educational institution in Afghanistan.

Time as U.S. Ambassador to Iraq

Zalmay Khalilzad and U.S. Army General George Casey attend a transfer of security responsibility ceremony in Baghdad, Iraq, in September 2006.

Khalilzad began his job as U.S. Ambassador to Iraq on June 21, 2005. He was credited for helping negotiate compromises which allowed the ratification of Iraq's Constitution in October 2005, which allows for the partitioning of Iraq into different regions along ethnic lines. Khalilzad also worked to ensure that the December 2005 elections ran smoothly and played a substantial role in forming the current government. Khalilzad was one of the first high-level Administration officials to warn that sectarian violence was overtaking the insurgency as the number one threat to Iraq's stability. After the Al Askari shrine bombing, in February 2006, he warned that spreading sectarian violence might lead to civil war — and possibly even a broader conflict involving neighboring countries.

Khalilzad's term as Ambassador to Iraq ended on March 26, 2007. He was replaced by Ryan Crocker, a career diplomat who was serving as Ambassador to Pakistan previously.

United States Ambassador to the United Nations

On 12 February 2007, the White House submitted Khalilzad's nomination to the Senate to become U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. He was confirmed by the Democratic-controlled U.S. Senate on March 29, 2007 by a unanimous voice vote. This marked a strong contrast to Khalilzad's predecessor, John R. Bolton, whose often controversial rhetoric caused him to fail to be confirmed by the Senate resulting in a recess appointment. Colleagues at the UN noted that Khalilzad has a different, more reconciling style than Bolton's.

In November 2007, Khalilzad charged that Iran is helping the insurgent groups in Afghanistan and Iraq. He also told the media, soon after the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) released its report on Iran, that the Iranian government is clearly going ahead with its nuclear program. Khalilzad explained that the United States will try to pass another resolution in the U.N. Security Council under Chapter 7, to impose additional sanctions on Iran.

Khalilzad, along with most U.S. politicians, supported Kosovo's independence.

In August 2008, he urged the UN Security Council to "take urgent action" and "condemn Russia's military assault on the sovereign state of Georgia," in addition to stating that Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov had told Secretary of State Rice that Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili "must go."

It has been reported by the New York Times that Khalilzad had been engaging in unauthorized contacts with Pakistan's newly elected President Asif Ali Zardari, reportedly angering senior administration officials. Khalilzad, an Afghan native, is rumored to be flirting with the possibility of returning home to challenge President Hamid Karzai when his term expires next year. Should Khalilzad return home, a good working relationship with Islamabad would be critical.

Writing on U.S. leadership

Khalilzad wrote several articles on the subject of the value of U.S. global leadership in the mid-1990s. The specific scenarios for conflict he envisioned in the case of a decline in American power have made his writings extremely popular in the world of competitive high school and college policy debate.

• Khalilzad, Zalmay (1995). "Losing the moment? The United States and the world after the Cold War". The Washington Quarterly. 18:2: 03012.

External links

• Zalmay.com, a profile view
• Profile of Khalilzad, RightWeb
• Khalilzad profile in The New Yorker
• Profile: Khalilzad, The Center for Cooperative Research
• RAND transition 2001 panel members, The RAND Corporation
• Zalmay Khalilzad's campaign contributions
• Afghan Roots Keep Adviser Firmly in the Inner Circle - mentions his past roles involving the Afghan mujaheddin
• Current Biography August 2006 cover story
• RFE/RL interview with Zalmay Khalilzad (May 18, 2007)
• Video: Khalilzad discusses Iraq, Afghanistan and the Middle East