Walter B. Slocombe

Walter B. Slocombe
United States Department of Defense Under Secretary of Defense for Policy
In office 1994–2001
Preceded by	Frank G. Wisner
Succeeded by	Douglas Feith
Personal details
Born	(1941-09-23) September 23, 1941
Nationality	United States
Alma mater	Harvard Law School University of Oxford Princeton University
Occupation	Lawyer

Walter Becker Slocombe (born September 23, 1941) is a former Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (1994–2001) and was the Senior Advisor for Security and Defence to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad (2003).

A lawyer and career federal official, Slocombe joined the staff of the National Security Council in 1969. Prior to that, he worked as a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Abe Fortas. He is a four-time recipient of an award for Distinguished Public Service and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. He currently practices law with the Washington firm of Caplin & Drysdale.

Education

Slocombe received a B.A. from Princeton University in 1963, where he received the Moses Taylor Pyne Honor Prize, the highest general distinction conferred on an undergraduate. Slocombe was also a Rhodes scholar, studying at the University of Oxford from 1963-1965. He graduated summa cum laude from Harvard Law School in 1968 and was admitted to the bar in 1970.

Iraqi Occupation and CPA

According to the second episode of the documentary "The Iraq War", aired on the BBC on 5 June 2013, Slocombe's unilateral decision to deny approximately 300,000 former Iraqi Army soldiers $20 (per soldier) sustenance payments a few months after the end of the (2003) Iraq War, drove the Iraqi soldiers to turn away from offering their services to help rebuild Iraq's infrastructure and led directly to a rapid onset of, and sustained increase in, violent insurgency against US forces, which were now perceived as an occupying force. In turn local militia's that initially arose to protect local resources from looters, suddenly gained a large influx of trained military personnel capable of constructing IEDs with which to attack US forces.

U.S. Government service

• Committee on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction (2004)
• Senior advisor for the Coalition Provisional Authority (2003)
• Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (1994-2001)
• Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (1979-1981), (1993-1994)
• Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Security Affairs (1977-1979)