Quick Facts
Biography
Graham E. Fuller (born November 28, 1937) is an American author and political analyst, specializing in Islamic extremism. Formerly vice-chair of the National Intelligence Council, he also served as Station Chief in Kabul for the CIA. A "think piece" that Fuller wrote for the CIA was identified as instrumental in leading to the Iran–Contra affair.
After a career in the United States State Department and CIA lasting 27 years, he joined Rand Corporation as senior political scientist specializing in the Middle East. As of 2006, he was affiliated with the Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, BC, as an adjunct professor of history. He is the author of a number of books, including The Future of Political Islam.
Career
Fuller attended Harvard University, where he earned first a BA and then a MA degree in Russian and Middle Eastern Studies.
State Department
Fuller joined the State Department of the United States, entering the Foreign Service for assignments in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.
CIA
He served 20 years as an operations officer in the CIA. Assignments include postings in: Germany, Turkey, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, North Yemen, Afghanistan, and Hong Kong. In 1982, the CIA appointed him National Intelligence Officer for Near East and South Asia. In 1986, the CIA appointed him vice-chairman of the National Intelligence Council.
Iran–Contra Affair
In 1987, Fuller was identified as the author of a 1985 study that according to the New York Times was "instrumental" in the decision of the Reagan Administration to secretly contact leaders in Iran and "eventually led to the covert sale of United States weapons to Tehran in what became the Iran–Contra affair." The document suggested that the Soviet Union was in position to influence Iran and that the United States might gain influence by selling arms to the country. According to Fuller, he had revised his opinion as the situation developed, but though he had told Government officials, a written report on the change was not circulated. Fuller denied that the original "think piece" he had prepared with Howard Teicher was "tailored ... to support Administration policy."
After government
Fuller left the CIA in 1988 for the RAND Corporation, remaining as a senior political scientist until 2000. At the RAND Corporation he wrote, among many publications, on political Islam in various countries, and on the geopolitics of the Muslim world.
Fuller is an adjunct history professor at Simon Fraser University. He speaks several Middle Eastern languages as well as Russian and Chinese.
After the Boston Marathon bombing, it was revealed that Fuller's daughter Samantha Ankara Fuller (married Tsarnaev) was married in the 1990s to Ruslan Tsarni (born Tsarnaev), the uncle of the perpetrators Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev. They divorced on 26 April 1999, in Orange County, North Carolina. Ruslan Tsarni worked for companies connected to Halliburton. He was also a consultant for a company contracted by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) in the former Soviet Republic of Kyrgyzstan.
Works
Books
- The Center of the Universe: The Geopolitics of Iran. Westview Press. 1991. ISBN 0-8133-1158-6.
- The Democracy Trap: The Perils of the Post-Cold War World. E. P. Dutton. 1991. ISBN 0-525-93371-9.
- How to Learn a Foreign Language. Storm King. 1993. ISBN 0-935166-02-5.
- The Future of Political Islam (revised ed.). Palgrave Macmillan. 2003. ISBN 1-4039-6136-0.
- The New Turkish Republic: Turkey as a Pivotal State in the Muslim world. US Institute of Peace Press. 2008. ISBN 1-60127-019-4.
- A World Without Islam. Little, Brown & Company. 2010. ISBN 0-316-07288-5.
- Three Truths and a Lie. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform. 2012. ISBN 1479274313. ISBN 978-1479274314.
- Breaking Faith (novel). Bozorg Press. 2015. ISBN 9780993751417.
Co-authored books
- Barkey, Henri J.; Graham E. Fuller (1998). Turkey's Kurdish Question. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 0-8476-8553-5.
- Francke, Rend Rahim; Graham E. Fuller (2001). The Arab Shi'a: The Forgotten Muslims. Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 0-312-23956-4.
- Fuller, Graham E.; Ian O. Lesser (1995). A Sense of Siege: The Geopolitics of Islam and the West. Westview Press. ISBN 0-8133-2149-2.
- Fuller, Graham E.; Ian O. Lesser; Paul B. Henze; James F. Brown (1993). Turkey's New Geopolitics: From the Balkans to Western China. Westview Press. ISBN 0-8133-8660-8.
- Ronfeldt, David F.; John Arquilla, Arroyo Center, Graham E. Fuller, Melissa Fuller (1998). The Zapatista "Social Netwar" in Mexico. Rand Corporation. ISBN 0-8330-2656-9.