Peter C. Grace
Peter C. Grace is an academic and commentator on politics and international relations.
He is the author of the Intelligence Intellectuals: Social Scientists and the Making of the CIA, (Georgetown University Press) and writes regularly on national security and intelligence matters. He is also one of the volume editors of New Zealand's Foreign Policy under the Jacinda Ardern Government.
Peter has lectured on foreign policy, intelligence, and international relations at the University of Otago, and on cyber security at the University of Waikato, both in New Zealand. He co-founded the Otago National Security School and is a member of the annual Otago Foreign Policy School committee.
He is currently writing a book on grand strategy and intelligence: a case study on how the U.S began to think about the Soviet Union as a potential enemy after World War II, and considered how to prepare again for a new conflict.
Photo by Stephen Penny
Recent Work
In the early days of the Cold War, the United States faced a crisis in intelligence analysis. A series of intelligence failures in 1949 and 1950 made it clear that gut instinct and traditional practices were no longer sufficient for intelligence analysis in the nuclear age.
Based on new archival research in declassified documents and the participants’ personal papers, The Intelligence Intellectuals reveals the history of how America’s brightest academic minds were recruited by the CIA to revolutionize intelligence analysis.
Peter C. Grace demonstrates how these professors—such as William Langer from Harvard, Sherman Kent from Yale, and Max Millikan from MIT—developed systematic approaches to intelligence analysis that reshaped the CIA’s methodology and gave the United States an advantage in the Cold War.
Readers interested in the history of intelligence and the history of the Cold War will enjoy this insightful book about the place of social science in national security.
“A terrific history of the CIA’s early struggle to become a world-class intelligence agency...” - David Hoffman, author, The Billion Dollar Spy: A True Story of Cold War Espionage and Betrayal
“A fascinating history of the people and purposes that shaped the US approach to peace-time strategic intelligence analysis after 1945.” - Lawrence Freedman, emeritus professor of war studies, King’s College London
“A must read for anyone interested in how and why intelligence in the United States functioned, and functions, as it does.” - Daniel Bessner, Anne H.H. and Kenneth B. Pyle Associate Professor in American Foreign Policy, Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies, University of Washington, and author of Democracy in Exile: Hans Speier and the Rise of the Defense Intellectual
“A masterful account. Thoroughly researched, Peter Grace’s book joins Cloak and Gown and Book and Dagger in showing how Ivy League academics silently crept into the world of intelligence analysis and eventually took it over.” - Greg Herken, author, The Georgetown Set: Friends and Rivals in Cold War Washington
Enquiries
Interested in working together? Fill out some info and we will be in touch shortly.