Bruce Jackson has founded and supported many advocacy groups, including the U.S.
Committee on NATO, the Project on Transitional
Democracies (PTD), and the Committee for
the Liberation of Iraq—the pressure group he founded in 2002 in the lead-up to the invasion
of Iraq as a way to generate public and congressional support for the invasion. He is a former director
at the (now-defunct) neoconservative Project
for the New American Century, and a former adviser to Frank
Gaffney's Center for Security Policy and
to the American Enterprise Institute.
A former military intelligence officer, Jackson also worked in the commercial defense industry. In
fact, while working for Lockheed Martin, in 1996 Jackson cofounded the U.S. Committee on NATO (formerly
the U.S. Committee to Expand NATO), an organization whose policies encapsulated much of Jackson's
beliefs. The committee's motto: "Strengthen America, Secure Europe. Defend Values. Expand NATO" (see
Tom Barry, "The NATO Expansion Lobby," March
19, 2004). Jackson also cofounded PTD, an advocacy group that he has presided over since 2002, though
after 2006 very little information is available on the group's activities.
That Jackson's effective advocacy for NATO expansion coincided with his employment at Lockheed Martin,
the world's largest defense contractor and a company that could benefit from bringing more countries
into the U.S. weapons market, has not been overlooked. Wrote one Jackson critic: "Mr. Jackson
was Vice President for Strategy and Planning at Lockheed Martin Corporation, which means that while
Jackson was founding the U.S. Committee on NATO and the Project [on] Transitional Democracies; while
he was serving on the board of the Project for the New American Century; and while he was chairing
the Republican Party subcommittee on foreign policy—all of which advocated more defense—Bruce P. Jackson
was also working for a company that stood to gain the most from stepped up spending on weapons" (Stephen
Gowans, "War, NATO Expansion, and the Other Rackets of Bruce P. Jackson," November 25, 2002).
A 1997 New York Times article describes Jackson's activities in a similar light: "At
night, Bruce P. Jackson is president of the U.S. Committee to Expand NATO, giving intimate dinners
for Senators and foreign officials. By day, he is director of strategic planning for Lockheed Martin
Corporation, the world's biggest weapons maker" (Jeff Gerth and Tim Weiner, New York Times,
June 29, 1997).
Jackson's political ties go beyond his lobbying efforts. Between 1986 and 1990, when he was working
in the Office of the Secretary of Defense in the Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations, Jackson
worked under Dick Cheney, who was then Bush
Senior's secretary of defense; he also worked under Paul
Wolfowitz, and Richard Perle, according
to Judis. Jackson also served as co-chair of the national finance committee for Bob Dole's presidential
campaign in 1995-1996. Perhaps not coincidentally, NATO expansion was one of Dole's principal foreign
policy positions, which in turn propelled Clinton administration support for the policy (cited in Arms
Sales Monitor).
Jackson stepped down from his position at Lockheed Martin in 2002 to focus full-time on the Project
on Transitional Democracies. Much like the U.S. Committee on NATO, PTD's stated mission is to "accelerate
democratic reform and integration which we believe will exist in the broader Euro-Atlantic region over
the next decade." In one of the organization's few recent public actions, PTD made a bid in early
2006 for shares in RosUkrEnergo, a Swiss-based joint venture between Ukraine and Russia that PTD
saw as exploitative. Jackson told the Weekly
Standard: "Due to the Corporation's [PTD's] non-profit status, we will commit to return
all profits to the people of Ukraine who are the legal owners of the assets from which the Project
would otherwise be improperly and illegally profiting." He added, seemingly tongue in cheek: "The
opportunity to get in on the ground floor of the greatest asset-stripping operation in European history
for less than a dollar was something our Board could not pass up. At a minimum, our representatives
will be able to attend the secret Board meetings in Switzerland and St. Petersburg where they will
get to drink champagne with the FSB and the mafia bosses who have stolen the future of Ukraine" (Weekly
Standard, February 9, 2006). In October 2007, Jackson criticized Russia for its slide toward authoritarianism,
accusing Russia of wielding its oil and gas exports to punish former Soviet states (cited in Gary Peach,
Associated Press World Stream, October 11, 2007).
Though U.S. foreign policy has shifted focus from Eastern Europe since the end of the Balkan Wars,
Jackson has remained engaged in the region. In the lead-up to the U.S. invasion of Iraq, he helped
draft a declaration for the Vilnius 10, a group of Eastern European countries seeking entry into NATO.
The declaration supported U.S. action with or without UN approval. "Eager for U.S. support for
their entry into NATO, these countries—dubbed the 'New Europe' by Defense Secretary [Donald]
Rumsfeld—joined the war coalition, at least in name" (see Barry, March 19, 2004). The declaration
stated: "The newest members of the European community agree that we must confront the tyranny
of Saddam Hussein and that the United Nations must now act." According to John B. Judis in the American
Prospect, "The declaration provided ammunition for the administration, but it also created
a furor in Western Europe and even in some of the Vilnius 10 countries, where the public, and even
the governments, did not want to be identified as part of what one Slovenian writer termed the 'war
coalition'" (American Prospect, January 1, 2003).
Jackson was also a member of the American Committee
for Peace in Chechnya (ACPC), an organization founded in 1999 by Freedom
House and seemingly defunct as of 2007 or earlier. According to John Laughland, "The ACPC
heavily promotes the idea that the Chechen rebellion shows the undemocratic nature of Putin's Russia,
and cultivates support for the Chechen cause by emphasizing the seriousness of human rights violations
in the tiny Caucasian republic. It compares the Chechen crisis to those other fashionable 'Muslim'
causes, Bosnia and Kosovo—implying that only international intervention in the Caucasus can stabilize
the situation there" (cited in Guardian, September 8, 2004).
Jackson called the growing tensions between the United States and Russia a "soft war." In
May 2006, London's Guardian reported: " Jackson sketches three fronts on the new battlefield
of ideas and values between Russia and the west: 'Our institutions versus their Potemkin institutions,
free markets versus their coercive state monopolies, and our democracy versus their managed democracy.
What we don't want is militarized competition'" (Guardian, May 13, 2006 ).
Jackson has also criticized some Bush administration policies toward Russia. Following the president's
2005 visit to Moscow, during which Bush ducked hard issues like Chechnya and the Yukos oil takeover,
Jackson said: "President Bush promised to put democracy at the center of the agenda with Russia.
It's on the agenda, but it's still on the periphery" (C.J. Chivers, New York Times , February
25, 2005).
In a 2006 opinion piece Jackson wrote that
"Despite statements at the time by President Putin and Minister of Defense Sergei Ivanov that
the government intended to recover the great power status of which Russia had been unfairly deprived
by the regrettable collapse of the Soviet Union, both Washington and European capitals refused to see
any geopolitical calculation in the methodical suppression of political and press freedoms and the
takeover of the economy by FSB officers and Kremlin cronies" ("Russia and the West Square
Off," Real Clear Politics, July 11, 2006).
Perhaps Jackson's most significant role has been that of an emissary, from the United States to Eastern
Europe, the defense industry to the defense department. Reporter John Judis quotes an unnamed "prominent
neoconservative," who said that Jackson was viewed as the "nexus between the defense industry
and the neoconservatives. He translates us to them, and them to us." And former U.S. Ambassador
to NATO Nicholas Burns called Jackson "an indispensable part of our efforts in reaching out to
these [former Soviet bloc] governments" (American Prospect, January 1, 2003).
This success as an intermediary led the Bush administration to call on him in 2002 to set up the Committee
for the Liberation of Iraq. "People in the White House said, 'We need you to do for Iraq what
you did for NATO,'" Jackson said (American Prospect, January 1, 2003).
Articles written by Jackson have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, National Interest, Policy
Review, Politya, Gazeta Wyborzca, and other publications.
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Affiliations
Project on Transitional Democracies: Founder, President
U.S. Committee on NATO: Founder, Former President
Project for the New American Century: Board of Directors
Center for Security Policy: Former Adviser
American Enterprise Institute: Former Member of International Advisory Board of the New Atlantic Initiative
Council on Foreign Relations: Member
International Institute for Strategic Studies, London: Member
Center for Strategic and International Studies: Board of Advisers
Committee for the Liberation of Iraq: Founder, Chairman of the Board, 2002-2003
Republican National Convention: Chair of Platform Subcommittee on Foreign Policy, 2000 Presidential Campaign
Dole for President: National Co-Chairman of Finance Committee, 1995-1996
American Committee for Peace in Chechnya: Former Member
Government Service
Office of the Secretary of Defense: Various Positions, 1986-1990
U.S. Army: Military Intelligence Officer, 1979-1990
Private Sector
Lockheed Martin: Vice President for Strategy and Planning, 1999-2002; Director of Global Development, 1997-1999; Director of Defense Planning and Analysis, 1995-1997
Martin Marietta Corp.: Former Director of Strategic
Planning; Former Director for Corporate Development Projects, 1993-1995
Lehman Brothers (Investment Bank): 1990-1993
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