Under his leadership, FDD has become one of the nation’s most highly regarded think tanks and a sought-after voice on a wide range of national security issues. He has helped assemble a staff and advisory board of the most compelling scholars and experts whose research, ideas, and recommendations have shaped important policies and legislation on terrorism, nonproliferation, human rights, Islamism, democratization, and related issues.

Cliff has had a long and distinguished career in international relations, journalism, communications, and politics. A veteran news reporter, foreign correspondent and editor (at The New York Times and other publications), he has covered stories around the world, including datelines from Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Israel, the West Bank, Jordan, Egypt, Turkey, the U.A.E., Bahrain, Oman, Sudan, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Chad, Mexico, Argentina, Northern Ireland, Hungary, Kazakhstan, China, and Russia.

From 2016 to 2018, Cliff served as a commissioner on the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), an independent, bipartisan U.S. federal government commission that makes policy recommendations to the President, the Secretary of State, and Congress in order to advance the pivotal right of religious freedom around the world, and integrate religious freedom into America’s foreign policy.

In 2006, he was appointed an advisor to the Iraq Study Group (Baker-Hamilton Commission) of the United States Institute of Peace, an independent nonpartisan national institution established and funded by Congress. He also received a two-year appointment (2007 to 2009) to the bipartisan Advisory Committee on Democracy Promotion, reporting to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. In 2008, he was nominated by President George W. Bush to serve on the Broadcasting Board of Governors, the entity responsible for all U.S. government and government-sponsored, non-military, international broadcasting. In 2009, the U.S. Department of State awarded him a “U.S. Speaker and Specialist Grant” for a series of speaking engagements and meetings (with government and religious leaders, academics, and journalists) in Pakistan.

He served as the communications director for the Republican National Committee during the historic 2000 cycle in which Republicans won the presidency, the Senate and the House for the first time in 48 years (as well as a majority of state legislatures and governors’ mansions).

A former syndicated columnist for Scripps Howard News Services, he is now the weekly “Foreign Desk” columnist of The Washington Times. He is a frequent guest on national and international television and radio news programs, providing analysis and participating in debates on national security issues. His writing has also appeared in The Wall Street Journal, National Review, Commentary, USA Today, The Atlantic, and many other publications. He is the co-editor of a book on the conflict in Afghanistan and Pakistan, as well as one on energy policy.

Cliff holds master’s degrees from both Columbia University’s School of International Affairs and its School of Journalism. His undergraduate degree is from Sarah Lawrence College, and he holds a certificate in Russian language and literature from Leningrad State University, USSR. He is a member of the Washington Institute of Foreign Affairs. He is married and has two children.

 Reuel is the author of The Wave: Man, God, and the Ballot Box in the Middle East (Hoover Institution Press, 2011), Know Thine Enemy: A Spy’s Journey into Revolutionary Iran (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1997) and The Islamic Paradox: Shiite Clerics, Sunni Fundamentalists, and the Coming of Arab Democracy (AEI Press, 2004). He is a contributing editor for The Weekly Standard and has been a correspondent for The Atlantic Monthly, as well as a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and other publications.

Mark is an expert on Iran’s nuclear program and global threat network, and is widely recognized as one of the key influencers in shaping policies to counter the threats from the regime in Iran. He also contributes to FDD’s China Program drawing on his academic background in China studies and his private sector work in the Indo-Pacific.

In 2019, Iran sanctioned Mark and FDD, calling them “the designing and executing arm of the U.S. administration” on Iran policy. These threats led to bipartisan condemnation, including from Trump, Obama, Bush and Clinton administration officials.

According to The New York Times, “Mark Dubowitz’s campaign to draw attention to what he saw as the flaws in the Iran nuclear deal has taken its place among the most consequential ever undertaken by a Washington think tank leader.”

According to The Atlantic, “Dubowitz has been helping design and push forward sanctions on Iran…establishing the FDD as D.C.’s ground zero for research and policy recommendations aimed at highlighting and fixing what Dubowitz saw as the flaws in the nuclear agreement.”

Before his White House service, Pottinger spent the late 1990s and early 2000s in China as a reporter for Reuters and the Wall Street Journal. He then fought in Iraq and Afghanistan as a US Marine during three combat deployments between 2007 and 2010. Following active duty, he founded and led an Asia-focused risk consultancy and ran Asia research at an investment fund in New York.

Leveraging his subject-matter expertise and native Persian-language skills, Behnam closely tracks a wide range of Iran-related functional and regional topics including nuclear non-proliferation, ballistic missiles and drones, sanctions, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and its proxies, the foreign and security policy of the Islamic Republic, and internal Iranian politics. Frequently called upon to brief journalists, congressional staff, diplomatic, military, academic, and policy audiences in Washington, across the United States, and around the world, Behnam has testified before various committees in the U.S. Congress, the Canadian Parliament, and the UK House of Commons.

Behnam’s analysis has been quoted in The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Reuters, Fox News, Associated Press, Agence France-Presse, Politico, and Axios, among others. Additionally, he has contributed to or coauthored articles for The Wall Street Journal, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, Politico Europe, Fox News, The Hill, War on the Rocks, Newsweek, and The National Interest. Behnam has appeared on a variety of broadcast programs, including PBS Newshour, BBC News, Fox News, CNN International, CBS News, C-SPAN, France 24, and Deutsche Welle.

Behnam earned his M.A. with honors in international relations from The University of Chicago, and his B.A. in international affairs and Middle East studies from The George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs. Behnam is also a member of the Anti-Defamation League’s Task Force on Middle East Minorities and a contributing editor to National Security Journal.

Mark completed 32 years as a nuclear-trained surface warfare officer in the U.S. Navy, retiring as a Rear Admiral.  His flag officer assignments included Director of Operations at U.S. Pacific Command; Commander of Carrier Strike Group 5; and Deputy Director, Plans, Policy and Strategy at U.S. European Command.