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New Atlanticist

Mar 16, 2022

Iran deal or not, Gulf nations need integrated air and missile defense 

By the Atlantic Council’s Gulf Security Task Force

Nuclear talks aside, a US-backed missile defense system is key in deterring Iran’s regional armed network while advancing US and Gulf security aims.

Defense Technologies Iran

In the News

Jan 28, 2022

Hooper in Defense News on the simultaneity problem

By Atlantic Council

LTG Charles Hooper, USA (Ret.) shares his view that the United States will not have to manage multiple crises simultaneously.

China Conflict

Seizing the advantage

Mar 18, 2021

US national defense strategy and the future of foreign military sales

By Charles W. Hooper

Ongoing great-power competition, US efforts to strengthen alliances and partnerships, and the global dominance of the US defense industry will ensure that FMS remains a policy tool of first resort. This being the case, US policymakers need to ensure that it is the most efficient tool that it can be.

Defense Industry Defense Policy
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Lieutenant General (Retired) Charles “Hoop” Hooper is known as an agile, resilient, and high-impact leader, who offers an uncommon blend of strategy and partnership development, disciplined leadership, and operational expertise—supplemented by global insight and deep cross-cultural experience. He is one of the nation’s foremost experts China’s military and defense industries, US-China military relations, US security cooperation and financial assistance, and foreign military sales. Hooper has over thirty years of experience in security policy formulation and execution, strategic intelligence, military diplomacy, sensitive negotiations, education, and transformational leadership of large, complex organizations. He has served in operational assignments with the 25th Infantry and 82nd Airborne Divisions, taught Chinese foreign policy at the Naval Postgraduate School, and served as the senior China policy official in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the senior Department of Defense strategist and planner for US Africa Command, and the senior US military officer in Egypt. He is a fluent Chinese linguist who served seven years in Beijing, culminating with his assignment as US Defense Attaché to China from 2007 to 2009. In his final military assignment, Hooper was director of the Defense Security Cooperation Agency, responsible for the overseas sale of all weapons, military equipment, support services, and training packages for the United States government. He was also a postgraduate research fellow at the Harvard Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Among his numerous honors, Hooper was awarded the National Defense Medal by the French Government and was the first Army student-officer and first Harvard Kennedy School of Government student selected to give a Harvard University graduate student commencement address. He is a member of MENSA, the Council on Foreign Relations, and is on the board of directors of the National Bureau of Asian Research.

Hooper holds a Bachelor of Science from the United States Military Academy, West Point, a Master of Public Administration from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, and a Master of Strategic Studies from the US Army War College. In addition to English, Hooper speaks Mandarin Chinese and the Egyptian dialect of Arabic.