Michael Turner is a nonresident senior fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Global China Hub and a former US diplomat and US Navy JAG Corps officer with nearly twenty-five years of experience on national-security issues with a focus on Asia. He is the founder of Turner Global Solutions, consulting on a variety of issues with a focus on China and the Asia-Pacific.
Most recently, Turner served as spokesperson for the US embassy in Beijing, leading on strategic and crisis press and social media campaigns and managing high-profile social media platforms to advance US policy interests and counter disinformation.
Turner previously served in the Office of the Secretary of State, was senior advisor to the ranking member on the House Armed Services Committee, wrote all-source analysis for the president’s daily brief, and planned the 20th anniversary of the normalization of diplomatic relations with Vietnam. The Navy’s sole prosecutor during 9/11, he deployed to Afghanistan in December 2001, to support the case against American Taliban John Walker Lindh.
Turner is the recipient of several Department of State and Department of Defense awards. A Harvard Business School alumnus, he holds a law degree from the University of Baltimore and a bachelor’s degree from George Washington University.