John Lewis Gaddis is a noted historian

Historian

A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is...

 of the Cold War

Cold War

The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...

 and grand strategy

Grand strategy

Grand strategy comprises the "purposeful employment of all instruments of power available to a security community". Military historian B. H. Liddell Hart says about grand strategy:...

, who has been hailed as the "Dean of Cold War Historians" by The New York Times

The New York Times

The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

. He is the Robert A. Lovett

Robert A. Lovett

Robert Abercrombie Lovett was the fourth United States Secretary of Defense, serving in the cabinet of President Harry S. Truman from 1951 to 1953 and in this capacity, directed the Korean War. Promoted to the position from deputy secretary of defense Domhoff described Lovett as a "Cold War...

 Professor of Military and Naval History at Yale University

Yale University

Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...

. He is also the official biographer of the seminal 20th century statesman George F. Kennan

George F. Kennan

George Frost Kennan was an American adviser, diplomat, political scientist and historian, best known as "the father of containment" and as a key figure in the emergence of the Cold War...

.

Gaddis is best known for his critical analysis of the strategies of containment

Containment

Containment was a United States policy using military, economic, and diplomatic strategies to stall the spread of communism, enhance America’s security and influence abroad, and prevent a "domino effect". A component of the Cold War, this policy was a response to a series of moves by the Soviet...

 employed by United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 presidents from Harry S. Truman

Harry S. Truman

Harry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States . As President Franklin D. Roosevelt's third vice president and the 34th Vice President of the United States , he succeeded to the presidency on April 12, 1945, when President Roosevelt died less than three months after beginning his...

 to Ronald Reagan

Ronald Reagan

Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....

, and for arguing that Soviet

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 leader Joseph Stalin

Joseph Stalin

Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...

's personality and role in history was one of the most important causes of the Cold War. His most recent work
The Cold War: A New History (2005) examines the history and effects of the Cold War in a more removed context than previously possible.
Other important works include We Now Know (1997), an analysis of the Cold War from its origins to the Cuban Missile Crisis, incorporating new archival evidence from the Soviet bloc, and his revised edition of Strategies of Containment (2005), which analyzes in detail the theory and methods used to contain the Soviet Union from the Truman to Reagan administrations.

He received his doctorate from the University of Texas at Austin

University of Texas at Austin

The University of Texas at Austin is a state research university located in Austin, Texas, USA, and is the flagship institution of the The University of Texas System. Founded in 1883, its campus is located approximately from the Texas State Capitol in Austin...

, where he worked under Robert Divine. He taught at Indiana University

Indiana University

Indiana University is a multi-campus public university system in the state of Indiana, United States. Indiana University has a combined student body of more than 100,000 students, including approximately 42,000 students enrolled at the Indiana University Bloomington campus and approximately 37,000...

 and has held visiting positions at the Naval War College

Naval War College

The Naval War College is an education and research institution of the United States Navy that specializes in developing ideas for naval warfare and passing them along to officers of the Navy. The college is located on the grounds of Naval Station Newport in Newport, Rhode Island...

, Princeton University

Princeton University

Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....

, and the University of Helsinki

University of Helsinki

The University of Helsinki is a university located in Helsinki, Finland since 1829, but was founded in the city of Turku in 1640 as The Royal Academy of Turku, at that time part of the Swedish Empire. It is the oldest and largest university in Finland with the widest range of disciplines available...

 before joining Ohio University

Ohio University

Ohio University is a public university located in the Midwestern United States in Athens, Ohio, situated on an campus...

 in 1969. At Ohio, he founded and directed the Contemporary History Institute

Contemporary history institute

The Contemporary History Institute is an interdisciplinary academic research institute at Ohio University in Athens, Ohio. It was founded in 1987 by the dean of Cold War historians, John Lewis Gaddis, who has since moved to Yale University...

 and was named a distinguished professor in 1983. He served as president of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations

Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations

The Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations is the leading learned society for the academic study of the history of United States foreign policy....

 in 1992.

In 2005, he received the National Humanities Medal

National Humanities Medal

The National Humanities Medal honors individuals or groups whose work has deepened the nation’s understanding of the humanities, broadened citizens’ engagement with the humanities, or helped preserve and expand Americans’ access to important resources in the humanities.The award, given by the...

.

Publications

• The United States and the Origins of the Cold War, 1941–1947 (1972; 2nd. ed., 2000).
• Russia, the Soviet Union, and the United States: An Interpretive History - (1978, 2d ed., 1990)
• Strategies of Containment: A Critical Appraisal of Postwar American National Security Policy - (1982; 2d ed. 2005)
• The Long Peace: Inquiries into the History of the Cold War - (1987)
• The United States and the End of the Cold War: Reconsideration, Implications, Provocations - (1992)
• On Moral Equivalency and Cold War History Ethics & International Affairs
  Ethics & International Affairs (journal)
  Ethics & International Affairs is a peer-reviewed academic journal covering international relations that is published by the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs. It was established in 1987. Topics covered in the journal range from global justice, democratization, international law,...
  
  , Volume 10 (1996)
• We Now Know: Rethinking Cold War History - (1997) ISBN 0-19-878071-0
• The Landscape of History: How Historians Map the Past - (2002)
• Surprise, Security, and the American Experience - (2004)
• The Cold War: A New History, Penguin Press (2005). ISBN 1-59420-062-9 (US edition). The Cold War, Allen Lane (2005). ISBN 0-7139-9912-8 (UK edition).
• Ending Tyranny: The past and future of an idea The American Interest
  The American Interest
  The American Interest is a non-partisan bimonthly magazine focusing primarily on foreign policy, international affairs, global economics, and matters related to the military...
  
  (September–October 2008)
• George F. Kennan: An American Life - (2011)