The Cognitive Crucible is a forum that presents different perspectives and emerging thought leadership related to the information environment. The opinions expressed by guests are their own, and do not necessarily reflect the views of or endorsement by the Information Professionals Association.

During this episode, Curtis Fox discusses his new book: Hybrid Warfare: The Russian Approach to Strategic Competition and Conventional Military Conflict. Curtis Fox utilizes a series of case studies on historic Russian operations to demonstrate that while Russia’s methods appear to be cloaked in a shadow of mystique, their strategic realities make them consistent and predictable.

Resources:

Cognitive Crucible Podcast Episodes Mentioned
- #144 Nick Eberstadt on Demographics
Hybrid Warfare: The Russian Approach to Strategic Competition and Conventional Military Conflict
About Curtis Fox
Hybrid Warfare: The Russian Approach to Strategic Competition and Conventional Military Conflict by Curtis Fox
Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies by Jared M. Diamond

Link to full show notes and resources

Guest Bio:

Curtis Lee Fox is the son of a West Texas cotton farmer and a Kentucky kindergarten teacher. He was raised in Texas and Virginia, and studied Mechanical Engineering at Virginia Tech, where he lived next door to his future wife Katie.

They eventually met after Curtis volunteered to help Katie’s roommates move furniture. Despite being accepted to the graduate engineering program at Virginia Tech under a research assistant-ship, Curtis chose to enlist in the Army. He was selected to attend the Special Forces Qualification Course, learned to speak Russian, won his Green Beret, and served in the 10th Special Forces Group.

After completing his time in service, Curtis studied at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business, earning a Master’s of Business Administration. Curtis and Katie married in 2017, and they now reside in Northern Virginia where Curtis works as a systems engineer and project manager. They celebrated the birth of their daughter Ginny in 2021.

As believing Christians, Curtis and Katie are involved in their Church.

“We change the world by changing ourselves. It’s only by letting go of grand-scale visions, the need to re-make the world ‘as it should be’, and by focusing on the development of our own consciences that our families and communities begin to transcend the meager existence that is man’s inheritance on Earth. The alleviation from unnecessary suffering, or perhaps from the habits of mind that produce suffering, is a direct result of the redemption of each individual human heart.”

About: The Information Professionals Association (IPA) is a non-profit organization dedicated to exploring the role of information activities, such as influence and cognitive security, within the national security sector and helping to bridge the divide between operations and research. Its goal is to increase interdisciplinary collaboration between scholars and practitioners and policymakers with an interest in this domain.

For more information, please contact us at communications@information-professionals.org.

Or, connect directly with The Cognitive Crucible podcast host, John Bicknell, on LinkedIn.

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