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Tom Nichols, a US professor and academic specialist on international affairs, came across a tweet that urged Twitterati to share their controversial food opi. We would like to show you a description here but the site won’t allow us.

Academic background
Born	Thomas M. Nichols December 7, 1960 (age 60)
Nationality	American
Title	Professor of National Security Affairs^[1]
Alma mater	Boston University (BA) Columbia University (MA) Georgetown University (PhD)
Academic work
Institutions	U.S. Naval War College, Harvard University, La Salle University, Dartmouth College, Georgetown University

Thomas M. Nichols (born December 7, 1960) is an academic specialist on international affairs, currently a professor at the U.S. Naval War College and at the Harvard Extension School. His work deals with issues involving Russia, nuclear weapons, and national security affairs. He was previously a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs, and the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.^[2]

Early life and education[edit]

Thomas M. Nichols grew up in Chicopee, Massachusetts.^[3] He has stated in a speech at The Heritage Foundation that he did not come from an educated family, and his parents were 'both Depression era kids who dropped out of college.'^[4] Nichols is an undefeated five-time Jeopardy! champion^[5] and was, at one time, one of the game's all-time top players.^[6]

Nichols has a BA degree in political science from Boston University; a MA degree in political science from Columbia University;^[7] and a Ph.D. in government from Georgetown University.^[5]^[7] He also holds a certificate from the Harriman Institute of Columbia University.^[7]

Career[edit]

Nichols taught international relations as well as Soviet and Russian Affairs at Dartmouth College and Georgetown University.^[4]^[7] He was also a fellow in the International Security Program at the Harvard Kennedy School.^[4] Nichols was the Chairman of National Security Affairs at the U.S. Naval War College where he also held the Forrest Sherman Chair of Public Diplomacy.^[4]^[7] Nichols is a former Secretary of the Navy Fellow^[4] and also a fellow in the International Security Program and the Project on Managing the Atom at the Harvard Kennedy School.^[7]

He taught as an associate professor at Dartmouth College in 1996, where he taught comparative politics and Russian affairs in the Department of Government.^[8] He began teaching on at the Harvard Extension School in 2005 and has taught courses on nuclear weapons, the Cold War, and national security issues.^[8]

In 2011, Nichols was named a Fellow at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.^[8] During this time he began working on a book on nuclear strategy, which was later published in 2014 as No Use: Nuclear Weapons and US National Security.^[8] The book is an analysis of American nuclear weapons policies possible reforms to the United States nuclear strategy.^[7]

Nichols was awarded the Petra T. Shattuck Excellence in Teaching Award from the Harvard Extension School in 2012.^[7]

In 2016, along with former United States Secretary of DefenseWilliam Perry, Nichols was one of nine named as the first professors in the USAF School of Strategic Force Studies.^[8] He specialized in nuclear deterrence issues.^[8]

As of 2019, Nichols is a professor in the Department of National Security Affairs at the U.S. Naval War College,^[7]^[8] while also teaching courses as an adjunct professor at the Harvard Extension School.^[4]^[5]^[7] He is additionally a Senior Associate of the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs in New York City.^[4]

In 1988, Nichols served in the United States Senate as Personal Staff for Defense and Security Affairs for Senator John Heinz.^[4]^[7]^[8]

Awards[edit]

Petra T. Shattuck Excellence in Teaching Award from Harvard Extension School (2012)^[7]
Navy Meritorious Civilian Service Award.^[7]

Politics[edit]

Nichols describes himself as a Never Trump conservative.^[9] During the 2016 presidential campaign, Nichols argued that conservatives should vote for Hillary Clinton, whom he detested, because Trump was 'too mentally unstable' to serve as commander-in-chief.^[10] Nichols continued that argument for the 2018 midterm elections.^[11]

After the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court of the United States, Nichols announced on October 7, 2018, that he would leave the Republican Party and become an independent and claimed that Senator Susan Collins's yes vote on the confirmation convinced him that the Republican Party exists to exercise raw political power.^[12] He also criticized the Democratic Party for being 'torn between totalitarian instincts on one side and complete political malpractice on the other' and said that the party's behavior during the Kavanaugh hearings, with the exception of Senators Chris Coons, Sheldon Whitehouse and Amy Klobuchar, was execrable but that the Republicans have become a threat to the rule of law and to constitutional norms.^[12]

In an opinion column, Nichols cited the Mueller Report to argue that Trump failed in his role as a citizen and then as commander-in-chief by not doing more to prevent and punish the Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.^[13]

Publications[edit]

Books[edit]

The Sacred Cause: Civil-Military Conflict over Soviet National Security, 1917-1992 (1993, Cornell University Press) ISBN0801427746
The Russian Presidency: Society and Politics in the Second Russian Republic (1999, Palgrave Macmillan) ISBN0312293372
Winning the World: Lessons for America's Future from the Cold War (2002, Praeger) ISBN0275966631
Eve of Destruction: The Coming Age of Preventive War (2008, University of Pennsylvania Press) ISBN0812240669
Tactical Nuclear Weapons and NATO, (co-editor) (2012, Military Bookshop) ISBN1584875259
No Use: Nuclear Weapons and U.S. National Security (2013, University of Pennsylvania Press) ISBN0812245660
The Death of Expertise: The Campaign Against Established Knowledge and Why it Matters (2017, Oxford University Press) ISBN0190469412, a study of why people mistrust established knowledge and how this damages democratic stability.
Our Own Worst Enemy: The Assault From Within on Modern Democracy (2020, Oxford University Press) ISBN0197518877

Twitter Radiofreetom

References[edit]

^'About Tom, tomnichols.net'. Retrieved 2018-10-08.
^The Federalist.
^https://twitter.com/RadioFreeTom/status/1114958117308178433
^ ^a^b^c^d^e^f^g^hNichols 2017.
^ ^a^b^cWashington Post Education Forum.
^J! Archive.
^ ^a^b^c^d^e^f^g^hⁱ^j^k^l^mHarvard University.
^ ^a^b^c^d^e^f^g^hU.S. Naval War College.
^'Never-Trump Confidential'. New York Times. July 18, 1016.
^Kennedy, Dan (February 6, 2017). 'Some calming thoughts on Trump coverage from a #NeverTrump conservative'. Media Nation. Retrieved February 6, 2017.
^Tom Nichols (September 4, 2018). 'Want to save the GOP, Republicans? Vote for every Democrat on this year's ballot'. WashingtonPost.com. Retrieved September 4, 2018.
^ ^a^bNichols, Tom (2018-10-07). 'Why I'm Leaving the Republican Party'. The Atlantic. Retrieved 2018-10-07.
^Nichols, Tom. 'Mueller report: Donald Trump failed us as commander in chief'. Retrieved May 24, 2019.

Bibliography[edit]

Nichols, Tom (March 31, 2017). Tom Nichols Discusses the Death of Expertise (Speech). The Heritage Foundation. Washington,DC: The Heritage Foundation. Retrieved February 4, 2019.
'Education Policy Panel'. C-Span. January 18, 2019. Retrieved February 5, 2019.
'Tom Nichols'. The Federalist. Retrieved June 17, 2015.
'Thomas M. Nichols'. Harvard University. 2017-06-12. Retrieved February 6, 2019.
'Tom Nichols'. J! Archive. Retrieved February 6, 2017.
'Thomas M. Nichols, Ph.D.' U.S. Naval War College. Retrieved February 6, 2019.
The Death of Expertise (product description). Oxford University Press. 2017. ISBN9780190469412. Retrieved February 15, 2017.

External links[edit]

Tom Nichols at IMDb

Retrieved from 'https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tom_Nichols_(academic)&oldid=1018363600'

On October 14, 1962, an American U-2 spy plane flew over Cuba and took hundreds of pictures of military installations on the island. The next day, the CIA determined that these bases were actually nuclear-missile sites, set up under our noses by the Soviet Union and discovered by pure luck.

On October 22, President John F. Kennedy enacted a blockade around Cuba and addressed the nation, and the world, on television, saying he was ready to take military action if necessary. The next day, he raised the U.S. military’s alert status to DEFCON 2, one step short of actual nuclear war. The Cuban missile crisis was under way.

Over the next few days, tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union heightened. The U.S.S.R. conducted demonstrative aboveground nuclear tests, and Soviet submarine commanders, on their way to Cuba, were authorized to use nuclear torpedoes at sea. At one point, Kennedy estimated the odds of a nuclear holocaust at “somewhere between one in three and even.”

By October 28, the Soviet ships had turned back, and the U.S.S.R. had pledged to remove the missiles from Cuba. The U.S. had agreed not to invade Cuba and to remove missiles from Turkey. From the time Kennedy went public to the end of the crisis was a mere six days.

Tom Nichols Radiofreetom Twitter

Mere spite, however, is not enough reason to remove Trump. He is willing to instigate violence against his own citizens and the other branches of government, an emotional condition that is an obvious case for invoking the Twenty-Fifth Amendment. Unfortunately, Vice President Mike Pence has resisted this move so resolutely that he refused to answer a call from the speaker of the House and the Senate minority leader.

Congressional Republicans, for their part, are resisting calls to remove Trump, arguing instead that we should all just clench our teeth and tough it out. Speaker Nancy Pelosi, meanwhile, has called for impeachment if Trump does not resign. But she has also told her caucus that she has spoken with the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to “discuss available precautions for preventing an unstable president from initiating military hostilities or accessing the launch codes and ordering a nuclear strike.”

This move is flatly unconstitutional. Pelosi has the right to ask questions as part of Congress's oversight, but she does not have the right to ask for options to circumvent the president's Article II powers. This is an unhealthy signal to the executive branch, and especially to the military, intelligence, and justice communities, to ignore the elected president and to function without an authority in power until Biden arrives.

This circumvention of the Constitution happened once before, albeit by a Cabinet officer rather than at the behest of a legislator. When Richard Nixon was in his final agony, rumored to be drinking heavily and having conversations with the portraits in the White House, Senator Alan Cranston phoned Defense Secretary James Schlesinger to warn about “the need for keeping a berserk president from plunging us into a holocaust.” Schlesinger told the U.S. military that any “unusual orders”—such as using nuclear weapons—should be verified by him or Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. What we didn’t know at the time was that the Soviet leader, Leonid Brezhnev, was in worse shape than Nixon. His health was failing, and he was addicted to sleeping pills. In October 1973, perhaps gambling that Nixon was too compromised to respond, Brezhnev threatened to send troops to the Arab-Israeli War then under way. Kissinger and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Thomas Moorer, decided to act. They issued a worldwide military alert—including elevating the ready status of U.S. nuclear forces—on the night of October 24.