Murphy, Paul J. 1943–

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Murphy, Paul J. 1943–

(Paul James Murphy)

PERSONAL:

Born November 14, 1943, in Nebraska City, NE; son of Arnold Eugene and Juanita Ardel Murphy. Education: Moscow M.V. Lomonsov State University, language diploma, 1969; University of Colorado, B.A., 1969, M.A., 1971; University of Queensland, Ph.D., 1978.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Fairfax, VA. Office—President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, Executive Office Bldg., Washington, DC 20500.

CAREER:

Political scientist, government official, and writer. University of Colorado, Boulder, assistant to director of Institute for Comparative Political Systems, 1969-72; University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia, lecturer in political science, 1972-75; U.S. Department of Defense, Washington, DC, political and military affairs analyst, 1975-82; White House, Washington, DC, assistant director of President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, 1983—. Military service: U.S. Air Force, 1962-66; became airman first class.

MEMBER:

Dobro Slovo Society.

WRITINGS:

(Editor) Naval Power in Soviet Policy, U.S. Government Printing Office (Washington, DC), 1978.

Brezhnev: Soviet Politician, McFarland Publications (Jefferson, NC), 1981.

(Editor) The Soviet Air Forces, McFarland Publications (Jefferson, NC), 1984.

MiG-21, Anchor Books, 1984.

The Wolves of Islam: Russia and the Faces of Chechen Terror, Brassey's (Washington, DC), 2004.

Contributor to World Review.

SIDELIGHTS:

Paul J. Murphy told CA: "Although I have written on a variety of subjects, Soviet politics is, unquestionably, my first passion; biography, my second. Seven years were dedicated to my search for the real Brezhnev, for the motives of his political involvement, and for the key to his success as a leader of the other superpower. What I found was a character unlike the one I had come to know from the Western media. Schooled under Stalin, ambitious, driven, cunning, disciplined, ruthless, and concealing, Brezhnev quietly made his way to the top of the Soviet political hierarchy and stayed there until his natural death. For the West he carefully cultivated the image of a ‘dove.’ ‘God will never forgive us if we don't disarm,’ he told President Carter. But privately he promised his generals military superiority and gave it to them in the 1970s. We in the West tend to view the world as we believe it should be, not as it is. My purpose in writing about Soviet politics and the Soviet Armed Forces is to illuminate, to the extent that it is possible, the other world as the Soviets perceive and shape it."

In his 1981 book, Brezhnev: Soviet Politician, Murphy provides a biography of the Soviet leader with a focus on his political life and maneuverings. John C. Campbell, writing in Foreign Affairs, noted that the author "has done a credible and creditable job."

Murphy turns his attention to the principal cast and characters of Russia's fight against terrorism with his 2004 book, The Wolves of Islam: Russia and the Faces of Chechen Terror. Murphy focuses primarily on the Islamic rebels from Chechnya and their efforts to drive Russia out of the North Caucasus. He closely examines the Chechen terrorists' horrific acts of terror, including the 2002 takeover of the Dubrovka Theater Center in an industrial suburb of Moscow. Filled with more than 700 spectators who came to see a musical, the theater was taken over by rebels, then recaptured by Russian troops in a battle that resulted in the death of more than one hundred theater goers. The rebels, however, did not kill the attendees. Rather, they succumbed to an incapacitating gas based on the drug fentanyl that the Russian authorities used just before storming the building and ending the siege. All of the militants were killed. The author also examines a subsequent terrorist takeover in 2004 in which Chechen militants massacred children in a school. In his analysis of this extreme militant group, the author discusses how he believes these terrorists have led Chechnya to become a place of chaos, political anarchy, and economic ruin. A Bookwatch contributor noted that the author "deftly examines the … terrorist group."