
Will Quinn
Next Generation National Security Fellow, 2018
Senior Policy Advisor, Office of Strategic Capital
Will Quinn is the Senior Policy Advisor at the Office of Strategic Capital (OSC), where he oversees legislative affairs, supports strategic planning, and provides counsel to OSC leadership on investments in emerging technologies, the industrial base, and economic competition.
Prior to joining OSC, Will was Deputy Director and Research Fellow at the Ax:son Johnson Institute for Statecraft and Diplomacy, an organization that applies the lessons of history to contemporary policy problems. In that role, he fostered the work of emerging scholars and engaged senior policymakers and analysts from the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe, and Japan in dialogue on subjects such as the role of emerging technologies in world order, the future of intelligence, transatlantic security, and strategic competition with the People’s Republic of China. Based at the Henry A. Kissinger Center for Global Affairs at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), Will also taught courses on briefing skills, the Intelligence Community, and Shakespeare with senior faculty and conducted research for the RAND Corporation on nuclear weapons, intelligence oversight, and escalation dynamics on the Sino-Indian border.
Will previously served as a Professional Staff Member on the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) for Chairman John McCain. In that role, he advised committee members and conducted oversight of DoD policy, operations, and programs under U.S. Central Command, U.S. Southern Command, and U.S. Northern Command, drafting and negotiating provisions in the annual National Defense Authorization Act. His portfolio included subjects such as regional threats, counterterrorism, security assistance, homeland defense, counternarcotics, defense support for civil authorities, counter-unmanned aerial systemsdefense, and force employment strategies aimed at focusing DoD resources on the Western Pacific. Prior to SASC, Will worked in strategic communications for the Peter G. Peterson Foundation – a New York-based non-profit organization dedicated to improving America’s fiscal outlook.
Will graduated cum laude from Harvard College with an A.B. in History and subsequently earned an M.A. in International Relations with concentrations in Strategic Studies and International Economics and a PhD with distinction at Johns Hopkins SAIS. His doctoral research focused on the role of U.S.-Russian relations in the development of U.S. foreign policy, strategic thinking, and politics prior to the Cold War, drawing on archives spanning the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.