Dr Lester W. Grau is a retired US Army infantry officer who fought in South Vietnam and who served as a Russian-speaking Soviet Foreign Area Officer during the Cold War. Les served in a variety of command and staff positions with postings in Germany, the Netherlands, South Korea and Moscow. He is the author of six books on Afghanistan, a book on Chechnya, mountain combat and Soviet partisan combat. In addition, he has published over two hundred articles on Soviet and Russian tactics, Afghanistan, urban combat and geopolitical topics. He has been a frequent visitor to Central and Southern Asia and was a CENTCOM Fellow. He currently is a Senior Analyst at the Foreign Military Studies Office in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas where he researches foreign understandings of contemporary and future geopolitical issues.