Washington Examiner July 10, 2011
THE 3-MINUTE INTERVIEW: John Pike
By Susan Ferrechio
Pike, one of the world's leading experts on defense, space and intelligence policy, is director of GlobalSecurity.org, which he founded in December 2000.
What does your organization do?
It's a military information website. If you want to learn more about military stuff, we are the website you come to.
Who makes up your audience?
We have about a million people visit the website every month. It's people in the military, people thinking about joining the military, veterans, kids whose grandfathers served in the war and are researching that war, and just plain citizens who want to learn more about stuff that's in the news.
What kind of information does the website provide?
Reliable information. Basically we go to government websites, to military websites, to contractor websites and consolidate the information that we find there.
Do you ever come across any surprises in your research?
I'm working on the collapse of the Manchu Dynasty. And I've learned a lot more about the last emperor than I had ever suspected. In "The Last Emperor" [1987 movie], we see the new president of China briefly riding in a car in his plumed uniform. Well, he turns out to be an absolute pivotal character in the whole story. And the readily accessible histories of the collapse of the Manchu dynasties really do not do him justice.
How did you become interested in defense issues?
My father served in World War II and the Korean War and I grew up at a very early age playing with all of his military paraphernalia. And then during the Cuban missile crisis I went down to the basement with my sisters with my comic book because it looked like maybe the world was going to get blown up. ... And I decided maybe these adults needed some help with nuclear weapons and so I started working on nuclear weapon policy since the age of 9 and I've been focused on it ever since.
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