Sam Plapinger

Sam Plapinger is a political scientist at RAND. He works on a range of defense and national security issues and his areas of expertise include strategic competition, military effectiveness, net assessment, force design, maritime, land, and special operations, logistics, irregular and urban warfare, and Middle East regional security. Prior to joining RAND, Plapinger was a research scientist at CNA's Center for Naval Analyses (the Department of the Navy's FFRDC). At CNA, he directed and worked on projects for senior leaders within the DOD, Navy, and Marine Corps on a variety of strategic and operational topics. He also served full-time as the embedded CNA Field Representative to Commander, U.S. Naval Forces Central Command/Fifth Fleet in Bahrain, where he conducted independent research and analysis directly for the top U.S. Navy commander in the Middle East to inform their decision-making.

Plapinger's academic research has been published in Security Studies, and his policy commentary has appeared in outlets such as West Point’s Modern War Institute and DefenseOne. 

Before joining CNA, Plapinger was a Pre-Doctoral Fellow at the Program on Order, Conflict, and Violence (OCV) at Yale University and a Summer Associate at RAND. He received his Ph.D. and M.A in foreign affairs from the University of Virginia and his B.A. in government and economics from Wesleyan University.