Aaron B. O’Connell is Associate Professor of History at the University of Texas at Austin and the author of Underdogs: The Making of the Modern Marine Corps (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2012). He was previously a professor of American history at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, where he taught courses on American military and diplomatic history. From 2016-2017, he worked in the White House as Director of Defense Policy and Strategy on the National Security Council. A native of Norwalk, Connecticut, he lives in Austin, Texas.