Jan M van Tol

Jan M. van Tol is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. Prior to his retirement from the Navy in 2007, Captain van Tol served as special adviser in the Office of the Vice President. He was a military assistant to Andrew W. Marshall, the Secretary of Defense’s Principal Advisor for Net Assessment, from 1993-96 and again from 2001-2003. At sea, he commanded three warships, two of which, the USS O’Brien (DD-975) and the USS Essex (LHD-2), were part of the U.S. Navy's Forward Deployed Naval Forces based in Japan. Captain van Tol’s analytic work has focused mainly on long-range strategic planning, military innovation, and wargaming. He holds degrees in Philosophy and Logic from the University of Massachusetts and in Operations Research from the Naval Postgraduate School, and graduated with distinction from the Naval War College.