Steve Pieczenik
Encyclopedia
Steve Pieczenik, MD, PhD (born December 7, 1943 in Havana
, Cuba
) is an American
psychiatrist
, former State Department official, author
and publisher.
, France
for six years, Pieczenik's family migrated to the United States where they settled in the Harlem
area of New York City
, New York
. Steve Pieczenik was eight years old when his parents received their visa to the US.
Pieczenik is a classical pianist who wrote a full-length musical at the age of eight.
Pieczenik is a Harvard-trained psychiatrist and has a doctorate in international relations from MIT.
According to Pieczenik's autobiography, he attended Booker T. Washington High School in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City. Pieczenik received a full scholarship to Cornell University at the age of 16. In 1964, Pieczenik claims he received a B.A. degree in Pre-Medicine and Psychology
from Cornell, later attending Cornell University Medical College. In his spare time, he attained a PhD in international relations from MIT while studying at Harvard Medical School. Pieczenik claims to be the first psychiatrist ever to receive a PhD focusing on international relations.
While doing his psychiatric residency at Harvard, he was awarded the Harry E. Solomon award for his paper entitled "The hierarchy of ego-defense mechanisms in foreign policy decision making."
An article written by Pieczenik - "Psychological dimensions of international dependency" appears in The American Journal of Psychiatry, Vol 132(4), Apr 1975, 428-431.
, Cyrus Vance
and James Baker
. His expertise includes foreign policy, international crisis management and psychological warfare. He served the presidential administrations of Gerald Ford
, Jimmy Carter
, Ronald Reagan
and George H.W. Bush in the capacity of deputy assistant secretary.
In 1974, Pieczenik joined the U.S. State Department as a consultant to restructure its Office for the Prevention of Terrorism.
In 1976, Pieczenik was made deputy assistant secretary of state for management.
At the State Department, he served as a "specialist on hostage taking." He has been credited with devising successful negotiating strategies and tactics used in several high profile hostage situations including the 1976 TWA Flight 355
hostage situation and the 1977 kidnapping of the son of Cyprus' president. He was involved in negotiations for the release of Aldo Moro
after Moro was kidnapped. As a renowned psychiatrist, he was utilized as a press source for early information on the mental state of the hostages involved in the Iranian Hostage Crisis after they were freed. In 1977, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Mary McGrory
described Stephen Pieczenik as "one of the most 'brilliantly competent' men in the field of terrorism." He worked "side by side" with Police Chief Maurice J. Cullinane in the Washington, D.C. command center of Mayor Walter Washington
during the 1977 Hanafi Siege. In 1978, Pieczenik was known as "a psychiatrist and political scientist in the U.S. State Department whose credentials and experiences are probably unique among officials handling terrorist situations."
On September 17, 1978 the Camp David Accords
were signed. Pieczenik was at the secret Camp David
negotiations leading up to the signing of the Accords. He worked out strategy and tactics based on psychopolitical dynamics. He correctly predicted that, given their common backgrounds, Egyptian President Anwar El Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin
would get along.
In 1979, he resigned as deputy assistant secretary of state over the handling of the Iranian hostage crisis.
In the early 1980s, Pieczenik wrote an article for The Washington Post in which he claims to have heard a senior U.S. official in the State Department Operations Center give permission for the attack that led to the death of U.S. Ambassador Adolph Dubs
in Kabul, Afghanistan in 1979.
Pieczenik got to know Syrian President Hafez Assad well during his 20 years in the US State Department.
In 1982, Pieczenik was mentioned in a New York Times article as "a psychiatrist who has treated C.I.A. employees".
In 2001, Pieczenik operated as chief executive officer of Strategic Intelligence Associates, a consulting firm.
Pieczenik has been affiliated in a professional capacity as a psychiatrist with the National Institute of Mental Health
.
Pieczenik has previously consulted with both the United States Institute of Peace and the RAND Corporation
Pieczenik is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations
.
Pieczenik is known to be fluent in five languages including Russian, Spanish and French
Pieczenik has lectured at the National Defense University
.
He studied writing along with medicine beginning with drama and poetry. But eventually "I turned to fiction because it allows me to address reality as it is or could be."
Pieczenik received a listed credit as "co-creator" for both Tom Clancy's Op-Center
and Tom Clancy's Net Force
, two best-selling series of novels, as a result of a business relationship with Tom Clancy. He was not directly involved in writing books in these series, but "assembled a team" including the ghost-writer who did author the novels, and someone to handle the "packaging" of the novels. The Op-Center series alone had grossed more than 28 million dollars in net profit for the partnership by 2003.
Books authored include: novel Mind Palace (1985), novel Blood Heat (1989), self-help My Life Is Great! (1990) and paper-back edition Hidden Passions (1991), novel Maximum Vigilance (1993), novel Pax Pacifica (1995), novel State Of Emergency (1999), novel My Beloved Talleyrand (2005). He's also credited under the pseudonym Alexander Court for writing the novels Active Measures (2001), and Active Pursuit (2002).
Pieczenik has previously had at least two articles published in the American Intelligence Journal
, a peer-reviewed journal published by the National Military Intelligence Association.
In September 2010, John Neustadt was recognized by Elsevier as being one of the Top Ten Cited Authors in 2007 & 2008 for his article, "Mitochondrial dysfunction and molecular pathways of disease." This article was co-authored with Pieczenik.
Pieczenik is the co-author of the published textbook, Foundations and Applications of Medical Biochemistry in Clinical Practice.
He calls himself a "maverick troublemaker. You make your own rules. You pay the consequences."
On May 3, 2011, radio host Alex Jones
aired an interview in which Pieczenik claimed that Osama Bin Laden had died of Marfan syndrome
in 2001 shortly after the 9/11 attacks, and that the attacks on the United States on 9/11 were part of a false flag operation by the American government.
Havana
Havana is the capital city, province, major port, and leading commercial centre of Cuba. The city proper has a population of 2.1 million inhabitants, and it spans a total of — making it the largest city in the Caribbean region, and the most populous...
, Cuba
Cuba
The Republic of Cuba is an island nation in the Caribbean. The nation of Cuba consists of the main island of Cuba, the Isla de la Juventud, and several archipelagos. Havana is the largest city in Cuba and the country's capital. Santiago de Cuba is the second largest city...
) is an American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
psychiatrist
Psychiatrist
A psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders. All psychiatrists are trained in diagnostic evaluation and in psychotherapy...
, former State Department official, author
Author
An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...
and publisher.
Early Life and Education
Pieczenik was born of Russian-Polish parents in Cuba and reared in France. His father, a doctor from Dombrovicz who studied and worked in Toulouse, fled Poland before World War II. His mother, a Russian Jew from Bialystok, fled Europe after many of her family members were killed. The couple met in Portugal, where both had fled ahead of the Nazi invaders. Pieczenik was born in Cuba—out of wedlock in 1943. After living in ToulouseToulouse
Toulouse is a city in the Haute-Garonne department in southwestern FranceIt lies on the banks of the River Garonne, 590 km away from Paris and half-way between the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea...
, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
for six years, Pieczenik's family migrated to the United States where they settled in the Harlem
Harlem
Harlem is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan, which since the 1920s has been a major African-American residential, cultural and business center. Originally a Dutch village, formally organized in 1658, it is named after the city of Haarlem in the Netherlands...
area of New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
. Steve Pieczenik was eight years old when his parents received their visa to the US.
Pieczenik is a classical pianist who wrote a full-length musical at the age of eight.
Pieczenik is a Harvard-trained psychiatrist and has a doctorate in international relations from MIT.
According to Pieczenik's autobiography, he attended Booker T. Washington High School in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City. Pieczenik received a full scholarship to Cornell University at the age of 16. In 1964, Pieczenik claims he received a B.A. degree in Pre-Medicine and Psychology
Psychology
Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...
from Cornell, later attending Cornell University Medical College. In his spare time, he attained a PhD in international relations from MIT while studying at Harvard Medical School. Pieczenik claims to be the first psychiatrist ever to receive a PhD focusing on international relations.
While doing his psychiatric residency at Harvard, he was awarded the Harry E. Solomon award for his paper entitled "The hierarchy of ego-defense mechanisms in foreign policy decision making."
An article written by Pieczenik - "Psychological dimensions of international dependency" appears in The American Journal of Psychiatry, Vol 132(4), Apr 1975, 428-431.
Professional life
Pieczenik was deputy assistant secretary of state under Henry KissingerHenry Kissinger
Heinz Alfred "Henry" Kissinger is a German-born American academic, political scientist, diplomat, and businessman. He is a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. He served as National Security Advisor and later concurrently as Secretary of State in the administrations of Presidents Richard Nixon and...
, Cyrus Vance
Cyrus Vance
Cyrus Roberts Vance was an American lawyer and United States Secretary of State under President Jimmy Carter from 1977 to 1980...
and James Baker
James Baker
James Addison Baker, III is an American attorney, politician and political advisor.Baker served as the Chief of Staff in President Ronald Reagan's first administration and in the final year of the administration of President George H. W. Bush...
. His expertise includes foreign policy, international crisis management and psychological warfare. He served the presidential administrations of Gerald Ford
Gerald Ford
Gerald Rudolph "Jerry" Ford, Jr. was the 38th President of the United States, serving from 1974 to 1977, and the 40th Vice President of the United States serving from 1973 to 1974...
, Jimmy Carter
Jimmy Carter
James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr. is an American politician who served as the 39th President of the United States and was the recipient of the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize, the only U.S. President to have received the Prize after leaving office...
, Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
and George H.W. Bush in the capacity of deputy assistant secretary.
In 1974, Pieczenik joined the U.S. State Department as a consultant to restructure its Office for the Prevention of Terrorism.
In 1976, Pieczenik was made deputy assistant secretary of state for management.
At the State Department, he served as a "specialist on hostage taking." He has been credited with devising successful negotiating strategies and tactics used in several high profile hostage situations including the 1976 TWA Flight 355
TWA Flight 355
TWA Flight 355 was a domestic Trans World Airlines flight which was hijacked by five terrorists, all members of the Croatian National Resistance which was a terrorist Croatian Ustaše emigrant organization, on September 10, 1976....
hostage situation and the 1977 kidnapping of the son of Cyprus' president. He was involved in negotiations for the release of Aldo Moro
Aldo Moro
Aldo Moro was an Italian politician and the 39th Prime Minister of Italy, from 1963 to 1968, and then from 1974 to 1976. He was one of Italy's longest-serving post-war Prime Ministers, holding power for a combined total of more than six years....
after Moro was kidnapped. As a renowned psychiatrist, he was utilized as a press source for early information on the mental state of the hostages involved in the Iranian Hostage Crisis after they were freed. In 1977, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Mary McGrory
Mary McGrory
Mary McGrory was a liberal American journalist and columnist. She was a fierce opponent of the Vietnam War and was on Richard Nixon's enemies list for writing "daily hate Nixon articles."...
described Stephen Pieczenik as "one of the most 'brilliantly competent' men in the field of terrorism." He worked "side by side" with Police Chief Maurice J. Cullinane in the Washington, D.C. command center of Mayor Walter Washington
Walter Washington
Walter Edward Washington, was an American politician, the first home-rule mayor of the District of Columbia...
during the 1977 Hanafi Siege. In 1978, Pieczenik was known as "a psychiatrist and political scientist in the U.S. State Department whose credentials and experiences are probably unique among officials handling terrorist situations."
On September 17, 1978 the Camp David Accords
Camp David Accords
The Camp David Accords were signed by Egyptian President Anwar El Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin on September 17, 1978, following thirteen days of secret negotiations at Camp David. The two framework agreements were signed at the White House, and were witnessed by United States...
were signed. Pieczenik was at the secret Camp David
Camp David
Camp David is the country retreat of the President of the United States and his guests. It is located in low wooded hills about 60 mi north-northwest of Washington, D.C., on the property of Catoctin Mountain Park in unincorporated Frederick County, Maryland, near Thurmont, at an elevation of...
negotiations leading up to the signing of the Accords. He worked out strategy and tactics based on psychopolitical dynamics. He correctly predicted that, given their common backgrounds, Egyptian President Anwar El Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin
Menachem Begin
' was a politician, founder of Likud and the sixth Prime Minister of the State of Israel. Before independence, he was the leader of the Zionist militant group Irgun, the Revisionist breakaway from the larger Jewish paramilitary organization Haganah. He proclaimed a revolt, on 1 February 1944,...
would get along.
In 1979, he resigned as deputy assistant secretary of state over the handling of the Iranian hostage crisis.
In the early 1980s, Pieczenik wrote an article for The Washington Post in which he claims to have heard a senior U.S. official in the State Department Operations Center give permission for the attack that led to the death of U.S. Ambassador Adolph Dubs
Adolph Dubs
Adolph "Spike" Dubs was the United States Ambassador to Afghanistan from May 13, 1978 until his death in 1979. He was killed in an exchange of fire after a kidnapping attempt.-Career:...
in Kabul, Afghanistan in 1979.
Pieczenik got to know Syrian President Hafez Assad well during his 20 years in the US State Department.
In 1982, Pieczenik was mentioned in a New York Times article as "a psychiatrist who has treated C.I.A. employees".
In 2001, Pieczenik operated as chief executive officer of Strategic Intelligence Associates, a consulting firm.
Pieczenik has been affiliated in a professional capacity as a psychiatrist with the National Institute of Mental Health
National Institute of Mental Health
The National Institute of Mental Health is one of 27 institutes and centers that make up the National Institutes of Health...
.
Pieczenik has previously consulted with both the United States Institute of Peace and the RAND Corporation
Pieczenik is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations
Council on Foreign Relations
The Council on Foreign Relations is an American nonprofit nonpartisan membership organization, publisher, and think tank specializing in U.S. foreign policy and international affairs...
.
Pieczenik is known to be fluent in five languages including Russian, Spanish and French
Pieczenik has lectured at the National Defense University
National Defense University
The National Defense University is an institution of higher education funded by the United States Department of Defense, intended to facilitate high-level training, education, and the development of national security strategy. It is chartered by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, with Navy Vice Admiral...
.
Writing ventures
Pieczenik has made a number of ventures into fiction, both as an author (of State of Emergency and a number of other books) and as a business partner of Tom Clancy for several series of novels.He studied writing along with medicine beginning with drama and poetry. But eventually "I turned to fiction because it allows me to address reality as it is or could be."
Pieczenik received a listed credit as "co-creator" for both Tom Clancy's Op-Center
Tom Clancy's Op-Center
Tom Clancy's Op-Center is a novel series, created by Tom Clancy and Steve Pieczenik, though the series is actually written by Jeff Rovin.-Main characters:These characters are in most or all books:...
and Tom Clancy's Net Force
Tom Clancy's Net Force
Tom Clancy's Net Force is a novel series, created by Tom Clancy and Steve Pieczenik and written by Steve Perry. It is set in 2010 and charts the actions of Net Force: a special division of the FBI set up to combat increasing crime on the internet....
, two best-selling series of novels, as a result of a business relationship with Tom Clancy. He was not directly involved in writing books in these series, but "assembled a team" including the ghost-writer who did author the novels, and someone to handle the "packaging" of the novels. The Op-Center series alone had grossed more than 28 million dollars in net profit for the partnership by 2003.
Books authored include: novel Mind Palace (1985), novel Blood Heat (1989), self-help My Life Is Great! (1990) and paper-back edition Hidden Passions (1991), novel Maximum Vigilance (1993), novel Pax Pacifica (1995), novel State Of Emergency (1999), novel My Beloved Talleyrand (2005). He's also credited under the pseudonym Alexander Court for writing the novels Active Measures (2001), and Active Pursuit (2002).
Pieczenik has previously had at least two articles published in the American Intelligence Journal
American Intelligence Journal
The American Intelligence Journal is a biannual peer-reviewed academic journal published by the National Military Intelligence Association. It has a focus on public education and the dissemination of unclassified knowledge about the profession of military intelligence....
, a peer-reviewed journal published by the National Military Intelligence Association.
In September 2010, John Neustadt was recognized by Elsevier as being one of the Top Ten Cited Authors in 2007 & 2008 for his article, "Mitochondrial dysfunction and molecular pathways of disease." This article was co-authored with Pieczenik.
Pieczenik is the co-author of the published textbook, Foundations and Applications of Medical Biochemistry in Clinical Practice.
More on Steve Pieczenik
In 1992, Pieczenik told Newsday that in his professional opinion, President Bush was "clinically depressed." As a result, he was brought up on an ethics charge before the American Psychiatric Association and reprimanded. He subsequently quit the APA.He calls himself a "maverick troublemaker. You make your own rules. You pay the consequences."
On May 3, 2011, radio host Alex Jones
Alex Jones
Alex or Alexander Jones may refer to:*Alex Jones , U.S. radio host and filmmaker*Alex Jones , Major League Baseball pitcher from 1889 to 1903...
aired an interview in which Pieczenik claimed that Osama Bin Laden had died of Marfan syndrome
Marfan syndrome
Marfan syndrome is a genetic disorder of the connective tissue. People with Marfan's tend to be unusually tall, with long limbs and long, thin fingers....
in 2001 shortly after the 9/11 attacks, and that the attacks on the United States on 9/11 were part of a false flag operation by the American government.