Peter Rough

Senior Fellow and Director, Center on Europe and Eurasia

peter_rough

At A Glance:

Peter Rough is a senior fellow and director of the Center on Europe and Eurasia at Hudson Institute.

Biography

Peter Rough is a senior fellow and director of the Center on Europe and Eurasia at Hudson Institute. In that capacity, he writes and comments on US foreign policy and regularly briefs official delegations, news media, public intellectuals, academics, and business leaders from around the world. Mr. Rough also convenes several track 1.5 dialogues.

Mr. Rough is a regular commentator on major radio and television and speaker in public forums. While at the institute, he has been named a next generation leader at the Munich Security Conference, Atlantik-Brücke, the Center for New American Security, and the American Institute for Contemporary German Studies. He has also helped edit Hudson’s journal, Current Trends in Islamist Ideology.

Mr. Rough is also principal and founder of Hilltop Solutions, a limited liability company that performs writing and research services for academics, executives, and political professionals. Previously, as director of research in the Office of George W. Bush, Mr. Rough assisted the former president with his memoir, Decision Points. In 2014, his highly acclaimed collaboration with Leila Fawaz on a social history of World War I in the Middle East, A Land of Aching Hearts, was published by Harvard University Press.

From 2007 to 2009, Mr. Rough served as associate director in the White House Office of Strategic Initiatives, where he helped coordinate political strategy and outreach to key stakeholders. He has also completed stints as a policy analyst at the US Agency for International Development, where he was staff briefer to Administrator Henrietta Fore, and as an advisor to US Army Special Operations Command, where he analyzed unconventional warfare doctrine for the commanding general’s Strategic Initiatives Group. In 2012, he was responsible for US-Russia bilateral relations as a member of the Romney for President Russia Working Group. In 2016, he served as a member of the Rubio for President Middle East Working Group.

Mr. Rough began his career at the Republican National Committee specializing in political research. A proud native of Des Moines, Iowa, he holds his BA, summa cum laude, from the George Washington University and MA in law and diplomacy from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, where he was a Cabot corporation scholar.

He is a member of the board of the American Main Street Initiative and previously was a commissioner of the Radio in the American Sector (RIAS) Commission in Berlin. Mr. Rough is also a member of the Friends of Ukraine Network’s (FOUN) Task Force on National Security and vice chair of the Reagan Institute’s Foreign for American Leadership Europe group.

Mr. Rough is a native German speaker.

Events
23
May 2023
Past Event
Senator Mike Rounds on the Importance of the War in Ukraine
Featured Speakers:
Senator Mike Rounds
Peter Rough
.
23
May 2023
Past Event
Senator Mike Rounds on the Importance of the War in Ukraine

Join Center on Europe and Eurasia Director Peter Rough to hear what Senator Rounds has to say on the war and its importance to American interests.

.
Featured Speakers:
Senator Mike Rounds
Peter Rough
17
May 2023
Past Event
The Next Move in Ukraine: A Conversation with Michael R. Pompeo
Featured Speakers:
Michael R. Pompeo
Peter Rough
Former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy shake hands in Kyiv, Ukraine, on April 4, 2023. (Ukrainian Presidency / Handout/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
17
May 2023
Past Event
The Next Move in Ukraine: A Conversation with Michael R. Pompeo
Former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy shake hands in Kyiv, Ukraine, on April 4, 2023. (Ukrainian Presidency / Handout/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
Featured Speakers:
Michael R. Pompeo
Peter Rough
04
May 2023
Past Event
Global Reverberations of Russia’s War on Ukraine: Perspectives on Africa
Featured Speakers:
Ebenezer Obadare
Joseph Sany, PhD
Joshua Meservey
Moderator:
Peter Rough
Russian President Vladimir Putin, Egyptian President Abdel Fattal el-Sisi, and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa during the plenary meeting of the Russia-Africa Summit on October 24, 2019, in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, Russia. (Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images)
04
May 2023
Past Event
Global Reverberations of Russia’s War on Ukraine: Perspectives on Africa

Joseph Sany of the United States Institute of Peace and Ebenezer Obadare of the Council on Foreign Relations join Hudson experts to analyze the historical, economic, and diplomatic complexities that shape the varied African perspectives on Russia.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, Egyptian President Abdel Fattal el-Sisi, and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa during the plenary meeting of the Russia-Africa Summit on October 24, 2019, in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, Russia. (Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images)
Featured Speakers:
Ebenezer Obadare
Joseph Sany, PhD
Joshua Meservey
Moderator:
Peter Rough
02
May 2023
Past Event
Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský on the Indo-Pacific, Ukraine, and Transatlantic Ties
Featured Speakers:
Jan Lipavský
Peter Rough
.
02
May 2023
Past Event
Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský on the Indo-Pacific, Ukraine, and Transatlantic Ties

Hudson Institute will host Czech Minister of Foreign Affairs Jan Lipavský for remarks on the Czech view of the Indo-Pacific, the war in Ukraine, and transatlantic relations, followed by a conversation with Europe and Eurasia Center Director Peter Rough.

.
Featured Speakers:
Jan Lipavský
Peter Rough
cheers
Caption
Russian President Vladimir Putin and China's President Xi Jinping toast during a reception at the Kremlin, Moscow, on March 21, 2023. (Pavel Byrkin/SPUTNIK/AFP via Getty Images)
peter_rough
peter_rough
Senior Fellow and Director, Center on Europe and Eurasia
In the Media
Members of the Ukrainian Volunteer Army prepare to fire a rocket propelled grenade while testing weapons systems on February 25, 2023, in Donbas, Ukraine. (John Moore/Getty Images)
Caption
Members of the Ukrainian Volunteer Army prepare to fire a rocket propelled grenade while testing weapons systems on February 25, 2023, in Donbas, Ukraine. (John Moore/Getty Images)
peter_rough
peter_rough
Senior Fellow and Director, Center on Europe and Eurasia
Podcast
1 Min Read