Jeffrey Engel

2026-2027 Writing Fellow
 
Seeking Monsters to Destroy: How Americans Go to War

Jeffrey Engel is the David Gergen Director of the Center for Presidential History and Professor in the Clements Department of  History. His book Seeking Monsters to Destroy traces U.S. conflicts across the span of American History, beginning with George  Washington and the Revolutionary War and continuing to the present day. It explores how the people charged with implementing  American policy, having first tried to understand their foes and define their strategic goals, then describe those foes and their own  international aspirations to the American people ultimately tasked with fighting the nation’s wars.