Dislodged by Policy, Anchored by Theory:
Clausewitz’s Trinity and My Exit from the American Research State
Clausewitz’s “remarkable trinity”—primordial violence, chance, and rational policy— was meant to describe the nature of war. Lately though, I’ve found it eerily applicable to the intellectual and professional battlefield I’ve been navigating.
Primordial Violence and Emotion: The ideological fervor sweeping through U.S. institutions with this new administration has felt less like policy and more like passion—an unreasoned purge of dissent, were loyalty trumps logic. There are countless examples of this loyalty over logic. Trump admin hires like Pam Bondi, Kash Patel, and Kristi Naomi, were clearly chosen due to their unwavering loyalty to Trump and Project 2025 instead of any deep expertise or experience in their respective positions.
Chance and friction: I didn’t expect to be fired. Seven years of work in anti-corruption, counter threat finance, and sanctions research ended not with a bang, but with a bureaucratic shrug. The randomness of it all—the timing, the targeting—felt like Clausewitz’s fog of war. There were weekly discussions of needing to be more “efficient”, but this was directed at everyone in the office. Since my lay off, I’ve seen thousands of former colleagues being RIF’d themselves. In some twisted way, I see myself as incredibly lucky being one of the first laid off as it’s given me the time to collect my thoughts and assess this maddening situation.
Rational policy? That’s the hardest part. The administration’s push to consolidate intellectual loyalty has created a chilling effect. Federal grants are being slashed, visas revoked, and entire research domains deemed “non-essential”. Recently, there’s been a crack-down from the DOD on cutting off employee’s attendance on workshops and conferences hosted by Think Tanks, NGOS and other more academic institutions. DOD officials pulled out of the Aspen Security Forum citing the “evils of Globalism”. The result? A coming brain drain not only of talent and expertise, but of trust.
So, I am embarking on leaving the States. I’m preparing for graduate studies abroad in Europe this autumn, where academic freedom still feels like a right, not a risk. It’s not just a career pivot—it’s a strategic withdrawal. Clausewitz wrote that war is “an act of force to compel our enemy to do our will.” In this case, the enemy was indifference and ambiguity, and the will was survival.
This Substack will be my campaign journal in a sense going forward. I’ll explore how strategic theory can illuminate not just military history, but the politics of knowledge. I’ll write about the siege of ideas, the terrain of bureaucracy, and the feigned retreats we make to preserve our intellectual integrity.