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Mackenzie Eaglen
Mackenzie Eaglen is the senior policy analyst for national security at The Heritage Foundation.
As an expert in Heritage’s Davis Institute for International Studies, Eaglen’s specialties include: force planning, net assessment and strategic planning, military readiness and transformation, defense strategy, and the defense industrial base.
Before coming to Heritage, Ms. Eaglen was the principal defense adviser for Senator Susan Collins, R-Maine, a senior member of the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee and the Ranking Member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. She also previously served as a military legislative assistant and appropriations associate for Representative John E. Sweeney, R-N.Y.
Eaglen also spent more than two years as a Presidential Management Fellow in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, where she did research and analysis on defense resources and budgeting, information operations campaign of Operation Enduring Freedom, Iraqi reconstruction efforts, and defense technology acquired through foreign acquisitions. In addition, she served as a speechwriter and special assistant to General Richard B. Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Prior to her fellowship, Eaglen was a national security analyst at the Association of the United States Army’s Institute of Land Warfare.
Eaglen’s op-ed articles have appeared in the New York Times; WashingtonPost.com; Armed Forces Journal International; National Defense magazine; The Washington Times; McClatchy-Tribune; Army Times; and Military Technology (MILTECH) magazine. Her paper, “A New Look at Readiness: Solving the Army’s Quandary,” is currently taught at the U.S. Army War College in Carlisle, Pa. She has served as a guest lecturer at Georgetown University, American University, National Defense University, University of Georgia, Indiana University, and Hofstra University and participated in defense panels with the U.S. Army War College, National Guard Association, National Defense Industrial Association, The Federalist Society, and the Security Industry Association.
Eaglen received her master’s degree in national security studies from Georgetown University in 2001. She graduated from Mercer University, in Macon, Ga., with a bachelor’s degree in international affairs while serving four years in the U.S. Army Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC).