Frederick
J. Chiaventone
......is a novelist, screenwriter, military historian, consultant,
retired cavalry officer and Professor Emeritus for International
Security Affairs at the U.S. Army's Command and General Staff
College. With his vast experience in the field he has become an
internationally recognized expert on guerrilla warfare, counter-
terrorism, peacekeeping operations, psychological operations, and
broadcast media. He is the inventor of the Reserve Components
Tank Commanders’ Course – his articles have appeared in the
Chicago Tribune, The Foreign Service Journal, The Journal of
the Army War College, Military Review, The New York Post,
The Los Angeles Times, The Washington Times, American
Heritage and many other professional publications. He is
Contributing Editor to both the Historical Dictionary of the
United States Army (Greenwood Press, London) and The
Oxford Companion to American Military History (Oxford
University Press).
He holds a Masters Degree in Film and Television Production
from San Francisco State University and has written, produced,
and directed documentaries and news programming for the
Department of Defense. As an expert on guerrilla warfare, he and
then President George Bush Sr. were interviewed by Gisela
Duarte for the news program Frente a Frente for
El Salvadoran
television. He now serves frequently as historical consultant and
advisor to film and television productions to include Ken Burns'
PBS documentary The West and TNT's productions
of The
Rough Riders and Two For Texas (winner of the 1999 Western
Heritage Award). He was also the Military/Historical Advisor and
coach for principal actors for Ang Lee's Civil War film Ride With
The Devil (Universal/USA Films).
Chiaventone's debut novel, A Road We Do Not Know: A Novel
of Custer at the Little Bighorn (Simon
& Schuster) was
published to rave critical reviews, won the 1999 Ambassador
William E. Colby
Literary Award and was nominated for the
Pulitzer Prize in literature. His next novel in the Lakota Trilogy,
Moon of Bitter Cold (Forge/St. Martin's Press) was awarded the
Western Heritage Award for Literature and also the William
Rockhill Nelson Award for Literature.
Fred has been a featured speaker at, among other venues, the
National Press Club in Washington, DC, The US Army’s
Command & General Staff College, and numerous other venues.
He has also appeared on Bill Bennett’s Morning in America, Fox
Television’s The Big Story, PBS’ The American Experience, and
on the History Channel. If you saw their “The Plot To Kill Jesse
James” he was one of the featured experts. Recently he was
asked to participate in the Combat Studies Institute's major
conference; “Warfare in the Age of the Non-State Actor:
Implications for the US Army.” A number of articles and essays
for professional publicatons resulted from those meetings.
In 1997 Chiaventone was inducted into the elite Colby Circle.
Established by the late Ambassador William Colby, it is a small
group of writers, journalists, and academics recognized for their
contributions to public understanding of military and political
affairs. Fellow members of the Colby Circle include best-selling
authors; Ralph Peters, Tom Clancy, Stephen Coonts, Winston
Groom, W.E.B. Griffin, James Webb, Phil Caputo, Harry
Coyle, and Mark Bowden. Of his work writer Mark Bowden,
author of "Black Hawk Down" has said; "...a fascinating
recreation, amazingly imagined and written with the
unpretentious command of a very skillful writer...a marvelous
accomplishment."
Fred's forthcoming novel "Gone to Kingdom" is an examination
of youth curtailed by America's brutal Civil War as two young
men come of age as guerrilla fighters.
