U.S. Marine Capt. Dan Grazier Joins POGO to Work on Military Reform

U.S. Marine Corps Capt. Daniel Grazier, who served tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, has joined the Project On Government Oversight where he will bring his on-the-ground insights to POGO’s Pentagon reform efforts.

“We’re fortunate to add Dan’s insights and experience as a veteran and a tough investigative journalist to our team,” said Mandy Smithberger, director of POGO’s Straus Military Reform Project. “Dan understands how Pentagon mismanagement and wasteful spending undermine combat effectiveness. His military reform work and experiences should wake up Washington to the need for serious changes on spending in our bloated Pentagon budgets.”

As POGO’s new Jack Shanahan Fellow, Grazier will advocate for Pentagon budget reforms that rein in programs that make little strategic sense, while supporting resources that increase combat effectiveness.

“I am absolutely thrilled by the opportunity to be even a small part of POGO’s efforts on military reform,” Grazier said. “POGO has a reputation for working to make the military as effective as it can possibly be.”

Grazier’s fellowship and the Straus Military Reform Project are part of the Center for Defense Information (CDI). The Jack Shanahan Fellowship position was created this year for dedicated military reformers with combat experience to leverage POGO’s leadership role in the Pentagon Budget Campaign on Capitol Hill.

Before joining the Marine Corps in 2005, he worked as a television journalist in Maryland and Missouri, covering breaking news and doing investigative reporting.

While on active duty, Grazier often wrote papers on military reform and maneuver warfare, appearing in the Marine Corps Gazette, Fires Bulletin, and Small Wars Journal. He also created a lecture series on basic warfighting philosophy—something he says from which the U.S. military has strayed.

Commissioned as a second lieutenant in March 2005, Grazier was deployed in 2007 to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom and later to Afghanistan in 2013 in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. He left active duty in May to join POGO.

He is a 2012 graduate of the Marine Corps Expeditionary Warfare School and holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in mass communications from Virginia Commonwealth University.