PROFESSOR Michael Clarke is the first nonmilitary man to be director of Britain’s top defence think tank - the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies (Rusi) - since its creation by the Duke of Wellington in 1831.

“In many countries, particularly in Asia and the Middle East, if you’re not a military officer they wonder why you’re doing this job. I have to prove I know about defence.” Clarke, 57, has impeccable credentials. He founded the Centre For Defence Studies at King’s College London and ran it for 17 years.

He said: “Rusi occupies a unique space in UK defence and security, but the field is getting wider with terrorism, international crime, civil disruption and more.”

This means finding new funding sources. Rusi, a charity based on Whitehall near Downing Street and the MoD, works intimately with them, but is independent and gets no state funding, even though its patron is the Queen.

The core of Rusi’s work is researching current trends in defence and security and their implications for Britain.

But its independence means Rusi can offer controversial views – a recent report argued the world should spend 10 times more on fighting climate change than on defence. It can also be highly critical. For example, Clarke said that invading Iraq remained a blunder from which Iran had gained most and that Britain and the West now had a worse understanding of Middle Eastern politics than for generations.

But he also offers praise. “In terms of dealing with terrorism in the UK, the security forces have done really well. It was hopeless a few years ago, but they’ve made really good progress.”

After returning from a conference in Johannesburg on conflict resolution Clarke’s working week combined his duties as Rusi director with a whirlwind of sessions meeting politicians, senior defence figures, business leaders and visiting academics.

All feed back into Rusi’s work. Its fastest-growing research area is homeland security with continuing studies on UK terrorism, radicalisation and protection of critical national infrastructure. So last week he also attended a forum on policing London, spent a day at a terrorism trial as an expert witness, attended a reception for the departing Pakistan High Commissioner and recorded his fortnightly Forces Radio show.

Clarke’s personal academic focus is British defence policy-making and nuclear issues. He is an adviser on disarmament to the UN secretary-general.

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