May 4, 2004

Speaker Biographies

James R. Lilley is a senior fellow in Asian studies at AEI. Mr. Lilley was the U.S. ambassador to the People's Republic of China from 1989 to 1991 and to the Republic of Korea from 1986 to 1989. He served as assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs from 1991 to 1993. Mr. Lilley wrote the forewords for the AEI books Chinese Military Modernization, Over the Line, and China's Military Faces the Future. He is also the coeditor of Beyond MFN: Trade with China and American Interests and Crisis in the Taiwan Strait.

Jeffrey Lilley has worked as a journalist and teacher. His work has appeared in the Far Eastern Economic Review, the Wall Street Journal, Sports Illustrated, and on the radio program Voice of America. He is currently working in Central Asia on a democracy-building project.

Judge William Webster is vice chairman of the Homeland Security Advisory Council. In 1970, he was appointed judge of the U.S. District Court for the eastern district of Missouri and was elevated to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit in 1973. In 1978, he became director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Beginning in 1987, he headed all U.S. foreign intelligence agencies and directed the Central Intelligence Agency until 1991. He has received the Distinguished Intelligence Medal and the Presidential Medal of Freedom, among numerous other awards.

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