Historian, bestselling author, and professional speaker Patrick K. O'Donnell has written twelve critically acclaimed books that recount the epic stories of America's wars from the Revolution to Iraq. He is a premier expert on elite and special operations units and irregular warfare. Patrick is a Fellow at the Fred W. Smith Library for the study of George Washington at Mount Vernon.

O’Donnell is the leading expert on the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), forerunner of the Central Intelligence Agency and America’s special operations forces in WWII.

On his second tour to Iraq, he served as a war correspondent for Men's Journal and Fox News, reporting on the conflict in Iraq from the perspective of the Marines on the ground. He has written for Military History Quarterly (MHQ) and WWII Magazine and is a frequent contributor to The National Review, as well as a variety of nationally recognized publications.

As an expert on WWII espionage, special operations, and counterinsurgency on the modern battlefield, he has assisted with the writing and production of numerous documentaries produced by the BBC, the History Channel, and others.

Patrick's skills and expertise have been tapped by private sector firms and government agencies, including DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency). For the agency, O’Donnell assisted in the development of modern weapons systems for urban warfare, researched and analyzed counterinsurgency strategies and tactics, and assessed German technology from WWII, focusing on its application to the modern battlefield. He has been selected to lecture at numerous agencies and branches of the armed forces, such as the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), U.S. Army Special Forces, U.S. ARMY, and USMC.

O'Donnell has traveled to nearly all of the battlefields of North America and many of the WWII battlefields in Northern Europe. In addition, each one of his books contains scores, if not hundreds, of oral history interviews he personally conducted, combined with years of archival research.