Paul Wolfowitz was a president of the World Bank since 2005 till 2007, after serving in a variety of government and academic posts. Wolfowitz was instrumental in formulating the Bush Doctrine and was a staunch proponent of military action against the regime of Saddam Hussein.

Paul Dundes Wolfowitz was born in 1943 in Ithaca, New York. He graduated in 1965 with a degree in mathematics. In 1972, he earned a doctorate in political science from the University of Chicago. Wolfowitz initially pursued an academic career and taught at Yale University. However, in 1973 he was appointed to the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. During his service, Wolfowitz's work attracted the attention of then secretary of defense Donald H. Rumsfeld. In 1977, Wolfowitz became the deputy assistant secretary of defense for regional programs. He produced several important studies for the Pentagon, including a recommendation for the creation of a new military command that would be able to respond to threats in the Middle East. He resigned in 1980 and accepted a teaching position at Johns Hopkins University.

Following the election of Ronald W. Reagan, Wolfowitz was appointed chief of the State Department's Policy Planning Staff. In 1982, he was promoted to the assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs. Wolfowitz subsequently served as U.S. ambassador to Indonesia from 1986 to 1989. In 1989, George H. W. Bush recalled Wolfowitz and made him the undersecretary of defense for policy under Secretary of Defense Richard B. Cheney. Wolfowitz oversaw the Pentagon's 700-person planning cell and worked to revise U.S. military strategy in the wake of the end of the Cold War. He then coordinated strategy among the branches of the U.S. military and coalition forces during the 1991 Persian Gulf War. In 1992, Wolfowitz authored a report, Defense Planning Guidance, which later served as the basis for the Bush Doctrine.

After Bush's defeat in the 1992 election, Wolfowitz left government service and returned to academia. He was a professor at the Naval War College and then accepted a post as the dean of the School of Advanced and International Studies at Johns Hopkins University. He served as a foreign policy advisor to Republican presidential candidate Robert Dole in the 1996 election. During this period, Wolfowitz became increasingly noted as a proponent of neoconservatism.

During the 2000 presidential campaign, Wolfowitz was a foreign policy consultant, along with future national security advisor Condoleezza Rice, to George W. Bush. In the aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks, Wolfowitz pressed for the development of a broad offensive against international terrorism. Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld argued that the Taliban and Al Qaeda could be defeated with only minimal assistance from allies. This contrasted with recommendations from Rice and Secretary of State Colin Powell, who wanted to utilize the widespread support offered to the United States as a way to promote future cooperation in counterterrorism efforts. After the defeat of the Taliban, Wolfowitz joined other senior officials in advocating an attack on Iraq as the next step in the war on terror. He was instrumental in the development and implementation of the Bush Doctrine, which was codified in the 2002 National Security Strategy of the United States.

Wolfowitz was a strong proponent of the use of force against Iraq. During the planning for the Iraq War, he resisted calls by military commanders for a large deployment and contended that the defeat of Iraq could be accomplished with 100,000 troops (140,000 were actually used). The subsequent insurgency undermined public confidence in Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz. Critics argued that Iraq demonstrated the limits of neoconservatism.

After the 2004 presidential election, Bush nominated Wolfowitz to be president of the World Bank. Although there was opposition to his appointment because of Wolfowitz's conservative reputation, he was confirmed and assumed office on 1 June 2005. As head of the World Bank, Wolfowitz adopted a moderate reform policy designed to increase the efficiency of the organization. He also increased the bank's emphasis on democracy and began a long-term shift away from loans to developing countries toward grants. He resigned in 2007.

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