Mr Thomas Perry Thornton

Thomas Thornton had been a resident of the Washington area for nearly 40 years, combining academic and governmental careers with a focus on foreign affairs. Thornton was the senior member of the State Department's Policy Planning Staff during Henry Kissinger's years as Secretary of State -- a time when the staff reached a level of influence second only to its early years under George Kennan -- dealing with a wide range of global affairs, especially relations with the Soviet Union and with the Third World. He was selected to join the staff of the National Security Council in the Carter administration where he was in charge of relations with much of the Third World and especially with India and Pakistan, areas in which he had long experience going back to an assignment in India with the U.S. Information Agency in the mid-1950s. Thornton left the NSC when Ronald Reagan took office and ultimately found himself on the administration’s "enemy list". Eased into early retirement, he returned to academia and joined the faculty of the Johns Hopkins School of International Studies in Washington where he taught from 1982 to 1993. Subsequently he was Adjunct Professor of International Relations at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. Earlier, Thornton had taught at Georgetown, George Washington and American Universities and was an associate of the Center for International Studies of Princeton University in 1961-62. In 1996 he spent a semester as Fulbright professor at the University of Halle in Germany. Matters relating to India and Pakistan were Thornton's principal teaching subjects and he wrote extensively on them, as well on broader issues of U.S. foreign policy. Recognized as one of the country's top experts on U.S. relations with the countries of South Asia, Thornton was a frequent participant at national and international conferences, a consultant to the State Department and witness before Congressional committees. Thomas Thornton was born in Pittsburgh in 1931, and received in BA from Haverford College and PhD from Johns Hopkins. He served in the Navy during the Korean War and was a long-time member of U.S. Naval Intelligence Reserve, retiring with the rank of captain. In 1992, after his marriage to Hanne Schulten, he moved to Baltimore. He is survived by his wife and three children from a previous marriage, Thomas A. of Harrisburg, PA, Peter A. of Cary NC, and Nalini T. Rogers of Bethesda, MD, and eight grandchildren.

Mr Thomas Perry Thornton

March 4, 1931 - May 5, 2023