Paul Haenle is the Director of the Carnegie-Tsinghua Center based at Tsinghua University in Beijing. In addition to running the Carnegie-Tsinghua Center, Haenle is an adjunct professor at Tsinghua, where he teaches undergraduate and graduate-level international relations courses to Chinese and international students. Haenle also serves as a senior advisor at the global business-consulting firm, Teneo Strategy, and as an advisor to the international strategic consulting firm Rice Hadley Gates LLC.
Prior to joining Carnegie, he served from June 2007 to June 2009 as the director for China, Taiwan, and Mongolian Affairs on the National Security Council staffs of former president George W. Bush and President Barack Obama. From June 2007 to January 2009, Haenle also played a key role as the White House representative to the U.S. negotiating team at the six-party-talks nuclear negotiations. From May 2004 to June 2007, he served as the executive assistant to the U.S. national security adviser.
Trained as a China foreign area officer in the U.S. Army, Haenle has been assigned twice to the U.S. embassy in Beijing, served as a U.S. Army company commander during a two-year tour to the Republic of Korea, and worked in the Pentagon as an adviser on China, Taiwan, and Mongolia Affairs on the staff of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Early assignments in the U.S. Army included postings in Germany, Desert Storm, Korea, and Kuwait. He retired from the U.S. Army as a lieutenant colonel in October 2009.