Dexter Filkins

Dexter Filkins
Filkins on the USS Rafael Peralta in 2023
Born	Dexter Price Filkins (1961-05-24) May 24, 1961 (age 64) Cincinnati, Ohio, U.S.
Alma mater	St Antony's College, Oxford (MPhil) Univ. of Florida (BA 1983)
Occupation(s)	journalist, author
Notable work	The Forever War
Awards	Pulitzer Prize 2009 The New York Times – International Reporting

Dexter Price Filkins (born May 24, 1961) is an American journalist known primarily for his coverage of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan for The New York Times . He was a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize in 2002 for his dispatches from Afghanistan, and won a Pulitzer in 2009 as part of a team of Times reporters for their dispatches from Pakistan and Afghanistan. In 2009, The Washington Post described him as "the premier combat journalist of his generation." ^[1] He currently writes for The New Yorker. ^[2]

Background

Filkins was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, but grew up in Florida after his parents divorced. He has a sister and an older brother. ^[3]

Filkins received a B.A. in political science from the University of Florida in 1983, and an M.Phil. in international relations from St Antony's College, Oxford, in 1984. ^[4]

Career

Before joining the Times in September 2000, Filkins worked at the Miami Herald and later served as New Delhi bureau chief for the Los Angeles Times for three years.

He reported from The New York Times' Baghdad bureau in Iraq from 2003 to 2006.

In 2006–2007, Filkins was at Harvard University on a Nieman Fellowship; in 2007–2008, he was a Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School. ^[5]

Filkins's book, The Forever War (2008), chronicling his experiences in Afghanistan and Iraq, was a New York Times best-seller. ^[6] The Forever War won the National Book Critics Circle Award for best nonfiction book of 2008, ^[7] and was named one of the best nonfiction books of the year by, among others, The New York Times, ^[8] Amazon.com, ^[9] The Washington Post , ^[10] Time , ^[11] and the Boston Globe . ^[12]

Filkins joined The New Yorker in 2011. ^[5]

In 2018, Filkins reported on unusual internet traffic involving a Trump Organization server and Russia's Alfa Bank. ^[13] Subsequent media analysis noted that FBI investigators found no substantiated link; Columbia Journalism Review later described the Alfa-Bank claims as having been debunked by investigators. ^[14]

Awards

Filkins has received two George Polk Awards. According to Long Island University, his 2004 award recognized reporting from the November 2004 assault on Fallujah in Iraq; he shared another Polk in 2011 (with Mark Mazzetti) for coverage of Afghanistan and Pakistan. ^{[15] [16]}

Filkins has won two National Magazine Awards; in 2009, for his story, "Right At the Edge," and in 2011 for "Bedrooms of the Fallen," an essay with the photographer Ashley Gilbertson. Both appeared in the New York Times Magazine.

Filkins' article "Right at the Edge" (September 7, 2008) was part of the body of work by the staff of The New York Times awarded the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for distinguished reporting on international affairs. ^[17]

In 2010, his reporting for The New York Times from Iraq and Afghanistan, alongside the work of photographer Tyler Hicks and reporter C. J. Chivers, was selected by New York University as one of the "Top Ten Works of Journalism of the Decade". ^[18]

He has also received multiple Overseas Press Club awards. ^{[19] [20]}

Bibliography

Books

• Filkins, Dexter (2008). The forever war. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.

Essays and reporting

• Filkins, Dexter (October 23, 2005). "The fall of the warrior king". Magazine. The New York Times.
• — (November 9, 2006). "Where Plan A left Ahmad Chalabi". Magazine. The New York Times.
• — (October 7, 2007). "Regrets Only?". The New York Times Magazine . Retrieved 2024-08-17.
• — (March 21, 2010). "The Shrine Down The Hall". The New York Times Magazine . pp. 34–47.
• — (September 12, 2011). "The journalist and the spies". The New Yorker.
• — (July 9, 2012). "After America: Will civil war hit Afghanistan when the U.S. leaves?". A Reporter at Large. The New Yorker. 88 (20): 54–67. Retrieved 2015-10-15.
• — (October 29, 2012). "Atonement". A Reporter at Large. The New Yorker. 88 (34): 92. Retrieved 2015-10-15.
• — (February 25, 2013). "After Syria : if the Assad regime falls, can Hezbollah survive?". A Reporter at Large. The New Yorker. 89 (2): 48–57. Retrieved 2015-05-02.
• — (May 13, 2013). "The thin red line : inside the White House debate over Syria". A Reporter at Large. The New Yorker. 89 (13): 40–49.
• — (September 30, 2013). "The shadow commander : Qassem Suleimani is the Iranian operative who has been reshaping the Middle East. Now he's directing Assad's war in Syria". A Reporter at Large. The New Yorker. 89 (30): 42–53. Retrieved 2015-03-02.
• — (September 29, 2014). "The Fight Of Their Lives". A Reporter at Large. The New Yorker. 90 (29): 42. Retrieved 2015-10-15.
• — (July 20, 2015). "Death of a prosecutor". A Reporter at Large. The New Yorker. 91 (20): 38–51.
• — (March 7, 2016). "A truce in Syria". The Talk of the Town. Comment. The New Yorker. 92 (4): 17–18.
• — (January 2, 2017). "Before the flood : a failing dam threatens millions of Iraqis". A Reporter at Large. The New Yorker. 92 (43): 22–28. ^[a] Mosul Dam.
• — (October 15, 2018). "Was There a Connection Between a Russian Bank and the Trump Campaign? A team of computer scientists sifted through records of unusual Web traffic in search of answers". A Reporter at Large. The New Yorker. 94 (32): 38–46. Retrieved 11 October 2018.
• — (September 7, 2020). "The uncounted". Letter from Florida. The New Yorker. 96 (26): 34–45. ^[b]
• — (September 13, 2021). "War with a human face : have rules to curb the cuelty of military force backfired?". The Critics. Books. The New Yorker. 97 (28): 68–72. ^[c]

———————

Notes

1. Online version is titled "A bigger problem than ISIS?".
2. Online version is titled "Who gets to vote in Florida?".
3. Online version is titled "Did making the rules of war better make the world worse?".

References

1. Bennett, Philip (15 March 2009). "What We Don't Know About Iraq". Washington Post. Retrieved 10 October 2011.
2. Nast, Condé. "Dexter Filkins". The New Yorker. Retrieved 2025-10-13.
3. Lamb, Brian (April 14, 2005). "Q&A with Dexter Filkins | C-SPAN.org". C-SPAN . Retrieved 4 October 2024.
4. St Antony's College, "St Antony's College Newsletter" (Spring 2007), p. 41 (PDF). https://www.sant.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/related-documents/spring_2007.pdf
5. "Dexter Filkins". The New Yorker . Retrieved February 25, 2015.
6. New York Times Bestsellers, Hardcover Nonfiction
7. "National Book Critics Circle Announces Award Winners (2008)". Archived from the original on 2011-07-21. Retrieved 2011-05-30.
8. Editors of The New York Times (December 3, 2008). "The 10 Best Books of 2008". The New York Times. Retrieved May 30, 2011.
9. "Best Books of 2008". Amazon.com . Retrieved February 25, 2015.
10. "Holiday Guide - Best Books of 2008". The Washington Post . December 7, 2008.
11. "The Top 10 Everything Of 2008". Time. November 3, 2008. Archived from the original on February 28, 2010.
12. Kenney, Michael (December 7, 2008). "Getting the goods - nonfiction: A guide to the most memorable titles of 2008, from entertaining to inspiring". Boston Globe. Retrieved May 30, 2011.
13. Dexter Filkins, "Was There a Connection Between a Russian Bank and the Trump Campaign?" The New Yorker, Oct. 15, 2018. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/10/15/was-there-a-connection-between-a-russian-bank-and-the-trump-campaign
14. Jeff Gerth, "The press versus the president, part one," Columbia Journalism Review, Jan. 30, 2023 (updated 2025). https://www.cjr.org/special_report/trumped-up-press-versus-president-part-1.php
15. Long Island University, "George Polk Awards for Journalism" (press release), Feb. 21, 2005. http://www.liu.edu/About/News/Univ-Ctr-PR/Pre-2008/February/GP-Press-Release-Feb-2005
16. WLRN, "Dexter Filkins on Iraq's War, and Election," Mar. 9, 2005. https://www.wlrn.org/2005-03-09/dexter-filkins-on-iraqs-war-and-election
17. "The 2009 Pulitzer Prize Winners: International Reporting". Pulitzer.org. Retrieved February 25, 2015.
18. "Top Ten Works of Journalism of the Decade, 2000-2009". New York University. Retrieved September 21, 2020.
19. Nieman Foundation, "The Overseas Press Club honors four Niemans," April 24, 2009. https://nieman.harvard.edu/the-overseas-press-club-honors-four-niemans/
20. Yale University, Office of Public Affairs & Communications, "Dexter Filkins," event bio (Feb. 21, 2019). https://communications.yale.edu/poynter/dexter-filkins

External links

• Dexter Filkins collected news and commentary at The New York Times
• "Right at the Edge'" at Pulitzer.org
• "My Long War"' August 22, 2008 by Dexter Filkins for the New York Times Magazine
• Appearances on C-SPAN
  • C-SPAN Q&A, April 24, 2005
• Dexter Filkins on Charlie Rose
• Dexter Filkins at IMDb
• "Q&A" about "The Forever War"
• Authors@Google One-hour video talk with Dexter Filkins (September 24, 2008)