Peter Edwards is a consultant historian and writer who has published on Australian defence and foreign policies for more than thirty years. He is the official historian of Australia’s involvement in Southeast Asian conflicts 1948–75 (Malaya, Borneo and Vietnam), for which he wrote the volumes dealing with strategy and diplomacy, Crises and Commitments (1992) and A Nation at War (1997). He was made a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for this work. His most recent book is Arthur Tange: Last of the Mandarins (2006). Both A Nation at War and Arthur Tange won major literary awards.

Dr Edwards is also the author of Permanent Friends? Historical Reflections on the Australian–American Alliance (2005), and Prime Ministers and Diplomats (1983); the co-editor of Facing North (vol. 2, 2003); the editor of Australia Through American Eyes (1977); and one of the founding editors of the series of Documents on Australian Foreign Policy. He is a former editor, and now a contributing editor, of the Australian Journal of International Affairs. Currently Dr Edwards is an honorary Visiting Professor of the University of New South Wales at the Australian Defence Force Academy, Canberra. He has held a number of consultancies with universities and government agencies and is a member of historical advisory committees in the Department of Defence and the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.