Philipp C. Bleek is an assistant professor in the Graduate School of International Policy and Management and fellow at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, both at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey. During 2012–13, he was on leave from those positions to serve as senior advisor to the assistant secretary of defense for nuclear, chemical, and biological defense programs under a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellowship in Nuclear Security, funded by the Stanton Foundation. In that position, he staffed the then-classified Syria Chemical Weapons Senior Integration Group, a Pentagon-based, interagency focal point for efforts to prepare for Syrian chemical-weapons contingencies.
W. Seth Carus is a distinguished research fellow at the Center for the Study of Weapons of Mass Destruction at the US National Defense University. His research focuses on issues related to biological warfare, including threat assessment, biodefense, and the role of the Department of Defense in responding to biological agent use. From 2003–13, he also served as the Center's deputy director. From 2001–13, Dr. Carus was detailed to the Office of the Vice President, where he was the senior advisor to the vice president for biodefense. Before assuming that position, he was on the staff of the National Preparedness Review commissioned to recommend changes in homeland security organization and supported the Office of Homeland Security while it was being established. From 1991–94, Dr. Carus was a member of the Policy Planning staff in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy. Dr. Carus has a PhD from The Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland.
Charles Duelfer spent over twenty-five years in the national-security agencies of the US government, where he was involved in policy development, operations, and intelligence in the Middle East, Africa, Central America, and Asia. Duelfer was also involved in US nuclear weapons and space programs. As special advisor to the director of Central Intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, Duelfer led the Iraq Survey Group. In the 1990s, Duelfer served as the deputy executive chairman and subsequently acting chairman of the UN Special Commission (UNSCOM) from 1993 until its termination in 2000. He is currently Chairman of Omnis, Inc.
Rolf Ekéus is a Swedish diplomat who has spent the last two decades working on international nonproliferation issues. From 1983 until 1989, he served as ambassador and head of the Swedish delegations to the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe and the Conference on Disarmament, where he served as chairman of the international negotiations on the Chemical Weapons Convention. From 1991 to 1997, he served as executive chairman of UNSCOM.
From 2001–07, he served as high commissioner on national minorities for the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe. He was been a member of the Advisory Board on Disarmament of the Secretary-General of the United Nations, the Canberra Commission on Nuclear Weapons, and the Tokyo Forum on Disarmament. He serves on the board of the Nuclear Threat Initiative and is chairman emeritus of the board of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. He is also a member of the Executive Board for the European Leadership Network.
Robert A. Friedman is an attorney-adviser at the US Department of State in the Office of the Legal Adviser for Nonproliferation and Arms Control, where he works on a range of legal issues related to weapons of mass destruction and outer space. He was the principal attorney supporting US efforts toward adoption of UN Security Council Resolution 2235 to identify those involved in chemical-weapons use in Syria through the establishment of a Joint Investigative Mechanism. He also worked in the Legal Adviser's Office for Diplomatic Law, where he focused on legal issues related to the United States's diplomatic footprint around the world, as well as the status of diplomatic relations with other countries.
Friedman currently serves as a fellow at the Truman National Security Project and on the Board of Governors of the Washington Foreign Law Society. He graduated cum laude from the Georgetown University Law Center, has an MA in Government, with honors, from The Johns Hopkins University, and received his undergraduate degree in Political Science from Emory University.
Katharine Hagen is an analyst at the US Defense Intelligence Agency. Previously, she worked on the Department of Defense’s Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program at the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Defense Threat Reduction Agency. She began her government career as a presidential management fellow at the Department of Homeland Security. She has an MS in biohazardous threat agents and emerging infectious diseases from Georgetown University and a BA in biochemistry from Occidental College.
Olli Heinonen is a senior fellow at the Harvard John F. Kennedy School of Government’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. His research and teaching concerns nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament, verification of treaty compliance, enhancement of the verification work of international organizations, and the transfer and control of peaceful uses of nuclear energy. Before joining the Belfer Center in September 2010, Heinonen served twenty-seven years at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna, including as deputy director general and head of the Department of Safeguards. Heinonen led teams of international inspectors to examine nuclear programs of concern around the world, and inspected nuclear facilities in South Africa, Iraq, North Korea, Syria, Libya, and elsewhere, seeking to ensure that nuclear materials were not diverted for military purposes. He also spearheaded efforts to implement an analytical culture to guide and complement traditional verification activities. He led the IAEA’s efforts to investigate and dismantle nuclear-proliferation networks, including the one led by the Pakistani official, A.Q. Khan. He is the author of numerous books and articles and has been published in dozens of outlets such as the New York Times, Foreign Policy, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Ha’aretz, Le Monde, and others.
Rebecca Hersman is director of the Project on Nuclear Issues and senior adviser for the International Security Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). She joined CSIS in April 2015 from the Department of Defense (DOD), where she served as deputy assistant secretary of defense for countering WMD since 2009. In this capacity, she led the formulation of DOD policy and strategy to prevent WMD proliferation and use, reduce, and eliminate WMD risks, and respond to WMD dangers. Hersman was a key leader on issues ranging from the nuclear security summits to the elimination of Syria’s chemical weapons and the global health security agenda. She served as DOD’s principal policy advocate on issues pertaining to the Biological Weapons Convention, Chemical Weapons Convention, Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, and Cooperative Threat Reduction program. Prior to joining DOD, Ms. Hersman was a senior research fellow with the Center for the Study of Weapons of Mass Destruction at the US National Defense University from 1998 to 2009. She holds an MA in Arab studies from Georgetown University and a BA from Duke University.
Chen Kane is the director of the Middle East Nonproliferation Program at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies of the Middlebury Institute for International Affairs at Monterey. In addition to her projects related to reducing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and terrorism, with a particular focus on the Middle East, Dr. Kane examines means to strengthen the International Atomic Energy Agency's safeguards system and the projected expansion of nuclear energy in the Middle East. She continues her affiliations as a non-resident research associate with the Managing the Atom project at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School, as an advisor to the National Nuclear Security Administration, and as an adjunct professor with the National Defense University.
Nicholas J. Kramer is a United States Army foreign area officer specializing in the Middle East and North Africa. In 2006, he served as an infantry platoon leader training an Iraqi Army battalion in central Baghdad, and subsequently as a Mechanized Infantry Company executive officer in western Baghdad, partnered with a second Iraqi Army battalion. Between 2010 and 2012, Major Kramer spent nineteen months as a Special Forces detachment commander in eastern Afghanistan, advising and training Afghan National Army Special Forces and Afghan Local Police. Major Kramer holds an MA in Nonproliferation and Terrorism Studies from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey in Monterey, California, and currently serves at the US Embassy in Rabat, Morocco.
Richard G. Lugar is the president of The Lugar Center, a non-profit organization focusing on global food security, WMD nonproliferation, aid effectiveness, and bipartisan governance. He is the longest-serving member of Congress in Indiana history. During his tenure in the United States Senate, he exercised leadership on critical issues such as food security, nuclear nonproliferation, energy independence, and free trade. He holds forty-six honorary degrees from colleges and universities in fifteen states and the District of Columbia, and was the fourth person ever named Outstanding Legislator by the American Political Science Association. Her Majesty The Queen of England bestowed upon Senator Lugar the rank of honorary Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire in honor of his work to make the world more secure from WMD and his commitment to the US-UK alliance. President Barack Obama named Senator Lugar a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Christine Parthemore is a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs fellow conducting research on nuclear energy export trends at the Institute of Energy Economics-Japan in Tokyo. Since 2010, she has also been an adjunct professor in the Global Security Studies Program at The Johns Hopkins University, and works as a consultant on international affairs. She served from 2011 to 2015 as the senior advisor to the assistant secretary of defense for nuclear, chemical, and biological defense programs in the US Department of Defense, an office that managed more than $3 billion annually in research and development, treaty compliance, and international partnership programs. Her think-tank experience includes the Center for a New American Security and the Center for Climate and Security.
Robert J. Peters is a senior research fellow at the Center for the Study of Weapons of Mass Destruction at the US National Defense University (NDU). His research focuses on WMD rollback policies, WMD elimination, nuclear attribution, loose nuclear weapons, and managing escalation and deterrence crises. From March to November 2009, he was detailed to the Office of the Secretary of Defense, where he led the counter-WMD analysis for the 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review. Prior to joining NDU, Peters worked as a technical analyst for the Northrop Grumman Corporation and as a research associate for the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies, focusing on WMD detection capabilities and nonproliferation policy. Mr. Peters received an MA in National Security Studies from Georgetown University, and a BA in Political Science and History from Miami University. His publications include “China, Democracy, and the Internet” in Information Technology and World Politics (Palgrave Macmillan, 2002); “Promoting Science and Technology to Serve National Security” in Science and Technology Policies for the Anti-Terrorism Era (IOS, 2006); and “Nuclear U-Turns: Learning from South Korean and Taiwanese Rollback” (co-authored with Rebecca Hersman) in the Nonproliferation Review (13.3, November 2006).
Joshua H. Pollack is the incoming editor of the Nonproliferation Review. He is recognized as a leading expert on nuclear and missile proliferation, focusing on Northeast Asia. Before joining the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey in April 2016, he served as a consultant to the US government, specializing in research related to WMD, including proliferation, arms control, and deterrence. As a defense policy analyst at DFI International, Science Applications International Corporation, and Constellation West, his clients included the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, the Department of Homeland Security, the National Nuclear Security Administration, and the Plans and Policy Directorate (J5) of US Strategic Command. In 2015, he was named an associate fellow of the Royal United Services Institute in London. He also serves as a research scientist at CNA, a nonprofit research institution in Arlington, Virginia. Pollack holds a Master's in public management from the University of Maryland College Park and a Bachelor’s degree from Vassar College. His work appeared previously in the Nonproliferation Review in 2011 and 2015.
Ted A. Ryba, Jr., serves as the Department of Defense representative to the US delegation to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). He provides expert advice to the US permanent representative to the OPCW. He has been a Department of the Army civilian associated with the destruction of chemical weapons (CW) for most of his career. He previously served as the Army's Site Project Manager for the Tooele Chemical Agent Disposal Facility (TOCDF), responsible for destroying nearly 44 percent of the United States's original declared CW stockpile in the United States. Prior to his assignment to TOCDF, he worked as an engineer at the Johnston Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal System, a pilot plant constructed to validate and verify US CW destruction technology prior to full-scale operations. Ryba holds a BS in chemical engineering from Drexel University.
Patrick Terrell is a senior research fellow at the Center for the Study of Weapons of Mass Destruction at the US National Defense University. Prior to joining the center, he served in the US Army Chemical Corps for twenty-seven years, culminating as the WMD military advisor and deputy director for Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear (CBRN) Defense Policy in the Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Countering WMD. During that assignment, he developed US policy for the security and destruction of Libya's chemical weapons (CW) and provided technical and operations expertise on the removal and destruction of Syria's CW. His military career included CBRN commands and staff assignments at the tactical and strategic levels. Mr. Terrell has a Master of Strategic Studies from the US Army War College, an MS in administration from Central Michigan University, and a Bachelor of business administration from New Mexico State University.
Paul F. Walker is international program director of the Environmental Security and Sustainability Program of Green Cross International. He helped to establish and oversee the Cooperative Threat Reduction (CTR) program in the early 1990s as a professional staff member of the Committee on Armed Services in the US House of Representatives, and has worked on facilitation of CTR projects in the former Soviet Union and elsewhere for over twenty years. He holds a PhD in international security studies from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, an MA in international affairs from The Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies, and an advanced Russian language certificate from the Defense Language Institute of the West Coast in Monterey, California. He is a Vietnam-era US military veteran.