Speaker biographies
James Acton is a lecturer at King’s College London in the Centre for Science and Security Studies. Mr. Acton is currently conducting research into and advising the government of Norway on technical and political aspects of the verification of nuclear disarmament. He is also involved in projects on nuclear forensics, operations research, and the role of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) with regard to weaponization activities. His previous research projects have included analysis of IAEA safeguards in Iran and study on the detection of clandestine weaponization activities. He has also published on novel forms of radiological terrorism. Before joining King’s, Mr. Acton was the science and technology researcher at the Verification Research, Training and Information Centre (VERTIC). His recent publications include “Strengthening Safeguards and Nuclear Disarmament: Is There a Connection?” (Nonproliferation Review, 2007), “Beyond Dirty Bombs: Rethinking Radiological Terror” (Survival, 2007), “The Use of Voluntary Safeguards to Promote Trust in States’ Nuclear Programmes: The Case of Iran” (Verification Matters, 2007), and “IAEA Verification of Military Research and Development” (Verification Matters, 2006).
J. D. Crouch is a senior scholar at the National Institute for Public Policy. Until May 2007, Mr. Crouch was assistant to the president and deputy national security advisor. He was a senior adviser to the president on national security matters, chaired the subcabinet deputies committee, and was second in command at the National Security Council. Mr. Crouch previously served as a U.S. ambassador to Romania, where he worked to expand democracy in the region; increase cooperation between the United States and Romania in the global war on terror; and foster Romania’s incorporation into Western security institutions, including NATO and the European Union. He has also served as assistant secretary of defense for international security policy and the principal deputy assistant secretary of defense for international security policy, worked for the assistant director for strategic programs in the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, and was an adviser to the U.S. delegation to the Nuclear and Space Arms Talks with the former Soviet Union. His recent publications include “Moscow’s Missile Gambit” (Washington Post, March 13, 2008) and “Tough Calls, Good Calls” (Wall Street Journal, January 22, 2008).
Robert Einhorn is a senior adviser in the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) International Security Program, where he works on a broad range of nonproliferation, arms control, and other national security issues. Before joining CSIS, he served in the U.S. government as assistant secretary for nonproliferation at the Department of State, where he was responsible for nonproliferation of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons; missile delivery systems; and advanced conventional arms. Mr. Einhorn was deputy assistant secretary for nonproliferation in the State Department’s Political-Military Bureau from 1992 to 1999 and a senior adviser on the department’s policy planning staff from 1986 to 1992. He served at the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency from 1972 to 1984, where he dealt with strategic arms issues, nuclear testing limits, chemical and biological weapons constraints, nonproliferation, and other security issues. From 1982 to 1986, he represented the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency in the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty talks. Mr. Einhorn has authored several publications on strategic nuclear issues, arms control, and nonproliferation. His recent publications include “The P-5 and Nuclear Nonproliferation” (CSIS, 2007) and “Assessing the G-8 Global Partnership: From Kananaskis to St. Petersburg” (CSIS, 2006).
Daryl Kimball became the executive director of the Arms Control Association (ACA) in September 2001. The ACA is a private, nonprofit membership organization dedicated to public education and support of effective arms control measures pertaining to nuclear, chemical, biological, and conventional weapons. From 1997 to 2001, Mr. Kimball was the executive director of the Coalition to Reduce Nuclear Dangers, a consortium of seventeen of the largest U.S. nongovernmental organizations working together to strengthen national and international security by reducing the threats posed by nuclear weapons. From 1989 to 1997, Mr. Kimball worked as the associate director for policy, and later as the director of security programs, for Physicians for Social Responsibility. Mr. Kimball is a frequent source for reporters and has written and spoken extensively about nuclear arms control, nonproliferation, and weapons production. His recent publications include “Avoiding a Space Arms Race” (Arms Control Today, April 2007) and “Replacement Warheads and the Nuclear Test Ban” (Carnegie Proliferation Analysis, March 2007).
George Perkovich is vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. In this capacity, he oversees the entire research program across all subject areas. His personal research has focused on nuclear strategy and nonproliferation, with an emphasis on South Asia. He is the author of India’s Nuclear Bomb (University of California Press, 2001), which received the Herbert Feis Award from the American Historical Association for outstanding work by an independent scholar and the A. K. Coomaraswamy Prize from the Association for Asian Studies as an outstanding book on South Asia. Mr. Perkovich is also developing a project on fairness in the international system, drawing on his interests in trade and globalization. From 1990 through 2001, Mr. Perkovich was director of the Secure World Program at the W. Alton Jones Foundation, a $400 million philanthropic institution located in Charlottesville, Virginia. At the time of the foundation’s division in 2001, he also served as deputy director for programs. Mr. Perkovich served as a speechwriter and foreign policy adviser to Senator Joe Biden (D-Del.) from 1989 to 1990. Mr. Perkovich coauthored a major Carnegie report, Universal Compliance: A Strategy for Nuclear Security, which serves as a blueprint for rethinking the international nuclear nonproliferation regime. Other recent publications include “Iran Gets the Bomb—Then What?” a chapter in Getting Ready for a Nuclear-Ready Iran (Strategic Studies Institute, October 2005); “Faulty Promises: The US-India Nuclear Deal” (Carnegie Policy Outlook, September 2005); “Giving Justice Its Due” (Foreign Affairs, July–August 2005); and “Changing Iran’s Nuclear Interests” (Carnegie Policy Outlook, May 2005).
Danielle Pletka is the vice president for foreign and defense policy studies at AEI. Her research areas include the Middle East, South Asia, terrorism, and weapons proliferation. Before coming to AEI, Ms. Pletka served for ten years as a senior professional staff member for the Near East and South Asia on the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. Since joining AEI, Ms. Pletka has developed a conference series on rebuilding post-Saddam Iraq, directed a project on democracy in the Arab world, and designed a project to track global business in Iran. She was a member of the congressionally mandated U.S. Institute of Peace Task Force on the United Nations, which released its final report in 2005. She recently coedited Dissent and Reform in the Arab World: Empowering Democrats (AEI Press, 2008) and coauthored Iranian Influence in the Levant, Iraq, and Afghanistan (AEI, 2008). Other recent publications include “ElBaradei’s Real Agenda” (Wall Street Journal, February 25, 2008), “Diplomacy with the Devil” (New York Times, November 19, 2007), and “Putting the Heat on Iran” (Wall Street Journal, September 28, 2007).
Henry Sokolski is the executive director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center, a Washington-based nonprofit organization founded in 1994 to promote a better understanding of strategic weapons proliferation issues for academics, policymakers, and the media. He is also an adjunct professor at the Institute of World Politics in Washington. He served from 1989 to 1993 as deputy for nonproliferation policy in the Office of the Secretary of Defense under Paul Wolfowitz. Prior to his appointment to this post, Mr. Sokolski worked in the Office of Net Assessment on proliferation issues. Mr. Sokolski served from 1984 through 1988 as senior military legislative aide to Senator Dan Quayle (R-Ind.) and as special assistant on nuclear energy matters to Senator Gordon Humphrey (R-N.H.) from 1982 through 1983. Mr. Sokolski was a consultant to the National Intelligence Council, as well as the Deutch Proliferation Commission and the Central Intelligence Agency’s senior advisory panel. Mr. Sokolski has been a resident fellow at the National Institute for Public Policy, the Heritage Foundation, and the Hoover Institution. His recent publications include Getting Ready for a Nuclear-Ready Iran (Strategic Studies Institute, 2005), Checking Iran’s Nuclear Ambitions (Strategic Studies Institute, 2004), and Getting MAD: Nuclear Mutual Assured Destruction, Its Origins and Practice (Strategic Studies Institute, 2004).
Sharon Squassoni is a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in the nonproliferation program and has been analyzing nonproliferation, arms control, and national security issues for two decades. Her research focuses on nuclear nonproliferation and national security. Previously, Ms. Squassoni worked at the Congressional Research Service as a specialist in weapons of mass destruction proliferation, at the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency as a nuclear safeguards expert, and at the State Department as director of policy coordination in the Nonproliferation Bureau. Ms. Squassoni has contributed to journals, magazines, and books on nuclear proliferation and defense. Her most recent publications include “The Iranian Nuclear Program,” a chapter in the forthcoming edited volume Combating Weapons of Mass Destruction: The Future of International Nonproliferation Policy, and “Risks and Realities: The ‘New Nuclear Revival’” (Arms Control Today, May 2007).
Bruno Tertrais is a senior research fellow at the Fondation pour la Recherche Stratégique (FRS). Mr. Tertrais is also a lecturer in world politics at the Institut d’études politiques de Paris. He has served as director of the Civilian Affairs Committee, NATO Assembly, Brussels; as a European affairs analyst at the Délégation aux Affaires stratégiques (policy division) and special assistant to the director of strategic affairs at the French Ministry of Defense; and as a visiting fellow at the RAND Corporation. His recent publications include “A Fragile Consensus (Iran’s Military Power)” (The National Interest, 2006), War Without End: America Ensnared? (New Press, 2005), “The Changing Nature of Military Alliances” (The Washington Quarterly, Spring 2004), L'Asie nucléaire (Institut français de relations internationales, 2001), and US Missile Defence: Strategically Sound, Politically Questionable (Center for European Reform, 2001).
David J. Trachtenberg is an independent consultant in national security affairs. From 2005 to 2007, he was a vice president of CACI International and division manager of the Strategic Analysis Division at CACI-NSR, Inc. From 2003 to 2005, he was senior vice president for homeland security and senior vice president for corporate support at National Security Research, Inc. From 2001 to 2003, Mr. Trachtenberg was principal deputy assistant secretary of defense for international security policy, where his office initiated successful efforts to restructure NATO, develop the Proliferation Security Initiative, and foster closer relationships with Russia and the former Soviet states. Concurrently, he was acting deputy assistant secretary of defense for forces policy, overseeing the office that led the development of the Nuclear Posture Review and the New Triad concept and provided policy rationale leading to the withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and deployment of an initial national missile defense capability. From 1995 to 2001, Mr. Trachtenberg was a senior professional staff member on the House Armed Services Committee. Prior to this, he was a member of the technical staff of the Analytical Sciences Corporation, a consultant to the president’s General Advisory Committee on Arms Control and Disarmament, a senior defense analyst for the Committee on the Present Danger, and a research associate with the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, Inc. Mr. Trachtenberg is widely published and has served on various boards, task forces, and commissions.
Rohit Tripathi is the founder and current president of Young India. Over the last four years, Mr. Tripathi has conceptualized and spoken at a dozen congressional briefings covering geopolitical, trade, and scientific aspects of Indo-U.S. relations. He has led Young India in bridging an important gap in understanding the internal political dynamics of both India and the United States and how that shapes the bilateral relationship. Mr. Tripathi has also been active in sharing the strategic relevance of “Gandhian nonviolent transformation,” which he ties directly to the question of empowerment. He has spoken on this issue at various places in India and the United States. Mr. Tripathi has worked on and critiqued bills on a wide range of development issues in India. He is currently working on a suite of policy guidelines that will bolster small business entrepreneurship and writing a “nonviolence primer” for high school students in India. His recent publications include “What Kind of a Relationship Do We Want?” (Young India, 2007) and “The Debate India Must Have” (Young India, 2007).
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