Speakers

Lloyd James Austin III was sworn in as the 28th Secretary of Defense on January 22, 2021. Mr. Austin is the principal assistant to the President in all matters relating to the Department of Defense and serves on the National Security Council.

Mr. Austin was born in Mobile, Alabama, and raised in Thomasville, Georgia. He graduated from the United States Military Academy with a Bachelor of Science degree and a commission in the Infantry. He holds a Master of Arts degree in counselor education from Auburn University, and a Master of Business Management from Webster University. He is a graduate of the Infantry Officer Basic and Advanced courses, the Army Command and General Staff College, and the Army War College.

His 41-year career in the Army included command at the corps, division, battalion, and brigade levels. Mr. Austin was awarded the Silver Star for his leadership of the Army’s 3rd Infantry Division during the invasion of Iraq in 2003.  Seven years later, he would assume the duties of Commanding General of United States Forces – Iraq, overseeing all combat operations in the country. 

After a tour as the Army’s Vice Chief of Staff, Mr. Austin concluded his uniformed service as the Commander of U.S. Central Command, responsible for all military operations in the Middle East and Afghanistan.  In this assignment, he led U.S. and coalition efforts to battle ISIS in Iraq and Syria.  He retired from the Army in April, 2016.

Since his retirement from military service, Mr. Austin served on the Boards of Directors for Raytheon Technologies, Nucor, and Tenet Healthcare.

Major General Joel “JB” Vowell grew up an Army brat and received his commission as an Infantry officer upon graduation from the University of Alabama in 1991. During his career, he has been stationed in Europe, Pacific, Middle East, and many posts across the United States. He has served on operational assignments to Egypt and on hurricane relief operations in the U.S., and served three combat tours in Afghanistan and one in Iraq, including the surge campaigns in both countries. His commands include 2nd Battalion, 327th Infantry Regiment (Air Assault) “No Slack” and the 3rd Brigade Combat Team (Air Assault) “Rakkasans” of the 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell, Kentucky.

He was a War College Fellow at Stanford University in 2012 and an Army Chief of Staff’s Senior Fellow to the Brookings Institution in 2016. He most recently served as the Deputy Commanding General-Operations for the 25th Infantry Division and Deputy Strategic Planning and Policy directorate (J-5), U.S. Indo-Pacific Command. He assumed his present duties June 25, 2021.

Major General Vowell is a Category 2 USA Cycling Road Racer and a member of the CoreTechs Masters Team, Portola Valley, California, along with being the 2018 and 2019 Hawaii State Masters Champion.

Timothy Brook is a historian of China who writings reach out to embrace world history. A student at the University of Toronto, Peking University, Fudan University, and Harvard University, he completing his doctorate in History and East Asian Languages in 1984. He has taught at Toronto, Stanford, and Oxford, and is currently Republic of China Chair at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. Over the past decade he has been a Guggenheim Fellow, a Getty Fellow, and a member of the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton. A historian of China since the 13th century, he writes on broad range of political, social, and cultural topics, with a particular interest in China’s engagements with the world. Brook has published thirteen books, which have been translated into many Asian and European languages. As editor or co-editor, he has published another nine titles, including Harvard University Press’s six-volume history of imperial China, a bestseller in China, for which he served as editor-in-chief. Among his more popular books are The Confusions of Pleasure, Vermeer’s Hat, Mr. Selden’s Map of China, and most recently, Great State: China and the World (HarperCollins).

Ivo H. Daalder is president of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. Prior to joining the Council in July 2013, he served as the US Ambassador to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization for more than four years. He also served on the US National Security Council staff as director for European Affairs from 1995-97.

Before his appointment as Ambassador to NATO by President Obama in 2009, Daalder was a senior fellow in foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution, specializing in American foreign policy, European security and transatlantic relations, and national security affairs. Prior to joining Brookings in 1998, he was an Associate Professor at the University of Maryland’s School of Public Policy.

A widely-published author, his most recent books include The Empty Throne: America’s Abdication of Global Leadership (with James M. Lindsay), In the Shadow of the Oval Office: Profiles of the National Security Advisers and the Presidents they Served—From JFK to George W. Bush (with I. M. Destler) and the award-winning America Unbound: The Bush Revolution in Foreign Policy (with James M. Lindsay). Other books include Beyond Preemption: Force and Legitimacy in a Changing World (2007); Crescent of Crisis: U.S.-European Strategy for the Greater Middle East (2006); and Winning Ugly: NATO’s War to Save Kosovo (2000). Daalder is a frequent contributor to the opinion pages of the world’s leading newspapers, and a regular commentator on international affairs on television and radio.

For his services at NATO, Ambassador Daalder was awarded the US Secretary of Defense Medal for Outstanding Public Service, the Order of Merit by the Federal Republic of Germany, the Order of the Cross of Terra Mariana of the Republic of Estonia, and the Order of the Three Star of the Republic of Latvia. He was educated at the Universities of Kent and Oxford, Georgetown University, and received his PhD in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He also received an honorary Doctor of Civil Law from the University of Kent.

Ivo Daalder was born in the Hague (the Netherlands) in 1960. He is married to Elisa Harris, and they have two sons.

Foreign correspondent in Washington who focuses on US-China relations & Asia. Former Washington Bureau Chief, US Politics correspondent, Pentagon & CIA correspondent, South China correspondent, and Asia News Editor. Here is my full bio and my FT author page.

Over two decades, I have reported from China, Japan, South Korea, India, Australia, Mongolia, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Philippines, Canada, Guantanamo Bay, Russia, Finland, Germany, England, Italy, Belgium, Poland, Lithuania, Turkey, Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Djibouti, Bahrain, Iraq and Afghanistan.

During my career, I have covered a wide array of stories: Trump White House, 2016 & 2020 US presidential races, Afghanistan & Iraq wars, Guantanamo Bay, terrorism, cyber security, North Korea nuclear program, South China & East China Sea, Hong Kong's Umbrella Revolution, Japan's 2011 tsunami, Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, Chinese manufacturing in the Pearl River Delta, China's anti-corruption drive, and Hurricane Katrina. Have interviewed American farmers & cowboys, Chinese factory workers & billionaires, diplomats & generals, US defense secretaries from Robert McNamara to Donald Rumsfeld, and President Donald Trump.

Born and raised in Dublin, Ireland (Howth). Have also lived in Tokyo, Beijing, Hong Kong, Washington, Boston, Indiana, London and Munich. Have traveled widely across the world, including visiting 48 states in America.

Graduated from Trinity College, Dublin, and have an MA in East Asian studies from Harvard University. I studied Japanese at Sophia University and Chinese at Peking University. I speak fluent Japanese, rusty Mandarin & basic Cantonese. In my spare time, I enjoy photography. You can find my photos here and on Instagram.

Confident public speaker who enjoys doing radio & podcasts, video & television, and moderating panels (but not manels). Have appeared on BBC, CNN, CNBC, FOX, NPR, RTE, and Japanese television in Japanese.  

Ron Keesing is the Vice President for AI at Leidos, where he is responsible for developing and implementing the company’s AI and ML strategy. He leads the Leidos AI Accelerator, a team of top data scientists, AI researchers, and solution architects addressing the company’s most challenging problems in AI and ML. Ron has been conducting and directing R&D in AI, ML, and related technologies for over 25 years. He has done pioneering work on programs addressing a broad range of technical challenges, from forecasting complex events like cyber threats and political instability from sparse data to discovering new potential cancer treatments by extracting and aligning knowledge embedded within massive datasets and research publications to creating the first generation of autonomous systems for spacecraft command and control. Keesing is a Leidos Technical Fellow and has authored papers and patents in diverse subfields of AI. He serves in an advisory capacity for external organizations including the Center for New American Security, where he is a member of the Task Force on Artificial Intelligence and National Security.

Kevin Baron is the founding executive editor of Defense One. Baron has lived in Washington for more than 20 years, covering international affairs, the military, the Pentagon, Congress, and politics for Foreign Policy, National Journal, Stars and Stripes, and the Boston Globe, where he ran investigative projects for five years at the Washington bureau. He is a frequent on-air contributor and previously was national security/military analyst at NBC News & MSNBC. Baron cut his muckraking teeth at the Center for Public Integrity and he is twice a Polk Award winner and a former vice president of the Pentagon Press Association. A member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Baron earned his M.A. in media and public affairs from George Washington University, B.A. in international studies from the University of Richmond, and studied in Paris. Raised in Florida, Baron now lives in Northern Virginia.

Tara Copp is senior Pentagon correspondent for Defense One. Copp has reported through the Middle East, Asia and Europe to cover defense policy and its impact on the lives of service members. Her investigative reporting on military aviation accidents and on skyrocketing veteran cancer rates drove Congressional hearings and legislation. Before returning to journalism, she worked as a senior defense analyst at the U.S. Government Accountability Office, focused on readiness and military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. She is a Plan II graduate of the University of Texas and earned her masters in Security Studies at Georgetown University.

Caitlin M. Kenney is staff reporter at Defense One, where she writes about the Army, Navy, and Marine Corps. She has covered the U.S. military for several years across the country, previously as a Pentagon reporter for Stars and Stripes. She’s a graduate of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

Dr. Colin H. Kahl was sworn in as the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy on April 28, 2021.  In this role, he is the principal advisor to the Secretary of Defense for defense policy and leads the formulation and coordination of national security policy within the Department of Defense.  Dr. Kahl ensures the integration of defense policies and plans to achieve desired objectives.  He is responsible for efforts to build partnerships and defense cooperation with U.S. friends and allies. 

Dr. Kahl was most recently the co-director of the Center for International Security and Cooperation, the inaugural Steven C. Házy Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, and a Professor, by courtesy, in the Department of Political Science at Stanford University.

He served as Deputy Assistant to the President and National Security Advisor to the Vice President from October 2014 to January 2017 where he advised President Obama and Vice President Biden on all matters related to U.S. foreign policy and national security affairs, and represented the Office of the Vice President as a standing member of the National Security Council Deputies’ Committee.  Dr. Kahl has formerly served in the Department as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Middle East. In this capacity, he was the senior policy advisor to the Secretary of Defense for Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel and the Palestinian territories, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Yemen, and six other countries in the Levant and Persian Gulf region. In June 2011, he was awarded the Secretary of Defense Medal for Outstanding Public Service by Secretary Robert Gates. 

Dr. Kahl was previously an assistant and associate professor in the Security Studies Program at Georgetown University's Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, a Senior Fellow at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), and assistant professor of Political Science at the University of Minnesota.  He served as a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellow in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, where he worked on issues related to counterinsurgency, counterterrorism, and responses to failed states.

Dr. Kahl received his B.A. in political science from the University of Michigan (1993) and his Ph.D. in political science from Columbia University (2000).

Brig. Gen. John M. Olson is the Mobilization Assistant to the Chief of Space Operations, Headquarters United States Space Force, Pentagon, Washington, D.C. He assists and advises the Chief of Space Operations with responsibilities that include developing space forces, known as Guardians; acquiring military space systems; maturing space power doctrine; and organizing space forces to present to the joint Combatant Commands. General Olson is the Space Force lead for Joint All Domain Command and Control and the Advanced Battle Management System.  He also leads Space Force initiatives in technology, innovation, data, infrastructure, mobility, logistics, and energy to advance, support, protect, and defend U.S. and allied interests in space. He develops strategy, plans, policy, and priorities for architectures, research, development, testing, force design, operations, and sustainment of technologies, capabilities, and systems with partners and allies for leadership in space. Brig. Gen. Olson also flies as an Airborne Emergency Action Officer leading strategic deterrence and operations missions aboard the Looking Glass Airborne Nuclear Command Post.

General Olson graduated with military distinction from the U.S. Air Force Academy and earned master’s degrees in engineering from the University of Illinois and the University of Tennessee, and a Doctorate in Systems Engineering from Auburn University. General Olson has held numerous air, space, acquisition, test, weapons, political-military, intelligence, and technology command, staff, and leadership roles. He is a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Test Pilot School and a former European and Eurasian Foreign Area Officer. Gen. Olson deployed to Southwest Asia, supporting air and space operations for operations Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and New Dawn in Iraq, Odyssey Dawn in Libya, and Joint Task Force Horn of Africa.The general transitioned to the Air Force Reserve in 2004 after joining NASA, where he served as a Senior Executive Service civilian leader in several roles for almost a decade.  In his civilian capacity, he served as a CEO, President, Vice President, and General Manager in both public and private corporations for 9 years, following 25 years of federal service culminating as the Assistant Director for Space and Aeronautics in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

Prior to his current assignment, General Olson served as the Mobilization Assistant to the Commander, 16th Air Force, Air Forces Cyber, and Joint Forces Headquarters-Cyber at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland where he help lead 49,100 Airmen responsible for Information Warfare.    

Jake Sullivan is the 28th Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs (National Security Advisor). In the Obama-Biden Administration, he served as Deputy Assistant to the President and National Security Advisor to then-Vice President Biden, Director of the Policy Planning Staff at the U.S. Department of State, and Deputy Chief of Staff to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. During his time in government, Sullivan was a lead negotiator in the initial talks that paved the way for the Iran nuclear deal and played a key role in the U.S.-brokered negotiations that led to a ceasefire in Gaza in 2012. He also helped shape the Asia-Pacific rebalance strategy at both the State Department and the White House. 

In the years following his service in the Obama-Biden administration, Sullivan was a Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where he helped conceive and design a bipartisan task force project on a foreign policy for the middle class. He also held teaching posts at Yale Law School, Dartmouth College, and the University of New Hampshire. He co-founded and co-chaired the advisory board for National Security Action, a nonprofit national security advocacy organization, and served on the advisory boards of a number of organizations involved in foreign policy and national security. Sullivan was a senior policy advisor on Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign. 

He holds a B.A. in political science and international studies from Yale College; a M.Phil in International Relations from Oxford, where he was a Rhodes Scholar; and a J.D. from Yale Law School. He clerked for Judge Stephen Breyer of the Supreme Court of the United States and Judge Guido Calabresi of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He grew up as the second of five children in Minneapolis, Minnesota and is a proud product of the Minneapolis public schools. He and his wife Maggie Goodlander have a permanent home in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

Congressman Jim Langevin (LAN'-jih-vin) is a senior member of the House Armed Services Committee, where he is the Chairman of the Cyber, Innovative Technologies, and Information Systems Subcommittee and also serves on the Subcommittees on Seapower and Projection Forces and Strategic Forces. He is also a senior member of the Committee on Homeland Security, where he serves on the Subcommittees on Intelligence & Counterterrorism and Cybersecurity, Infrastructure Protection, & Innovation. A national leader on securing our nation’s technology infrastructure against cyber threats, Langevin co-founded the Congressional Cybersecurity Caucus to increase awareness around the issue and serves as a member of the Cyberspace Solarium Commission.  He has authored or co-authored dozens of pieces of cybersecurity legislation, including most recently the National Cyber Director Act.

As co-chair of the bipartisan Congressional Career and Technical Education Caucus, Langevin advocates to improve and increase access to training that gives students and workers the skills that best fit the needs of expanding industries. He has successfully fought for strong CTE funding under the Carl D. Perkins Vocational and Technical Education Act and, in Rhode Island, has worked to foster employer-educator partnerships and career training programs across a variety of career fields.

A voice for those facing serious challenges, Langevin championed passage of a bipartisan bill to expand services for families caring for their elderly and disabled loved ones. He is a strong advocate for inclusion and independence for people with disabilities and helped pass the ADA Amendments Act that strengthened the protections of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Langevin was inspired to enter public service by the tremendous outpouring of support he received during the most challenging time of his life, after a gun accident paralyzed him at age 16 and left him a quadriplegic. He is driven by a belief that everyone deserves a fair opportunity to make the most of their talents.

After serving as secretary for the state’s Constitutional Convention in 1986, Langevin won election to the Rhode Island House of Representatives, and in 1994, became the nation’s youngest Secretary of State. His leadership resulted in reforms to Rhode Island’s outdated election system and a landmark report documenting widespread violations of the state’s Open Meetings Law. He served in that role until winning election to Congress in 2000.

Bryan Clark is a senior fellow and Director of the Center for Defense Concepts and Technology at Hudson Institute. He leads studies there in naval operations and fleet architecture, electronic warfare, autonomous systems, military competitions, 5G telecommunications, microelectronics, and command and control.

Before joining Hudson Institute, Bryan was a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA), where he led studies for the DoD Office of Net Assessment, Office of the Secretary of Defense, and Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency on new technologies and the future of warfare. During his 25-year Navy career, Bryan was an enlisted and officer submariner, serving in afloat and ashore submarine operational and training assignments including tours as chief engineer of two nuclear submarines and special assistant to the Chief of Naval Operations and director of his Commander’s Action Group.

Ronald J. Epstein is a managing director in Equity Research at Bank of America Merrill Lynch covering Aerospace/Defense and Multi-Industrials with large aerospace components. He actively covers companies listed in the United States, Canada and Brazil.  He joined Merrill Lynch in 2001.

In the Institutional Investor All-America Research poll, he has ranked as a top three analyst in Aerospace & Defense Electronics for the last nine years and number one for the last three years. Previously, he worked as a research scientist in applied aerodynamics technology at Boeing Phantom Works. He was also an adjunct faculty member in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis, teaching fluid dynamics and control systems.

Epstein has a BA with highest honors from Skidmore College, an MBA with honors from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, and a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Duke University.

Ron, his wife Catherine and their three children, Henry, Catherine and Oliver, reside in Chatham, NJ.

Kristine Liwag is an executive director at Morgan Stanley. She is the Senior Aerospace & Defense equity analyst. Prior to joining Morgan Stanley in 2020, Liwag was at Bank of America Merrill Lynch for 12 years in the Aerospace & Defense Team and covered Smid-Cap Aerospace & Defense companies and Aircraft Lessors. Liwag holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Georgetown University in Washington, DC.

Kevin Baron is the founding executive editor of Defense One. Baron has lived in Washington for more than 20 years, covering international affairs, the military, the Pentagon, Congress, and politics for Foreign Policy, National Journal, Stars and Stripes, and the Boston Globe, where he ran investigative projects for five years at the Washington bureau. He is a frequent on-air contributor and previously was national security/military analyst at NBC News & MSNBC. Baron cut his muckraking teeth at the Center for Public Integrity and he is twice a Polk Award winner and a former vice president of the Pentagon Press Association. A member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Baron earned his M.A. in media and public affairs from George Washington University, B.A. in international studies from the University of Richmond, and studied in Paris. Raised in Florida, Baron now lives in Northern Virginia.

Tara Copp is senior Pentagon correspondent for Defense One. Copp has reported through the Middle East, Asia and Europe to cover defense policy and its impact on the lives of service members. Her investigative reporting on military aviation accidents and on skyrocketing veteran cancer rates drove Congressional hearings and legislation. Before returning to journalism, she worked as a senior defense analyst at the U.S. Government Accountability Office, focused on readiness and military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. She is a Plan II graduate of the University of Texas and earned her masters in Security Studies at Georgetown University.

Jacqueline Feldscher is senior national security correspondent at Defense One. Previously, she was national security and space reporter at Politico. Before that, Feldscher covered defense issues in Congress and at the Pentagon for the Washington Examiner, the Washington Times, and Navy Times, covering the Navy and Coast Guard. She’s a graduate of Boston University, and holds a master’s in journalism from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University.

Patrick Tucker is technology editor for Defense One. He’s also the author of THE NAKED FUTURE: WHAT HAPPENS IN A WORLD THAT ANTICIPATES YOUR EVERY MOVE? (CURRENT, 2014). Previously, Tucker was deputy editor for The Futurist for nine years. Tucker has written about emerging technology in Slate, The Sun, MIT Technology Review, Wilson Quarterly, The American Legion Magazine, BBC News Magazine, Utne Reader, and elsewhere.

Marcus Weisgerber is the global business editor for Defense One, where he writes about the intersection of business and national security. He has been covering defense and national security issues for more than a decade, previously as Pentagon correspondent for Defense News and chief editor of Inside the Air Force. He has reported from Afghanistan, the Middle East, Europe, and Asia, and often travels with the defense secretary and other senior military officials.

Frank Kendall is the 26th Secretary of the Air Force responsible for organizing, training, and equipping the U.S. Air and Space Forces. In this capacity, he directs the Department of the Air Force’s annual budget exceeding $168 billion, provides Air and Space forces to combatant commanders for global military operations, and is accountable for the welfare of nearly 700,000 active duty, Guard, Reserve, and civilian Airmen and Guardians and their families.

Mr. Kendall has more than 50 years of experience in engineering, management, defense acquisition, and national security affairs across private industry, government, and the military. He was a consultant to defense industry firms, non-profit research organizations, and the Department of Defense in the areas of strategic planning, engineering management, and technology assessment. Additionally, he is an attorney and was active in the field of human rights, working primarily on a pro bono basis.

Earlier in his career, Mr. Kendall was Vice President of Engineering for Raytheon Company, providing management and direction to the engineering functions throughout the company and for internal research and development. He also served as a Managing Partner at Renaissance Strategic Advisors, a Virginia-based aerospace and defense sector consulting firm.

Within government, Mr. Kendall held numerous posts including Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics as well as Deputy Director of Defense Research and Engineering for Tactical Warfare Programs in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. He is a former member of the Army Science Board and the Defense Intelligence Agency Science and Technology Advisory Board, and was a consultant to the Defense Science Board.

Mr. Kendall is a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. He served 11 years as an active duty Army officer, including assignments in Germany, teaching Engineering at West Point, and in research and development positions.

Maj. Gen. Sherrie L. McCandless is the Interim Commanding General, District of Columbia National Guard. As Commanding General, she is responsible for the strategic leadership, training, readiness, operational employment and performance of the Army and Air Force components of the D.C. National Guard.  General McCandless oversees Joint Force Headquarters-Air, which includes the 113th Wing, F-16 Fighting Falcon that secures the skies over the Nation’s Capital and C-40 Clipper that transports members of Congress and other dignitaries globally. As well as the Land Component Command that includes the 74th Troop Command, 260th Regiment (Regional Training Institute), the 1-224th Aviation Security and Support Battalion, and the 1-226th General Support Aviation Battalion, which includes the UH-60 Black Hawk, UH-72 Lakota and the C-26 Metroliner.

General McCandless began her military career receiving a commission from the Reserve Officer Training Corps at the University of Miami. She has commanded units at the squadron and wing levels. Prior to her current assignment she served as Director, Office of Legislative Liaison, National Guard Bureau.

Congresswoman Stephanie Bice is a fourth generation Oklahoman, born and raised in Oklahoma’s Fifth Congressional District. She graduated from Oklahoma State University in 1995 with a degree in Marketing and International Business. 

Prior to her election to Congress, Bice served in the Oklahoma State Senate for six years. During her tenure, she was Assistant Majority Floor Leader and Chair of the Senate Finance Committee. 

Before her public service, Bice worked in the private sector for eight years in financial oversight, business strategy and marketing for her family's technology company. In addition, she ran her own marketing company, and later helped lead a boutique digital marketing agency as vice president of business development.  

Oklahoma's Fifth Congressional District includes all or parts of Oklahoma, Pottawatomie and Seminole counties. 

In the House of Representatives, Bice was elected by her peers to serve as Freshman Class President and serves as a member of the Republican Whip Team. 

Stephanie and her husband Geoffrey have two daughters.

After graduating from the US Naval Academy in 1994, Congresswoman Sherrill spent almost 10 years on active duty in the Navy. She flew missions throughout Europe and the Middle East as a Sea King helicopter pilot, worked on the Battle Watch Floor in the European Theater during the Iraq invasion, and served as a Flag Aide to the Deputy Commander in Chief of the U.S. Atlantic Fleet. Congresswoman Sherrill also served as a Russian policy officer and worked on the implementation of our nuclear treaty obligations and oversaw the relationship between the U.S. Navy and Russian Federation Navy. Congresswoman Sherrill sits on the House Armed Services Committee, the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee, and the House Education and Labor Committee.

Elisabeth Braw is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where she focuses on defense against grayzone threats. She is also a columnist with Foreign Policy, where she writes on national security and the globalized economy, and the author of The Defender’s Dilemma: Identifying and Deterring Grayzone Aggression (2021).

Before joining AEI, Elisabeth was a senior research fellow at RUSI, whose Modern Deterrence project she led. Prior to that, she worked at Control Risks, a global risk consultancy. Elisabeth is also a member of the steering committee of the Aurora Forum (the UK-Nordic-Baltic leader conference) and a member of the UK National Preparedness Commission. She regularly writes op-eds, including for the Financial Times, Politico, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (writing in German) and the Wall Street Journal. She is also the author of God’s Spies (2019), about the Stasi.

Elisabeth attended university in Germany, graduating with a Magister Artium in political science and German literature.

Benjamin Haddad is the senior director of the Europe Center at the Atlantic Council. He is an expert in European politics and transatlantic relations. Before moving to the Atlantic Council, he was a fellow at Hudson Institute in Washington DC. His work has notably advocated for transatlantic unity in the face of Russian aggression, greater European responsibility, and investment on strategic matters. His recent book “Paradise Lost: Europe in the World of Trump” makes the case for greater European unity in a world of new challenges and threats.

He has been published in Foreign Affairs, The American Interest, Foreign Policy, the Wall Street Journal, Le Monde, Le Figaro, Politique Etrangère and is a frequent guest on France 24, BFM, CBC, CNN, Fox News, and NPR.

A graduate of Sciences Po Paris, where he obtained an MA in international affairs and HEC, with an MA in financial economics, Haddad has lectured in international affairs at Sciences Po.

Constanze Stelzenmüller is an expert on German, European, and trans-Atlantic foreign and security policy and strategy. She is the inaugural holder of the Fritz Stern Chair on Germany and trans-Atlantic Relations in the Center on the United States and Europe at Brookings. From March 2020 to December 2020, she was a senior fellow in the Center on the United States and Europe. She held the Kissinger Chair on Foreign Policy and International Relations at the Library of Congress from October 2019 to March 2020. She served as the inaugural Robert Bosch Senior Fellow at Brookings from 2014 to 2019.

Prior to working at Brookings, she was a senior transatlantic fellow with the German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF), where she directed the influential Transatlantic Trends survey program. Her areas of expertise include: transatlantic relations; German foreign policy; NATO; the European Union’s foreign, security, and defense policy; international law; and human rights.

Stelzenmüller is the former director of GMF’s Berlin office. From 1994 to 2005, she was an editor for the political section of the German weekly DIE ZEIT, where she had also served as defense and international security editor and covered human rights issues and humanitarian crises. From 1988 to 1989, she was a visiting researcher at Harvard Law School. She has also been a GMF campus fellow at Grinnell College in Iowa, a Woodrow Wilson Center public policy scholar in Washington, D.C., and a member of the Remarque Forum—a conference series of the Remarque Institute at New York University.

Stelzenmüller’s essays and articles, in both German and English, have appeared in a wide range of publications, including Foreign Affairs, Internationale Politik, the Financial Times, the International New York Times and Süddeutsche Zeitung. Her dissertation, "Direkte Demokratie in den Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika," was published in 1994 by Nomos. She is also a frequent commentator on American and European radio and television, including Presseclub (ARD), National Public Radio, and the BBC. Stelzenmüller is a governor of the Ditchley Foundation and a fellow of the Royal Swedish Society for War Sciences.

She has worked in Germany and the United States, and speaks English, French, German, and Spanish. Stelzenmüller holds a doctorate in law from the University of Bonn (1992), a master’s degree in public administration from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University (1988), and a law degree from the University of Bonn (1985).

Kevin Baron is the founding executive editor of Defense One. Baron has lived in Washington for more than 20 years, covering international affairs, the military, the Pentagon, Congress, and politics for Foreign Policy, National Journal, Stars and Stripes, and the Boston Globe, where he ran investigative projects for five years at the Washington bureau. He is a frequent on-air contributor and previously was national security/military analyst at NBC News & MSNBC. Baron cut his muckraking teeth at the Center for Public Integrity and he is twice a Polk Award winner and a former vice president of the Pentagon Press Association. A member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Baron earned his M.A. in media and public affairs from George Washington University, B.A. in international studies from the University of Richmond, and studied in Paris. Raised in Florida, Baron now lives in Northern Virginia.

Tara Copp is senior Pentagon correspondent for Defense One. Copp has reported through the Middle East, Asia and Europe to cover defense policy and its impact on the lives of service members. Her investigative reporting on military aviation accidents and on skyrocketing veteran cancer rates drove Congressional hearings and legislation. Before returning to journalism, she worked as a senior defense analyst at the U.S. Government Accountability Office, focused on readiness and military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. She is a Plan II graduate of the University of Texas and earned her masters in Security Studies at Georgetown University.

Jacqueline Feldscher is senior national security correspondent at Defense One. Previously, she was national security and space reporter at Politico. Before that, Feldscher covered defense issues in Congress and at the Pentagon for the Washington Examiner, the Washington Times, and Navy Times, covering the Navy and Coast Guard. She’s a graduate of Boston University, and holds a master’s in journalism from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University.

Marcus Weisgerber is the global business editor for Defense One, where he writes about the intersection of business and national security. He has been covering defense and national security issues for more than a decade, previously as Pentagon correspondent for Defense News and chief editor of Inside the Air Force. He has reported from Afghanistan, the Middle East, Europe, and Asia, and often travels with the defense secretary and other senior military officials.