Rebecca Hersman

Rebecca Hersman is an independent consultant specialising in strategic risk management for complex national security threats. Until January 2025, she served as Director of the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), overseeing more than 2,200 personnel across 50+ countries and managing over $2.4 billion in programs to counter and deter the use of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) and mitigate emerging threats.

Prior to DTRA, Ms Hersman was Director of the Project on Nuclear Issues (PONI) and a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). At CSIS, she was a leading voice on nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons policy, global health security, and crisis management. She led a flagship national programme to cultivate the next generation of nuclear experts and authored influential studies on WMD policy, strategic stability, and decision-making under crisis. She co-chaired the CSIS U.S./UK/France Trilateral Dialogues on Nuclear Issues and served on the Commission on Strengthening America’s Health Security.

From 2009 to 2015, Ms Hersman was the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Countering WMD in the U.S. Department of Defense. She directed policy to prevent proliferation, eliminate risks, and respond to WMD threats. Key roles included efforts to eliminate Syria’s chemical weapons, the Fukushima nuclear response, and WMD interdiction. She led DoD engagement with NATO, South Korea, Japan, and others on arms control and nonproliferation.

Earlier in her career, Ms Hersman was a senior fellow at the National Defense University, an international affairs fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, and served in policy roles at the Department of Defense and on Capitol Hill. She holds an MA from Georgetown University and a BA from Duke University. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.