Walter B. Slocombe is the Secretary, Director, and member of the Executive Committee of the Atlantic Council and a Senior Counsel at the Washington, D.C., law firm Caplin & Drysdale. He has over 50 years’ experience, including many years with the Defense Department, and has developed particular expertise in legal and ethical considerations in information operations.
Walter B. Slocombe is the Secretary, Director, and member of the Executive Committee of the Atlantic Council and a Senior Counsel at the Washington, D.C., law firm Caplin & Drysdale.
Previously, he has served as Senior Advisor for National Security and Defense in the Coalition Provisional Authority for Iraq, and as Under Secretary of Defense for Policy. Before that, he served in the Defense Department as Principal Deputy Under Secretary, Deputy Under Secretary for Policy Planning, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Security Affairs, and as Director of the DOD Task Force on the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT). He was also a member of the staff of the National Security Council.
He has been a member of the State Department International Security Advisory Board, the Commission on Intelligence Capabilities Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction, and the Defense Policy Board, and he has served various National Academies of Sciences committees.
He has particular expertise in legal and ethical considerations in information operations, and ballistic missile defense.
Slocombe received his education at Princeton University, as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, and at Harvard Law School.
Articles
CSIS European Trilateral Track 2 Nuclear Dialogues: 2023 Consensus Statement
Dr. Heather Williams, The Hon. Walter B. Slocombe, Dr. Caitlin Talmadge
"The European Trilateral Track 2 Nuclear Dialogues, organized by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in partnership with the Royal United Services Institute...
A Strategic Posture for a New Era: Introducing the Congressional Strategic Posture Report
Madelyn Creedon, The Hon. Walter B. Slocombe
"There’s a new, more dangerous, and more competitive environment afoot. Is the United States ready for it?" "The Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of...
What needs to change about US nuclear weapons strategy?
"It’s an explosive question. On Thursday, a bipartisan congressional commission—the first of its kind in fourteen years—said that US nuclear weapons policy is “ill-prepared” for...
Congress should fund the nuclear sea-launched cruise missile
"The House and Senate appropriations committees have not provided adequate funding for the nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missile (SLCM-N). This is a mistake. The United States...