Ashton Carter

Ashton Baldwin Carter (born September 14, 1954) is a United States national security professional serving as the United States Deputy Secretary of Defense. Prior to that, he served as Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics (AT&L) for President Barack Obama. He is currently on leave from his post as Co-Director (with former Secretary of Defense William J. Perry) of the Preventive Defense Project, a research collaboration of Harvard and Stanford universities. He is also on leave from the International Relations, Security, and Science faculty at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government. He is a member of the guiding coalition of the Project on National Security Reform. On August 2, 2011, President Obama nominated Carter to be the new Deputy Secretary of Defense, and on September 23, 2011 the United States Senate confirmed him by unanimous consent. He assumed his office as Deputy Secretary of Defense on October 6, 2011.

Carter served as Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy in the Clinton Administration from 1993 to 1996, and was nominated to join the Obama Administration on March 18, 2009. Carter served as a member of the Defense Science Board from 1991–1993 and 1997–2001, the Defense Policy Board from 1997–2001, and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's International Security Advisory Board from 2006-2008. In 1997, Carter co-chaired the Catastrophic Terrorism Study Group with former CIA Director John M. Deutch, which urged greater attention to terrorism. From 1998 to 2000, he was deputy to former Secretary of Defense William J. Perry in the North Korea Policy Review and traveled with him to Pyongyang. In 2001-2002, he served on the National Academy of Sciences Committee on Science and Technology for Countering Terrorism and advised on the creation of the Department of Homeland Security.

Education
Carter received bachelor's degrees in physics and in medieval history from Yale University, summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa. He received his doctorate in theoretical physics from the University of Oxford, where he was a Rhodes Scholar.

In 1972, Carter graduated from Abington High School in Abington, PA where he had been President of the Honor Society.

Department of Defense career
Carter served as Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy during President Clinton's first term.

His Pentagon responsibilities encompassed: countering weapons of mass destruction worldwide, oversight of the U.S. nuclear arsenal and missile defense programs, policy regarding the collapse of the former Soviet Union (including its nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction), control over sensitive U.S. exports, and chairmanship of NATO's High Level Group. Carter directed military planning during the 1994 crisis over North Korea's nuclear weapons program; was instrumental in removing all nuclear weapons from the territories of Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Belarus; directed the establishment of defense and intelligence relationships with the countries of the former Soviet Union when the Cold War ended; and participated in the negotiations that led to the deployment of Russian troops as part of the Bosnia Peace Plan Implementation Force. Carter managed the multi-billion dollar Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction program to support elimination of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons of the former Soviet Union, including the secret removal of 600 kilograms of highly enriched uranium from Kazakhstan in the operation code-named Project Sapphire. He also directed the Nuclear Posture Review and oversaw the Department of Defense's (DOD's) Counterproliferation Initiative. He directed the reform of DOD's national security export controls. His arms control responsibilities included the Agreed Framework which froze North Korea's plutonium producing nuclear reactor program, the extension of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, the negotiation of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, and matters involving the START II, ABM, CFE, and other arms control treaties.

In an April 4, 2013 speech at Center for Strategic and International Studies the Secretary affirmed that the 'Shift to Asia' initiative of President Obama was a priority that would not be affected by the Budget sequestration of 2013 as the Pentagon and other departments scaled down spending. The Secretary responded to a Reuters reporters question that China was suspicious of the refocusing of American foreign policy to Asia as a military targeting of China by stating that the Chinese should ask the North Koreans to lower their military posturing and resolve to use diplomacy and dialogue to solve their problems. Carter noted that China was a central economic partner and that 'The Shift to Asia' is principally an economic matter with new security implications. India, Australia, and New Zealand were mentioned as forthcoming security partners.

Other roles
Carter had been a longtime member of the Defense Science Board and the Defense Policy Board, the principal advisory bodies to the Secretary of Defense. During the Bush administration, he was also a member of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's International Security Advisory Board, co-chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's Policy Advisory Group, a consultant to the Defense Science Board, a member of the National Missile Defense White Team, and a member of the National Academy of Sciences Committee on International Security and Arms Control. In 1997 Carter co-chaired the Catastrophic Terrorism Study Group with former CIA Director John M. Deutch, which urged greater attention to terrorism. From 1998 to 2000, he was deputy to William J. Perry in the North Korea Policy Review and traveled with him to Pyongyang. In 2001-2002, he served on the National Academy of Sciences Committee on Science and Technology for Countering Terrorism and advised on the creation of the Department of Homeland Security. He has testified frequently before the armed services, foreign relations, and homeland security committees of both houses of Congress.

In addition to his public service, Carter was a Senior Partner at Global Technology Partners and a member of the Board of Trustees of the MITRE Corporation, and the Advisory Boards of MIT's Lincoln Laboratory and the Draper Laboratory. He has been a consultant to Goldman Sachs and Mitretek Systems on international affairs and technology matters, and speaks frequently to business and policy audiences. Carter was also a member of the Aspen Strategy Group, the Council on Foreign Relations, the American Physical Society, the International Institute for Strategic Studies, and the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations. Carter was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Carter's research focuses on the Preventive Defense Project, which designs and promotes security policies aimed at preventing the emergence of major new threats to the United States.

From 1990-1993, Carter was Director of the Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government, and Chairman of the Editorial Board of International Security. Previously, he held positions at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment, and Rockefeller University.

Recognition
Carter was twice awarded the Department of Defense Distinguished Service Medal, the highest award given by the Department. For his contributions to intelligence, he was awarded the Defense Intelligence Medal. In 1987 Carter was named one of Ten Outstanding Young Americans by the United States Jaycees. He received the American Physical Society's Forum Award for his contributions to physics and public policy. In November 2011, Carter was included on The New Republic's list of Washington's most powerful, least famous people.

Works
In addition to authoring numerous articles, scientific publications, government studies, and Congressional testimonies, Carter co-edited and co-authored eleven books, including:


 * Directed Energy Missile Defense in Space (1984)
 * Ballistic Missile Defense (1984)
 * Managing Nuclear Operations (1987)
 * Soviet Nuclear Fission: Control of the Nuclear Arsenal in a Disintegrating Soviet Union (1991)
 * Beyond Spinoff: Military and Commercial Technologies in a Changing World (1992)
 * A New Concept of Cooperative Security (1992)
 * Cooperative Denuclearization: From Pledges to Deeds (1993)
 * Preventive Defense: A New Security Strategy for America (1997)
 * Keeping the Edge: Managing Defense for the Future (2001)