National Security in a Digital World

Speaker: Honorable Sue Gordon (Former Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence)

Date: 31 August 2021

Speaker Session Summary

SMA hosted a speaker session with the Honorable Sue Gordon (Former Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence) as part of its SMA INSS/PRISM Speaker Series.

The vast amount of current and emerging technologies allows any individual or governing body to maximize the impact of information operations. The Honorable Sue Gordon commented that there is more technology available to the DoD than it can reasonably use. This amount of modern communication technology allows users to share information and data much faster than ever before. The amount and speed at which data is created generates new challenges for data analysts, breaks down long-standing physical boundaries between populations, and creates a new geopolitical competition focused on the collection of data—especially economic data. Data competition is a major component of the geopolitical competition between China and the US. Additionally, non-great power states and violent extremist organizations (VEOs) also have the capability to threaten the US through digital means.

She added that the changing of personnel for DoD institutions, which creates a void of institutional experience, is a potential weakness of the US bureaucratic system. As technology continues to advance at a rapid pace, the DoD must train its leaders to have a more technical skillset. This training should include the development of AI and best practices for using it as a decision-making tool. Ms. Gordon emphasized that the US must support its identity as the leader of the free world and not abandon traditional US values that have made it a global ideological leader since WWII. 

Speaker Session Recording

Note: We are aware that many government IT providers have blocked access to YouTube from government machines during the pandemic in response to bandwidth limitations. We recommend viewing the recording on YouTube from a non-government computer or listening to the audio file (below), if you are in this position.

Briefing Materials

Biography:

Ms. Gordon is the former Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence, serving from 2017-2019, where she advised the President on intelligence matters and provided operational leadership of the 17 agencies and organizations of the Intelligence Community (IC). She is a widely respected authority on risk management, technical innovation, and cyber and space issues. Today, she is an active board member, university fellow, and advises private companies in the areas of technology, strategy, and leadership.

Throughout Ms. Gordon’s more than three decades in the IC, she led large scale organizational change and delivered revolutionary outcomes. Ms. Gordon worked to adapt the IC to emerging economic, military, and political trends impacting the current operating environment. Ms. Gordon led the establishment of In-Q-Tel, the Central Intelligence Agency’s venture arm, in the 1990s. In the last several years, she focused on advancing intelligence integration across the IC, expanding outreach and partnerships to the private sector and international allies, and driving innovation across the Community.

While serving as Deputy Director of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) from 2015 to 2017, Ms. Gordon helped lead NGA through a transformation to adapt to emergent challenges. In this role, she spearheaded agile decision-making, modernization of the information environment, and the expansion of geospatial intelligence services to the open marketplace. 

Ms. Gordon joined the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in 1980 and served for 29 years, rising to senior executive positions in each of the Agency’s four directorates: operations, analysis, science and technology, and support. She is renowned for her commitment to mentorship and diversity and inclusion, serving as a champion for the LGBTQ community. Ms. Gordon is recognized for her creative executive leadership, receiving numerous awards, including the Distinguished Intelligence Medal and Presidential Rank Award at the distinguished level.

Ms. Gordon is a Rubenstein Fellow at Duke University; serves on several boards, including as an independent director for CACI International and Avantus Federal, and as a senior advisor for Pallas Advisors, the Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation, Primer.ai, and ColdQuanta; and consults for several companies, including Microsoft Corporation.  

Gordon holds a Bachelor of Science from Duke University where she was a three-time captain of the Duke Women’s Basketball team. She is married to fellow Duke graduate Jim Gordon with whom she has two grown children, two grandchildren, and two Greater Swiss Mountain dogs, Astro and Elroy.

The SMA INSS/PRISM Speaker Series description and list of the other sessions in this series can be downloaded here.