Scenario-based Planning to Maintain the Credibility of the U.S. Nuclear Deterrent Against Emerging Threats

https://cgsr.llnl.gov/experts/fellows/ronald-lehman

Amb. Ronald F. Lehman II

lehman3@llnl.gov  (925) 423-3711

The Honorable Ronald F. Lehman II is the Counselor to the Director of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. For the State Department, Lehman Chairs the Governing Board of the International Science and Technology Center (ISTC), an intergovernmental organization. For the Defense Department, Ron was one of the original members of the Defense Threat Reduction Advisory Committee (TRAC) and was its Chair from 2014 though 2019 having previously served as Vice Chair.

Lehman was Director of the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency from 1989 to 1993, when START I, START II, the Chemical Weapons Convention, Conventional Forces in Europe. Open Skies, and other historic agreements where concluded. Previously, he served in the U.S. Department of Defense as Assistant Secretary for International Security Policy, in the State Department as Ambassador and U.S. Chief Negotiator on Strategic Offensive Arms (START I), and in the White House as Deputy Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs. He has also served on the National Security Council staff as a Senior Director, in the Pentagon as Deputy Assistant Secretary, on the Senior Professional Staff of the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee, and in Vietnam commissioned in the United States Army. In past years, he served on the Presidential Advisory Board on Proliferation Policy, on the State Department's International Security Advisory Board, as chair of the NATO High Level Group, on the governing board of the U.S. Institute of Peace, and as a U.S. representative to a number of United Nations disarmament and review conferences including co-chair of US delegations to the 1990 NPT Review Conference and the 1993 Paris CWC signature conference.

Lehman co-chaired (with David Franz) the National Academy of Sciences' study on the future of Cooperative Threat Reduction and formerly co-chaired (with Ash Carter) the Policy Advisory Group on nonproliferation for the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He was on the Defense Science Board Task Forces on Globalization and Security, on Tritium, on Global Strike, and on Defense against Biological Weapons. He is served on the National Research Council Committee on U.S. Air Force Strategic Deterrence Military Capabilities in the 21st Century and served on the National Research Council's Committee on Science, Technology, and Health Aspects of the Foreign Policy Agenda of the United States and on its Committee on Alternative Technologies to Replace Anti-Personnel Landmines. He was detailed to the Administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration as counterterrorism coordinator after the September 11, 2001, attacks. For the Department of Energy he was the U.S.-Snezhinsk Working Group Co-Chair for the Joint Russian-American Steering Committee on the Nuclear Cities Initiative. He served on the advisory panel for USSTRATCOM's Global Innovation and Strategy Center. He was on the Council on Foreign Relations Independent Task Force on the U.S. Nuclear Posture. He was a Public Affairs Fellow at the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace at Stanford University and an Adjunct Professor at Georgetown University. He received his Ph.D. from Claremont Graduate University (1975) and his B.A. from Claremont McKenna College (1968). During his military service, he graduated from Armor Officer, Combat Intelligence, Southeast Asia, Airborne, and Electronic Warfare and Cryptologic Staff Officer courses. He is on the Board of Governors of the Keck Center for International and Strategic Studies at Claremont McKenna College, having served previously as its Board Chair. For many years, he was the Director of the Center for Global Security Research at LLNL.

Selected Publications

“Chapter 3: ‘Sputnik-like Events: Responding to Technological Surprise,” in Zachary Davis and Michael Nacht, eds., Strategic Latency: Red, White, and Blue, pp. 33-51.

“Chapter 4: Simplicity and Complexity in the Nth Nuclear Era: Cross-Domain Aspects,” Cross Domain Deterrence, Oxford University Press, 2018.

“Cooperation and Threat Reduction: Learning Curves and Forgetting Curves,” Cooperative Threat Reduction Programs for the Next Ten Years and Beyond, 18 September 2017, at http://sites.nationalacademies.org/pga/cisac/pga_181908.

"Unclear and Present Danger: The Strategic Implications of Latent, Dual-Use Science and Technology," in Zachary S. Davis, Ronald Lehman, and Michael Nacht, eds., Strategic Latency and World Power: How Technology is Changing our Concepts of Security, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Center for Global Security Research, 2014, pp. 5-21.

"Chapter 5: Future Technology and Strategic Stability," in Elbridge A. Colby and Michael S. Gerson, eds., Strategic Stability: Contending Interpretations, with Foreword by Thomas C. Schelling (Strategic Studies Institute, Army War College, January 2013), pp. 147-199.

"Foreword," in Jeffrey A. Larsen and James J. Wirtz, eds., Arms Control and Cooperative Security, Boulder and London: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2009, pp. vii-xii.

"Additional Views," in U.S. Nuclear Weapons Policy, Council on Foreign Relations Independent Task Force Report No. 62, William J. Perry and Brent Scowcroft, Chairs (Council on Foreign Relations, New York, 2009), p. 98.

Co-chair with David R. Franz of Committee on Strengthening and Expanding the Department of Defense Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, National Academy of Sciences, Global Security Engagement: A New Model for Cooperative Threat Reduction, Washington, D.C.: The National Academies Press, 2009.

"Agriculture and the Changing Taxonomy of War," in M. Taeb and A.H. Zakri, eds., Agriculture, Human Security, and Peace: A Crossroad in African Development, West Lafayette, Indiana: Purdue University Press, 2008, pp. 11-34.

"Chapter 12: International Arms Restraint by Treaty, Law, and Policy," in John Norton Moore and Robert F. Turner, eds., National Security Law, 2nd ed., Carolina Academic Press, 2005, pp. 523-660.

“Presentation: Science and Society’s Future,” Vision 2033: Linking Science and Policy for Tomorrow’s World, Proceedings Celebrating the 30th Anniversary of the AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellowship Programs, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Washington, DC, 13-14 May 2004. With Robert N. Schock, Eileen S. Vergino, and Neil Joeck, "Atoms for Peace after 50 Years," Issues in Science and Technology, Vol. XX, No. 3, The National Academies, Spring 2004, pp. 37-40.

"Nonproliferation Regimes and South Asia: Is there a Meeting Point?" in S. Rajagopal and Sridhar K. Chari, eds., Prospects for Stability in a Nuclear Subcontinent, Bangalore, India: National Institute of Advanced Studies, 2003, pp. 30-49.

"Introduction: Verification and the Challenges to Constructive Engagement with North Korea," in Michael May, ed., Verifying the Agreed Framework, Center for International Security and Cooperation, Stanford University and CGSR (UCRL-ID-142036/CGSR-2001-001) April 2001, pp. 1-6.

“Research and nonproliferation,” CHEMTEC, American Chemical Society, Volume 28, Number 10, PP. 14-15.With Victor Alessi, "Science in the Pursuit of Peace: The Success and Future of the ISTC," Arms Control Today, Washington, D.C., The Arms Control Association, June/July 1998, pp. 16-22.

"Learning from the Arms Control Experience," in Environmental Threats and National Security: An International Challenge to Science and Technology, Proceedings from the Workshop at Monterey, California, Center for Global Security Research (UCRL-ID-129655), December 1996, pp. 53-70.

"Chapter 23: Nuclear Deterrence and Disarmament after the Cold War," in James Brown, ed., Old Issues and New Strategies in Arms Control and Verification, Amsterdam: VU University Press, 1995, pp. 349-361.

U.S. Nuclear Policy in the 21st Century: A Fresh Look at National Strategy and Requirements: Final Report, edited with Robert Joseph, Center for Counterproliferation Research, National Defense University, 1998.

"Report of Working Group One: Defining the Middle East/Security Doctrine and a New Security Order," Fred Wehling, ed., Workshop on Arms Control and Security in the Middle East III, Policy Paper #23, Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation, June 1996, pp. 6-8.

"Deterrence, Denuclearization, and Proliferation: Alternative Visions of the Next Fifty Years," in Francine R. Frankel, ed., Bridging the Nonproliferation Divide: The United States and India, New York: University Press of America, 1995, pp. 21-57.

"The Beginning of the End or the End of the Beginning," in James Brown, ed., New Horizons and Challenges in Arms Control and Verification, Amsterdam: VU University Press, 1994, pp. 1-8.

"Trends and challenges in global arms control regimes," in Fred Tanner, ed., Arms Control, Confidence-Building and Security Cooperation in the Mediterranean, North Africa and the Middle East, Msida, Malta: Mediterranean Academy of Diplomatic Studies, University of Malta, December 1994, pp. 33-50.

"Foreword," Christopher C. Harmon and David Tucker, eds., Statecraft and Power: Essays in Honor of Harold W. Rood, New York: University Press of America, 1994.

"Chapter 8: The Importance of Domestic Law to International Arms Control," in Serge Sur, ed., Disarmament and Arms Limitation Obligations: Problems of Compliance and Enforcement, United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research, 1994, pp. 153-158.

"A North Korean Nuclear-Weapons Program: International Implications," Security Dialogue, Vol. 24, No. 3, September 1993, pp. 257-272.

"Arms Control: Passing the Torch as Time Runs Out," The Washington Quarterly, Washington, D.C.: The Center for Strategic and International Studies, Summer, 1993, pp. 37-52.

"Changing Realities," Comparative Strategy, Vol. 12 (1993), pp. 47-51.

"Arms Control is Everyone's Business: The United States and the United Nations at the Mid-Point of the1990s," in Steven Mataija and Lyne C Bourque, eds., Proliferation and International Security: Converging Roles of Verification, Confidence Building and Peacekeeping, Toronto: York University Centre for International and Strategic Studies, 1993, pp. 159-170.

"World Security Beyond the Cold War," Managing Nuclear Weapons in a Changing World, Center for Security and Technology Studies (CSTS-42-93), Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, July 2, 1993.

"Issues and Challenges of Verification," in James Brown, ed., Challenges in Arms Control for the 1990s, Amsterdam: VU University Press, 1992, pp. 15-20.

"Concluding the Chemical Weapons Convention," in Brad Roberts, ed., Chemical Disarmament and U.S. Security, Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press/Center for Strategic and International Studies, 1992, pp. 1-13.

"Chapter 12: Nuclear Weapons: Deployment, Targeting and Deterrence," and "Chapter 14: Measures to Reduce Tensions and Prevent War," in John Norton Moore, Frederick S. Tipson, and Robert F. Turner, National Security Law, Carolina Academic Press, 1990, pp. 485-550 and pp. 641-669.

"Arms Control in Lehman's Terms: ACT Interviews ACDA Director Ronald F. Lehman," Arms Control Today, Vol. 19, No. 9, November 1989, pp. 3-8.

William A. Chambers

Major General William A. Chambers, USAF (retired) served in uniform for 35 years, culminating in duty as the Assistant Chief of Staff for Strategic Deterrence and Nuclear Integration, Headquarters U. S. Air Force, Washington D.C.  In that role, he directed the policy, planning, advocacy, and assessment for Air Force nuclear weapon systems.  

Since retirement from active duty in 2013, he has been employed by the Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA), a Federally-funded Research and Development Center, which provides studies for the Department of Defense on a full range of national security issues.  At IDA, he leads research teams focused on nuclear weapons policy and strategy as well as strategic force structure modernization and Nuclear Enterprise infrastructure; his team recently provided analysis that fulfilled a statutory requirement to examine the issue of presidential decision-making regarding nuclear weapons.  He also led analysis efforts that informed the 2018 Nuclear Posture Review and its ongoing implementation and helped lead IDA’s research in support of the congressionally-mandated Augustine-Mies Panel and their report, “New Foundations for Nuclear Security.”  General Chambers also served on the Defense Science Board Task Force on Deterring, Preventing, and Responding to the Threat or Use of Weapons of Mass Destruction and co-chaired a panel on the Defense Science Board Summer Study on National Leadership Command Capabilities.  He also serves on the DoD’s Threat Reduction Advisory Committee and the USSTRATCOM Strategic Advisory Group.  

General Chambers was a master navigator and weapon systems officer; his operational experience included tours in Strategic Air Command flying the KC-135A and FB-111A.  He served as a nuclear policy planner on the Joint Staff and as deputy executive assistant to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.  He commanded the 11th Wing at Bolling Air Force Base, Washington, DC.  He has also served in a variety of leadership roles in the Pentagon and in overseas commands.  General Chambers served as Deputy Commanding General, Combined Forces Command-Afghanistan in Kabul during 2006-2007.  From 2008-2010 he served as Director of Air and Space Operations and then as Vice Commander, U.S. Air Forces in Europe.  

General Chambers graduated from the U.S. Air Force Academy in 1978.  He conducted graduate work at the University of Colorado and Boston University and earned a Master’s degree in National Security and Strategic Studies from the Naval War College.

Air Force Bio: https://www.af.mil/About-Us/Biographies/Display/Article/104848/major-general-william-a-chambers/