Dr. David A. Cooper

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David Cooper is a Senior Research Fellow at the Center for the Study of Weapons of Mass Destruction at the National Defense University (NDU). His areas of focus include nonproliferation, disarmament, and homeland security. He also serves as the Center’s focal point for education outreach.

Dr. Cooper joined NDU in March of 2009 after nineteen years of public service in the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD), where he was a career member of the Senior Executive Service. His final assignment was with U.S. Africa Command, where he led partnership and strategic communication efforts. His major assignments at OSD have included Principal Director for Homeland Security Integration, managing strategic planning, intergovernmental coordination, international partnership, strategic communication, and capability and budget assessment activities related to homeland defense and security missions. He also served for four years as Director of Nonproliferation Policy, managing a broad range of Defense Department and United States Government policies to prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and their means of delivery. His specific responsibilities in this capacity included: counterproliferation interdiction operations; Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI); negotiation and implementation of multilateral nonproliferation treaties; international nuclear safeguards; export control regimes; regional WMD disarmament; and, nonproliferation sanctions. During his tenure he served as U.S. Head of Delegation to the PSI Operational Experts Group (OEG) process, U.S. Representative to the United Nations Panel of Governmental Experts on Missiles, and led bilateral talks with a number of key countries. Before that he served as Director of the Office of Strategic Arms Control Policy, managing negotiation, ratification, and implementation of nuclear treaties and agreements. He joined the Defense Department in 1990 as a Presidential Management Intern (PMI) and has worked on a wide variety of nonproliferation, arms control, and regional security issues.

He holds a PhD in Political Science and International Relations from The Australian National University, a Master of International Affairs from Columbia University, and is a graduate of Oberlin College. He is the author of various articles and a book (Competing Western Strategies Against the Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction, Praeger: 2002). He serves as an Adjunct Professor of U.S. Foreign Policy at American University and was previously an Adjunct Associate Professor of International Affairs at Georgetown University.