Cooperation & Integration in the Light of Maritime Strategic Challenges

Dr. Henrik Breitenbauch heads the Centre for Military Studies at the University of Copenhagen. He is a senior researcher and policy analyst with a track record of international and domestic agenda setting in defence and security, strategy processes, national security and defence planning as well as strategic foresight and futures studies. Henrik has extensive experience with political and strategic analysis, policy development, policy formulation and quality control in a timely manner, as well as wide exposure to electronic and print media as expert commentator.

Karsten Friis is a Senior Adviser and head of NUPIs Research Group on Security and Defence. He has a PhD from the University of Groningen and a MSc in International Relations from London School of Economics. Karsten has previously worked for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) in Serbia, Montenegro and Kosovo, as well as for the Norwegian Armed Forces in Oslo and in Kosovo. His main area of expertise is security and defense policies, international military operations, civilian-military relations, cyber security, as well as the political developments in the Western Balkans.

Rear Admiral John Gumbleton is a native of Falmouth, Massachusetts, and a 1989 graduate of Norwich University, where he earned a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Engineering.   He also holds a Master of Science in Information Systems from The George Washington University (GWU), a Master of Arts in National Security and Strategic Studies from the Naval War College, and attended the GWU/MIT National Security Management Course.

Gumbleton was designated a naval aviator in October 1990 and qualified as an SH-60B pilot at the Fleet Replacement Squadron in Mayport, Florida.

He has served in a variety of sea and shore assignments. At sea, his assignments include HSL-44, deploying with USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG 58) as detachment training officer and USS Vicksburg (CG 69) as detachment maintenance officer. Twice serving at HSL-46, he deployed with USS Ticonderoga (CG 47) as detachment officer-in-charge. Reporting back to HSL-46 he served as squadron operations officer and as detachment officer-in-charge on board USS Taylor (FFG 50).  In command he led the men and women of HSL-48 and USS Boxer (LHD 4).

His shore assignments include the Bureau of Naval Personnel as War College and graduate education detailer; flag lieutenant to Commander, Naval Air Systems Command; legislative fellow to Senator John Warner of Virginia; and congressional liaison, Appropriations Matters Office in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Navy (FM&C); military assistant to Deputy Assistant Chief of Staff Allied Command Transformation Staff Element Europe; CNO Fellow to Strategic Studies Group 34; and director, Operations Division (FMB1), Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Navy (FM&C).

In his current assignment, Gumbleton is the director of Maritime Headquarters (N4/5/8/9) supporting naval component theater engagement development, resource programing and operational planning in support of U.S. European Command and U.S. Africa Command.

His personal awards include the Legion of Merit (two awards), Defense Meritorious Service Medal (one award), Meritorious Service Medal (two awards), Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal (five awards), and the Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medal (one award).

Dr. Peter Haynes is a Senior Fellow at CSBA specializing in grand strategy, maritime and naval strategy, the development of strategy and operational concepts, naval and air warfare, the future of conflict, special operations, and irregular warfare.

Prior to retiring from the U.S. Navy in 2016 as a captain, he served as the Deputy Director, Strategy, Plans, and Policy (J5) at U.S. Special Operations Command. He served in other strategy-related positions, which include: the Director, Strategy and Plans (J5) for Combined Joint Task Force—Horn of Africa (2012); Branch Chief, Advanced Concepts, (N511), OPNAV (2010-11); Branch Chief, Strategy and Concepts (N513), OPNAV (2006); and Desk Officer, Russia and Ukraine, Joint Staff J5 (2001–2002). Operationally, he flew the E-2C Hawkeye carrier-based command and control aircraft with Carrier Airborne Early Warning Squadron (VAW) 116, including deployments to the Western Pacific/Indian Ocean (1989) and to the Persian Gulf in support of Operations Desert Storm (1991) and Southern Watch (1999), and with VAW-112 as the commanding officer and executive officer, which included deployments to the Western Pacific (2003) and the Persian Gulf in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom (2005).

He is the recipient of the Defense Superior Service Medal, the Legion of Merit, the Air Medal with Combat “V” and the Navy/Marine Corps Commendation Medal with Combat “V”, among others, as well as the 2009–2010 Naval History and Heritage Command’s Samuel Eliot Morison Naval History Scholarship.

He is the author of Toward a New Maritime Strategy: American Naval Thinking in the Post-Cold War Era (U.S. Naval Institute Press, 2015).

Ambassador Timo S. Koster is a career diplomat at the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and ambassadorial fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security.

In November 2018, Koster assumed his new position as ambassador-at-large with a focus on security policy and cyber. From 2012 to 2018, he was director for defense policy and capabilities at NATO headquarters in Brussels. After finishing his law degree at the University of Amsterdam, Ambassador Koster joined the diplomatic academy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands in 1991. His first appointment was at the Royal Netherlands Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya. He returned to The Hague in 1994, where he served in several positions within the Ministry, including a stint as private secretary to the Minister for European Affairs. From 1998 to 2001 he served at the Netherlands Embassy in London as head of the Economic Department. In 2001, Ambassador Koster became acting director for European integration at the Ministry of Economic Affairs, after which he served as a project director at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs. In 2003, Koster was appointed Deputy Ambassador at the Royal Netherlands Embassy in Athens, Greece. In 2008 he moved to Brussels where he served as defense adviser at the Netherlands Permanent Representation to NATO until 2012, when he moved to the position of director for defense policy and capabilities in the NATO International Staff. Ambassador Koster is married with two sons and two daughters.

Kristian Søby Kristensen is deputy head of the Centre for Military Studies at the University of Copenhagen. He conducts research on security and strategy. What is security – and for whom, where and how? In concrete terms that means a focus on NATO as well as Danish and Western strategy and security policy. His primary research areas are NATO and the transatlantic relationship, Danish and Western defense and security policy, War, strategy and globalization and Arctic security policy. He supervises, teaches and conducts public lectures within the same areas.

Professor Magnus Petersson recieved his PhD in history at the University of Stockholm in 2003. Between 1998 and 2008 he was researcher, lecturer, director of studies, and head of research at the Swedish National Defence College. He is associate professor at Stockholm University and Oslo University, where he teaches and supervises regularly.

Dr. Gary John Schaub Jr is a defense and national security expert located in Copenhagen, Denmark. As a tenured Senior Researcher at the Centre for Military Studies of the University of Copenhagen, my colleagues and I conduct research-based consultancy work for the Danish Ministry of Defence and the Defence Committee of Parliament as well as scholarly research on international security issues.

Schaub previously had been an Assistant Professor of Strategy and Leadership at the U.S. Air War College, a Research Fellow at the U.S. Air Force's Research Institute, a Visiting Assistant Professor at the U.S. Air Force's School of Advanced Air and Space Studies, and a Lecturer in History at Chatham College.

Schaub's research agenda at the University of Copenhagen since 2012 has been primarily determined by the topics requested by the Danish Ministry of Defence.  He has authored or contributed to reports and projects on hybrid maritime warfare; autonomous weapon systems; the Royal Danish Air Force's experience with the F-16 fighter jet; the transformation of European airpower; the development and integration of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs or "drones") into the Danish, French, British, Canadian, and American militaries; the arms control architecture of Eurasia; the interests of Asian countries in the Arctic; cooperation between international organizations in complex emergencies in east Africa; multinational military education; multinational procurement of military hardware; and the demographics of the Danish armed forces.

Beyond these research-based consultancy services, Schaub has conducted research into the state's loss of its monopoly over the legitimate use of force by contributing to and editing a collection of essays on private military and security contractors (Private Military & Security Contractors: Controlling the Corproate Warrior (Rowman & Littlefield 2016), assessing state actor intentions within deterrence theory, and the demographics of the American military.

He has also been consulted by the US Office fo the Secretary of Defense with regard to the professional development of US military officers.

Rear Admiral Frank Trojahn is a Danish naval officer, serving as the Chief of the Royal Danish Navy. He was appointed Chief of Navy Staff on 15 April 2013.

Scott Truver is an expert in naval and maritime affairs. He has more than 40 years' experience in research, analysis, and publishing. At CNA, he conducts research and analysis of Navy forward-presence requirements and operations, future fleet architecture and mix, and "gray zone" operations.

Since 1972, he has participated in numerous studies for government and private industry in the United States and abroad, and has also written extensively for U.S. and foreign publications. He has supported the Secretary of Defense, Secretary of the Navy, the Chief of Naval Operations, the Commandant Marine Corps, the Air Force Strategic Planning Directorate, the Commandant Coast Guard, the Department of Homeland Security Deputy Secretary and Under Secretary for Science and Technology, and many other senior decision makers, as well as the operating forces.

Truver holds a Ph.D. in Marine Policy Studies and a M.A. in Political Science/International Relations from the University of Delaware, where he held university and Rockefeller Foundation fellowships. He also holds a B.A. in Political Science from Susquehanna University.