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The National Security Staff's Senior Director for
Europe Liz Sherwood-Randall will
take up a newly created senior White House post next month, called the White
House coordinator for defense policy, countering weapons of mass destructions,
and arms control, The Cable has
learned.
Randall will take over all the main responsibilities
of the White House's former "WMD Czar" Gary
Samore, who left government late last year for a position at Harvard
University. But the newly created job will add defense policy to Samore's
former portfolio in a move that White House officials say is meant to recognize
and better coordinate the relationship between these various issues. The job is
also meant to help galvanize a renewed second-term administration push to
implement the Prague agenda on nuclear weapons reductions that President Barack
Obama announced in 2009.
"As
one of the president's closest advisors for the past four years, Liz's
leadership and advice have been instrumental as we have successfully
strengthened our alliances and partnerships across Europe, helped to revitalize
NATO, and worked with Europe to advance the president's global agenda,"
National Security Advisor Tom Donilon
said in a statement to be released Tuesday, obtained in advance by The Cable. "Liz brings deep expertise
and a track record of accomplishment in defense issues and in proliferation
prevention. The president will look to her to bring significant energy and
capability to his second term as we pursue the ambitious goals he set forth in
his Prague speech in 2009 and prepare our military to defend the American
people and our allies against the threats we face today and in the future."
Sherwood-Randall
will become one of only three senior "coordinators" inside the NSS. Former
Assistant Secretary of State for Europe
Phil Gordon began March 11 as the White House coordinator for Middle East,
North Africa, and the Gulf region.
Michael Daniel is the White House cybersecurity coordinator.
In this new position,
Sherwood-Randall will work closely with acting senior director for defense
policy and strategy Lt. Col. Ron Clark
(USMC), senior director for WMD terrorism and threat reduction Laura Holgate, and senior director for
arms control and nonproliferation Lynn
Rusten. The White House is now working on finding a replacement for
Sherwood-Randall as senior director for Europe. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland is expected to be
nominated to replace Gordon at State.
Sherwood-Randall worked at the
Pentagon during the first term of the Clinton administration as deputy
assistant secretary of defense for Russia, Ukraine, and Eurasia and also served as chief
foreign affairs and defense policy advisor to then Sen. Joseph Biden. Former Defense Secretary Bill Perry, Sherwood-Randall's mentor, praised the White House's
decision to promote her in an interview with The Cable.
"Liz has a unique background and experience in all
of those fields. I can't think of anybody else who has the same background,"
Perry said, noting that Sherwood-Randall is a Russian speaker and was a key
staffer to him when he worked to remove nuclear weapons from the former Soviet
states of Ukraine,
Kazakhstan, and Belarus.
Sherwood-Randall
and Deputy Defense Secretary Ash Carter
were Perry's two key aides during that effort, Perry said. In fact, when Perry
met with Russian Defense Minister
Paval Grachev to take a photo
commemorating the departure of the last nuclear weapon from Ukraine, Grachev
insisted Sherwood-Randall be in the picture.
"Wait a minute, bring Liz in here. She's the one who
made this happen," Grachev said, according to Perry.
Perry said combining defense policy with arms
control and WMD issues makes sense, as long as you have someone who has
expertise in all of those areas.
"There's a lot of synergism. The problem is that you
usually can't find someone with background in all those areas. If you have
someone who has all of the background in those three areas, then it's a good
idea to combine them," he said.
NSS Spokeswoman Caitlin
Hayden told The Cable that the
new position is meant to add senior level attention to the mission of aligning
nuclear policy with defense strategy across the government.
"In the first term, the President laid out an
ambitious nonproliferation and nuclear agenda in Prague, and last year he
issued Defense Strategic Guidance that aims to ensure our military is postured
appropriately around the world and has the capabilities to address the
challenges we face in the future," she said. "Appointing Liz to this position
will bring serious energy and experience to these two interconnected strategic
priorities in the second term. She'll be able to rely on the relationships
she's forged in the interagency and in Europe over the past few years, and on
her relationship with the president."
Sherwood-Randall begins her new job April 8.
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