Eric Rosenbach

The Honorable Eric Brien Rosenbach is an American public servant and professor who served as Pentagon Chief of Staff from July 2015 to January 2017 and as Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense and Global Security from September 2014 to September 2015. As Chief of Staff, Rosenbach assisted Secretary Ash Carter on the Department of Defense's major challenges of the time, which included increased Russian aggression, the Syrian Civil War, and North Korean missile tests.

Rosenbach's background is in cybersecurity, both public and private sector. He was the first-ever DoD ‘cyber tzar’ known as the Principal Cyber Advisor to the Secretary of Defense. From September 2011 to August 2014, he served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Cyber, in which role he oversaw and led the DoD's cybersecurity strategy. Rosenbach continued to oversee cybersecurity as Chief of Staff. From 2000 to 2002 he advised Tiscali, the then-largest Internet service provider in Europe, on cybersecurity as their Chief Security Officer, and prior to that, he was an Army intelligence communications officer.

Returning to Harvard Kennedy School to teach in 2007, Rosenbach was the executive director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs for three years before going to the DoD. He would again return to Harvard in May 2017 to become co-director of the Belfer Center with Secretary Ash Carter.