Veteran U.S. foreign service officer Thomas Countryman on Sunday took over as the State Department’s acting undersecretary for arms control and international security.
Countryman replaces Rose Gottemoeller, who left Foggy Bottom to become deputy secretary general at NATO. Countryman will remain assistant secretary of state for international security and nonproliferation, his position for the last five years.
Countryman is charged with heading U.S. diplomatic initiatives to halt the proliferation of biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons, along with their means of delivery and associated materials. “As Acting Under Secretary, Mr. Countryman advises the Secretary on arms control, nonproliferation, disarmament and political-military affairs,” according to his updated biography on the State Department website.
In his long tenure with the Foreign Service, dating to the early 1980s, Countryman has worked in U.S. embassies in Egypt, Greece, Italy, and Serbia. He has also served as principal deputy assistant secretary of state for political-military affairs and deputy assistant secretary for European affairs, and did stretches at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, as National Security Council director for Near East and South Asian affairs, and as foreign policy adviser to the U.S. Marine Corps commandant.