2026 Great Decisions Conference – Speakers & Presenters

2026 Great Decisions Conference: Ruptured Alliances and the Risk of Nuclear Proliferation
Tuesday, April 14 – 8:00 am Central Time

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Keynote Speaker: Rose Gottemoeller

Former Deputy Secretary General of NATO and former U.S. Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security

Under Secretary Gottemoeller is the William J. Perry Lecturer at Stanford University’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and Research Fellow at the Hoover Institute.

Before joining Stanford, Gottemoeller was the Deputy Secretary General of NATO from 2016 to 2019, where she helped to drive forward NATO’s adaptation to new security challenges in Europe and in the fight against terrorism. Prior to NATO, she served for nearly five years as the Under Secretary for Arms Control and International Security at the U.S. Department of State, advising the Secretary of State on arms control, nonproliferation and political-military affairs. While Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control, Verification and Compliance in 2009 and 2010, she was the chief U.S. negotiator of the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) with the Russian Federation.

Prior to her government service, she was a senior associate with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, with joint appointments to the Nonproliferation and Russia programs. She served as the Director of the Carnegie Moscow Center from 2006 to 2008, and is currently a nonresident fellow in Carnegie’s Nuclear Policy Program.

At Stanford, Gottemoeller teaches and mentors students in the Ford Dorsey Master’s in International Policy program and the CISAC Honors program; contributes to policy research and outreach activities; and convenes workshops, seminars and other events relating to her areas of expertise, including nuclear security, Russian relations, the NATO alliance, EU cooperation and non-proliferation.

 

Keynote Moderator: Margo Squire

Foreign Service Officer (ret.)

Margo Squire, a career diplomat specializing in public diplomacy, has served in Ankara, Baku, Melbourne, Moscow, Munich and Washington, D.C. After retiring, she returned to government service in August 2020 as a Cultural Affairs Specialist in the U.S. embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, supporting American Centers across the country and organizing programs to empower women and girls. Her Foreign Service career included managing democracy-building programs throughout the former Soviet Union and supporting press work across Europe and Eurasia. She directed public education on issues of weapons of mass destruction in her last position at the U.S. State Department. Margo volunteers with Global Minnesota, East-West Connections, The Minneapolis Institute of Art and The Museum of Russian Art.

Mrs. Squire holds a Bachelors from Dartmouth College and a Masters from John Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.

 

Speaker: Alan Carlson

Foreign Affairs Consultant & Foreign Service Officer (ret.)

Alan Carlson is a retired Foreign Service Officer, who served with the U.S. State Department from 1987 to 2012. He was a Political Officer, serving in Bosnia, Denmark, Jamaica, Montenegro, and Switzerland. He was an Advisor to seven annual U.S. delegations to the United Nations. While serving at the Bureau of International Organizations as an Intelligence Analyst he worked with the Bureau of Intelligence and Research and the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs. He was also the first Political and Military Officer with the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs.

Mr. Carlson grew up in Bloomington, MN, and has a B.A. in U.S. History and J.D. from the University of Minnesota, as well as a Master’s in Military Studies from the Marine Corps University at Quantico, VA. He lives in Stillwater, MN with his wife Tessa.

 

Panelist: Mark Bell

Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Minnesota

Mark Bell is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Minnesota. His research examines issues relating to nuclear weapons and proliferation, international relations theory, and U.S. and British foreign policy.

His first book, Nuclear Reactions: How Nuclear-Armed States Behave, examines how states change their foreign policies when they acquire nuclear weapons. It was published in 2021 by Cornell University Press and won the International Studies Association Foreign Policy Analysis Section’s Best Book award. His other work has been published in journals including International Organization, International Security, International Studies Quarterly, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Journal of Strategic Studies, and Texas National Security Review. Dr. Bell’s policy-oriented work has been published by Foreign Affairs, War on the Rocks, and The Washington Quarterly. His work been funded by organizations including the Stanton Foundation, the U.S. Air Force Academy and Defense Threat Reduction Agency, the Smith Richardson Foundation, the Charles Koch Foundation, and the Tobin Project.

He holds a Ph.D in Political Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a Master’s in Public Policy from Harvard Kennedy School, where he was a Frank Knox Memorial Fellow, and a B.A. in Politics, Philosophy, and Economics from St. Anne’s College, Oxford University.

 

Panelist: Mary Curtin

Foreign Service Officer (ret.)

Mary T. Curtin, a Minnesota native, served for ten years as Diplomat-in-Residence and Chair of the Global Policy Area at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs, coming to that position after a 25-year career as a U.S. State Department Foreign Service Officer. During her Foreign Service career, Dr. Curtin served at the U.S. Mission to the E.U. in Brussels, as Political Counselor in Warsaw, Poland, and at missions in Tunisia, Mali, and Chile, as well as in Washington, D.C. She has expertise in issues including Middle East policy, European affairs, human rights and democratization, and nuclear non-proliferation. She was a member of the U.S. delegation to the 1995 United Nations Conference on Women.

She earned a Ph.D. in History from Columbia University, a Master’s in Security Studies from the U.S. Army War College, and a B.A. from the University of Notre Dame. She speaks French, Polish, and Spanish.

 

Panelist: Raymond Kuo

Director of the Taiwan Policy Initiative at the RAND Corporation

Dr. Raymond Kuo is a Political Scientist with the RAND Corporation. He is an expert on international security, order, and East Asia. He published two books in 2021: Following the Leader (Stanford University Press) on military alliances and international order and Contests of Initiative (George Mason University-Westphalia Press) on Chinese maritime coercion. He has also written on arms sales, unmanned warfare, Taiwan, Ukraine, the laws of war, and evolution. Previously, Dr. Kuo was a tenure-track professor at Fordham University and the University at Albany, SUNY. He has also worked for the United Nations, and the National Democratic Institute, among others. Dr. Kuo holds a Ph.D. from Princeton University.

 

Panel Moderator: Tom Hanson

Diplomat in Residence, Alworth Institute for International Studies, University of Minnesota Duluth

Thomas Hanson is a former Foreign Service Officer with the U.S. Department of State whose diplomatic postings included East Germany, France, Norway, the Soviet Union,the former Soviet Republic of Georgia, and Sweden.  He also participated in the opening of new U.S. embassies in Estonia and Mongolia, worked on the Foreign Relations Committees of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, and served as Director for NATO and European Affairs at the Atlantic Council of the United States in Washington, D.C.

Mr. Hanson is currently a Diplomat in Residence at the Alworth Institute for International Affairs at the University of Minnesota – Duluth and has taught diplomacy at Carleton College.  He also serves as Chair of the Minnesota Committee on Foreign Relations and as Co-Chair of the Minnesota International Business Council. He is a past board member of the Oslo Center for Peace and Human Rights and Director at the Institute for Eastern Europe and Central Asia (IEECA). He is also a member of the U.S. Foreign Policy Working Group of the British International Studies Association (BISA) as well as the Council of Advisers at the Museum of Russian Art and the Minnesota Peace Initiative (MPI) at Norway House.

As a member of the Great Decisions advisory committee of Global Minnesota, Mr. Hanson speaks frequently on international issues and contributes to local and international media.

Mr. Hanson holds a B.A. from the University of Minnesota and graduate degrees from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy; the Institute of Advanced International Studies in Geneva, Switzerland; and the National School of Administration (ENA) in Paris, France.