Stephen J. Blank is an internationally recognized authority on Russian foreign policy matters with over 1200 published articles, fifteen books, and twenty-plus years as a call-first consultant to media worldwide, private firms, think tanks and the Congressional and Executive branches of the United States government. His expertise spans and incorporates the Russian, Soviet and post-Communist periods and he speaks and writes extensively on information warfare, energy politics, foreign policy, defense policy and strategy, and American, European and Asian security concerns. He is currently an independent speaker, consultant, and writer as well as a Senior Fellow at the American Foreign Policy Council. Previously, he was a member of the U.S. Army War College faculty for over two decades, serving as the Douglas MacArthur Professor of Research from 1998-2001. He has consulted for the CIA and the US Army, and chaired international conferences in the United States, UK, Italy, and the Czech Republic.