Nicholas Burns is director of the Aspen Institute’s Aspen Strategy Group. He is also professor of the practice of diplomacy and international politics and faculty chair for programs on the Middle East, India, and South Asia at the Harvard Kennedy School. Burns is senior counselor at the Cohen Group. Previously, he was under secretary of state for political affairs, the State Department’s third-ranking official; US ambassador to NATO from 2001 to 2005 and to Greece from 1997 to 2001; and State Department spokesman from 1995 to 1997. He worked on the National Security Council as senior director for Russia, Ukraine, and Eurasia affairs under President Bill Clinton and, before that, director for Soviet affairs for President George H. W. Bush.