Air Marshal Sir Chris Harper is a nonresident senior fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Transatlantic Security Initiative in the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security.

He joined the Royal Air Force as a pilot in 1976 and has flown numerous aircraft including the Jaguar, the CF-18 and, more recently, the Eurofighter Typhoon. He was involved in active operations over Iraq and in the Balkans and has commanded at all levels of the Royal Air Force including, from 2007 to 2009, as air officer commanding No 1Group.  In this role he was responsible for more than 15,000 personnel and all of the Royal Air Force’s combat air power. Sir Chris has also held important staff appointments in the UK Ministry of Defense and at the RAF’s Air Command headquarters.  His last 7 years in the Royal Air Force saw him working in NATO.  From 2009 to 2011, he was deputy commander of NATO’s Joint Force Command at Brunssum in the Netherlands; following that, he was the UK’s military representative to NATO and the EU in Brussels. More recently, from 2013 to 2016, he was director general of the HQ NATO International Military Staff. Sir Chris left the Royal Air Force in January 2017 and started a small independent company, CH4C Global Ltd, which offers bespoke consultancy services to organisations working in the international defense and security sector. He regularly speaks at key events such as the Munich and Berlin Security Conferences, Wilton Park, and the Lennart Meri Conference in Estonia. During early 2018 he worked with the Tallinn-based International Center for Defense and Security to lead an in-depth study of Baltic region air defense. Sir Chris is the Honorary Air Commodore of No 2620 ‘County of Norfolk’ Squadron of the Royal Auxiliary Air Force and is the president of the Royal Air Force Flying Clubs Association.  He is also a vice president of the Royal International Air Tattoo, a trustee of the Air League.