Cara Abercrombie

The Honorable Cara Abercrombie is an adjunct senior fellow with the Defense Program at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS).

Abercrombie is a senior advisor with The Cohen Group. She held numerous senior positions in the Pentagon and the White House over a two-decade civil service career. In the Biden administration, she served as the acting deputy under secretary of defense for policy and was confirmed by the Senate as the assistant secretary of defense for acquisition. From 2021 to 2023, Abercrombie served as deputy assistant to the president and coordinator for defense policy and arms control at the White House National Security Council. Prior to that, she was the founding president of the Defense Security Cooperation University and was dual hatted as the acting deputy director of the Defense Security Cooperation Agency.

Over the course of her civil service career, Abercrombie worked to advance U.S. relations with partners across the Indo-Pacific, strengthening alliances and initiating ground-breaking defense cooperation with India. In addition to serving as the deputy assistant secretary of defense for South and Southeast Asia, she was principal director for East Asia policy, and from 2017–2018 was a visiting fellow with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s South Asia Program.

Abercrombie holds a BA from Dartmouth College and a master’s degree in public and international affairs from Princeton University.