CNAS Expands Indo-Pacific Security Program with Four Adjunct Appointments

Washington, August 26, 2025 —The Center for a New American Security (CNAS) is delighted to welcome four new adjunct senior fellows to its Indo-Pacific Security Program, expanding and deepening the program’s research on the world’s most populous region.

Annie Pforzheimer, Derek Grossman, Daisuke Kawai, and Tamanna Salikuddin bring decades of accumulated foreign policy experience working on a wide array of policy issues in a number of countries.

“This fantastic group with extensive U.S. government experience and regional knowledge will help expand and deepen our team’s research on the critical issues facing the entire Indo-Pacific region,” says Lisa Curtis, senior fellow and director of the Indo-Pacific Security Program.

Tamanna Salikuddin is a senior executive with over 20 years of experience advising U.S. leadership on national security, foreign policy, international relations, and counterterrorism. Salikuddin was most recently director of South Asia programs at the U.S. Institute of Peace from 2020 to 2025. She also serves as a senior advisor at Cambridge Global Associates with a focus on Indo-Pacific security.

Salikuddin’s full bio is available here.

Annie Pforzheimer is a retired senior U.S. diplomat, an adjunct professor of international relations at the City University of New York and Pace University, and a consultant, researcher, and public commentator on foreign policy. Before retiring in 2019, she was the acting deputy assistant secretary of state for Afghanistan and served as deputy chief of mission in Kabul, as well as the director for international narcotics and law enforcement at the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City.

Pforzheimer’s full bio is available here.

Derek Grossman is professor of the practice of political science and international relations at the University of Southern California, as well as founder and chief analyst of Indo-Pacific Solutions, LLC, a consulting firm examining the geopolitics of the region. Grossman is a former senior defense analyst at RAND and professor of policy analysis at the RAND School of Public Policy.

Grossman’s full bio is available here.

Daisuke Kawai is a project assistant professor and the director of the Economic Security & Policy Innovation Program at the Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology of the University of Tokyo. His areas of expertise include Indo-Pacific security and economic security, with a special interest in critical and emerging technologies.

Kawai’s full bio is available here.

As the region is increasingly defined by great power competition, the addition of these four new expert voices will ensure CNAS continues to stay at the cutting edge of Indo-Pacific analysis.

For more information or to arrange an interview, please contact Charles Horn at [email protected].