Austin Long joined CNSP as Senior Fellow on July 1, 2025. Dr. Long was previously appointed to the Senior Executive Service in October 2022. As DD StS, Dr. Long is responsible for the formulation of Joint Staff positions and recommendations regarding strategy, plans and policy for strategic deterrence, space, cyberspace, electromagnetic spectrum operations, information operations, nuclear, missile defense, countering weapons of mass destruction, subsea and seabed warfare, arms control, and other international negotiations. He was previously Vice Deputy Director for Strategic Stability.
Prior to joining the Joint Staff, Dr. Long was a senior political scientist at the RAND Corporation and an associate professor at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs. He was an analyst and adviser to the U.S. military in Iraq (2007-2008) and Afghanistan (2011 and 2013). In 2014-2015, he was a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellow in Nuclear Security, serving in the Joint Staff J5.
Dr. Long’s research has appeared in International Security, Security Studies, the Journal of Strategic Studies, the Journal of Cold War Studies, Orbis, the Journal of Cybersecurity, Texas National Security Review, and Survival. He is also the author of The Soul of Armies: Counterinsurgency Doctrine and Military Culture in the United States and United Kingdom (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2016) and co-editor (with Charles L. Glaser and Brian Radzinsky) of Managing U.S. Nuclear Operations in the 21st Century (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2022).
Dr. Long received his B.S. from the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at the Georgia Institute of Technology and his Ph.D. in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Contact: aglong@mit.edu
Pranay Vaddi joined CNSP as the inaugural Senior Nuclear Fellow of 2025. Vaddi holds a BS in Biochemistry and BA in Political Science from the University of Rochester, and a JD from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law.
From May 2022 to January 2025, Vaddi served as special assistant to President Joe Biden and as senior director for Arms Control, Disarmament, and Nonproliferation at the National Security Council. Prior to this, he served as a senior advisor in the Bureau of Arms Control, Verification, and Compliance at the Department of State, where he coordinated the department’s inputs for the 2022 Nuclear Posture Review. Previously, he was a fellow in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where he focused on developing recommendations for the U.S. nuclear posture and arms control policy, and examined Congress’ role in arms control.
Contact: prvaddi@mit.edu | Office: NE49-3182B