Sarah Smedley
Former Adjunct Senior Fellow
Sarah Smedley is a former Adjunct Senior Fellow in the Defense Program at the Center for New American Security. She is also the Director of Analysis at Govini, a national security focused decision science and analytics software company.
Prior to joining Govini, Sarah was a Senior Strategic Analyst in the Office of the Deputy Assistance Secretary of Defense for Strategy and Force Development, where she oversaw Department-wide analytic efforts to better link military strategy, operations, and the development of future warfighting concepts to inform force development. Additionally, she advised the Joint Staff on the development of the Joint Warfighting Concept and was a member of the 2022 National Defense Strategy team, specifically focused on the development of the Force Planning Construct.
From 2015-2019, Sarah was a Research Scientist at the Center for Naval Analyses (CNA) and led CNA's operational and strategic wargame portfolio. In this role, she designed and facilitated wargames for DoD and the Intelligence Community with an emphasis on force development and defense strategy, emerging technologies, and climate change.
Sarah holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry from the Pennsylvania State University, and a BS in Chemistry from Virginia Tech.