About

Flashpoint Partners is a research and analysis enterprise focused on global security, with managing partners based in London and New York.  FP offers a host of contract consulting services which are available to international governments, law enforcement agencies, media outlets, academic institutions, and private corporations.  We have a proven track record in successfully completing critical projects for a variety of high-profile clients around the world--including the U.S. Department of Justice, the U.S. Department of Defense, Scotland Yard's SO-15 Counter Terrorism Command, the United Kingdom Crown Prosecution Service, the Australian Federal Police (AFP), and the International Court of Justice at the Hague.

About Evan Kohlmann

Evan Kohlmann is a private sector International Terrorism Consultant who has spent over a decade tracking Al-Qaida and other terrorist organizations.  During the course of his research, Mr. Kohlmann has amassed one of the largest and most extensive open source databases in the world of original documents, communiqués, and multimedia.  He currently works as a senior investigator for the Nine Eleven Finding Answers (NEFA) Foundation--and has also served at various times as a contract consultant in terrorism matters on behalf of the U.S. Department of Defense, the U.S. Department of Justice, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Office of the High Representative (OHR) in Bosnia-Herzegovina, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTFY) at the Hague, the Australian Federal Police (AFP), the U.K. Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), Scotland Yard's SO-15 Counter Terrorism Command, the Central Scotland Police, West Yorkshire Police, and the Danish Security and Intelligence Service (PET).

About Laith Alkhouri

Laith Alkhouri is an associate researcher with Flashpoint Partners. He is the senior translator and interpreter of terrorism-related material. Mr. Alkhouri conducts data analyses and research on various different original-source material in Arabic; his native tongue. With his expanding knowledge and keen focus in this field, Mr. Alkhouri has contributed valuable analytical input on matters relating to contemporary international terrorist groups. He has analyzed and translated multiple terrorism-related documents that were used in the U.S. Federal Court System and aired on national television.

Mr. Alkhouri holds a B.A. in Political Science from Manhattanville College, and currently he attends The New School University in pursuance of M.S. in International Affairs with concentration on International Conflict and Security.

Advisory Board

Flashpoint's Advisory Board includes leaders in the private sector and former senior government officials who provide advice and counsel to Flashpoint's management team. Members of our Advisory Board include:

Roger Cressey: Roger Cressey is the President and founder of Good Harbor Consulting, LLC, a security and risk management consulting firm based in Arlington, VA. He is also a Fellow at the Center on Law and Security at New York University. Prior to starting Good Harbor, Cressey served in senior cyber security and counterterrorism positions in the Clinton and Bush Administrations. At the White House, he was the Deputy for Counterterrorism on the National Security Council staff from November 1999 to November 2001. He was responsible for the coordination and implementation of US counterterrorism policy and managed the US Government response to multiple terrorism incidents, including the Millennium terror alert, the USS COLE attack, and the September 11th attacks. For the past six years, he has been an on-air counterterrorism analyst for NBC News, appearing frequently on NBC Nightly News, The Today Show, MSNBC and CNBC. Prior to his White House service, Mr. Cressey served in the Department of Defense, where he worked on US defense strategy and the review of  the Pentagon's war plans. From 1991–1995, he served in the Department of State working on Middle East security issues, including serving as a member of the US delegation to the multilateral track of the Arab-Israeli peace process talks. His overseas experience includes serving as a Pol-Mil officer with the US Embassy in Israel and with UN peacekeeping operations in Somalia and the former Yugoslavia. While in the former Yugoslavia, Cressey was part of a United Nations team that planned the successful capture of the first individual indicted for war crimes in Croatia. From 2001 - 2006, he taught a graduate course on U.S. counterterrorism policy at Georgetown University. He received his B.A. in Political Science from the University of Massachusetts at Lowell and an M.A. in Security Policy Studies from The George Washington University.

Jim Putt: Jim Putt served in the Central Intelligence Agency's Clandestine Service for nearly 20 years. Mr. Putt is an Arabic speaker and spent some 15 years serving in the Middle East and South Asia, focused on terrorism issues.

Bruce Riedel: Bruce Riedel is a Senior Fellow in the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution. He retired in 2006 after 30 years service at the Central Intelligence Agency including postings overseas. He was a senior advisor on South Asia and the Middle East to the last four Presidents of the United States in the staff of the National Security Council at the White House. He was also Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Near East and South Asia at the Pentagon and a senior advisor at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in Brussels. In January 2009, President Barack Obama asked him to chair a review of American policy towards Afghanistan and Pakistan, the results of which the President announced in a speech on March 27, 2009. He is the author of The Search for al Qaeda: Its Leadership, Ideology and Future (2008 hardcover and 2010 paperback) and contributor to Asymmetric Warfare in South Asia: The Causes and Consequences of the Kargil Conflict (2010), Toughing it Out in Afghanistan (2010), The Reluctant Spy (2010), Which Path to Persia: Options for a New American Strategy Toward Iran (2009) and The Battle for Yemen: Al Qaeda and the Struggle for Stability (2010). He teaches at Georgetown University’s School for Foreign Service and the Johns Hopkins University School for Advanced International Studies. He is a graduate of Brown (BA), Harvard (MA) and the Royal College of Defense Studies in London.

Donald Upson: Donald W. Upson is a founding partner of UpsonVito, a marketing firm specializing in the government technology and management sectors, and in assisting companies and governments in acquiring and utilizing information and communications technologies to meet government challenges and improve service delivery.

For more than three decades Upson has held senior management positions in government and private sector organizations.

In addition to marketing and business services, UpsonVito organizes the government technology sector's premier annual policy conference, CES Government, which is held annually in partnership with International CES. The firm also manages the Government Business Executive Forum, an elite organization of business executives whose primary business interest is the government technology and management arena.

From 2002 to 2009 Upson built a successful marketing firm, ICG Government, where he served as president and founder. ICG Government was sold to UpsonVito in 2009.

Upson served as Virginia and the country's first Secretary of Technology, an office that combined traditional functions of a chief information officer with broader economic development and R&D responsibilities. In this position, Upson brought together leading business and academic leaders to produce the first comprehensive government policy encouraging growth and responsible Internet utilization, major outsourcing and other IT management initiatives, and a state legal framework to encourage attraction and growth of technology companies in Virginia.

As Senior Vice President of PRC Inc, an $800 million company specializing in complex government technology solutions and applications, Upson managed business development for civilian markets and built an industry-leading marketing strategy that supported the company's growth and eventual acquisition by Litton Industries.

Upson served in senior positions on Capitol Hill from 1977 to 1992, ending with a six-year stint as staff director of the House Government Operations committee: the investigative arm of the House of Representatives. He was a principal staff leader involved with a range of investigations and legislative initiatives that included the Inspector General Act, the Chief Financial Officers Act, the Paperwork Reduction Act, the Procurement Integrity Act, others.

Upson is a recognized subject matter expert on government management and acquisition and is a frequent speaker at national and international forums on these subjects. He is a seven time recipient of the Federal 100 honoring the top 100 industry and government leaders in government technology, received an honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Marymount University and numerous other recognitions. He holds a BA in Economics and Political Science from California State University, Chico and completed his graduate work in Public Administration at George Washington University.

Upson serves on the board of two publicly traded companies, IGI and Lattice Inc., and on the advisory board of two others.