Skip navigation links
US Department of Defense
 
Stephen C. Johnson

Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Western Hemisphere Affairs
Mr. Johnson presently serves as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense, Western Hemisphere Affairs, one of the four components of the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense and Americas Security Affairs. In this position, he oversees policy issues and defense relations involving foreign countries in the hemisphere as well as U.S. government funding of hemispheric defense cooperation, and the integration of U.S. Northern Command and U.S. Southern Command activities.

Commissioned in the U.S. Air Force, Mr. Johnson received his wings in 1974 from Undergraduate Pilot Training at Vance AFB, Oklahoma. He served as an aircraft commander in KC-135 tankers at Pease AFB, New Hampshire before selection as an Assistant Air Attaché assigned to Honduras with accreditation to Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Nicaragua. In 1985, he left active duty and joined the U.S. Department of State, serving in leadership positions in the Bureaus of Inter-American Affairs and Public Affairs. Remaining in the Air Force as a reservist, he also served as a strategic planning officer in the Public Affairs Directorate of the Secretary of the Air Force and in 1992 became the IMA to the U.S. Southern Command Director of Public Affairs. In 1995, he was co-director of public affairs for the multi-nation joint peacekeeping exercise Fuerzas Unidas in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Johnson retired from the Air Force Reserve in 2000.

Mr. Johnson joined the Washington-based Heritage Foundation in 1999 as a foreign policy analyst for Latin America—writing policy studies, organizing international conferences, and speaking at public events until January 2007. Mr. Johnson has observed elections in El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, and Nicaragua and has spoken before the Council of the Americas and at numerous conferences in the United States and abroad. His commentaries have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Miami Herald, National Review Online, Business Week, Fox News.com, Washington Times, Long Island Newsday, Diario Las Américas, El Comercio (Peru), and Venezuela Analítica. His broadcast appearances include CNN, CNN en Español, Fox News, MSNBC, National Public Radio, Univisión, Telemundo, BBC, RCN-TV (Colombia), and the Voice of America. He has lived in El Salvador, Honduras and Uruguay.

Mr. Johnson was raised in Cheyenne, Wyoming and graduated with a B.S. in Mass Communications from the University of Wyoming in 1973. He received a Masters Degree in Liberal Studies from Georgetown University in 1990 in the field of International Relations.
Printer-friendly Version  Printer-friendly Version Email A Copy  Email A Copy