Arctic

Ambassador Brent Hardt is a resident senior fellow at GMF who brings 35 years of experience leading at all levels of government. He has guided five embassies as ambassador, chargé d’affaires, and deputy chief of mission, and served as foreign policy advisor to US Central Command and US Special Operations Command, working closely with allies to meet vital security challenges. As professor and senior advisor at the US Naval War College, he taught national security strategy and policy and developed a seminar on the evolution of modern Europe.

Hardt joined the US Foreign Service in 1988, serving in Berlin, the Hague, Rome, Paris, Canada, and the Caribbean. He was an exchange diplomat with the Netherlands Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Defense in 1993. In Washington, he served as Team Leader for NATO Policy in the State Department’s Office of European Political and Security Affairs, where he was responsible for NATO enlargement, NATO-Ukraine, and European Security and Defense policy issues.

Over the course of his career, Hardt has received multiple Senior Performance Awards, the Director General's Award for Reporting, five Superior Honor Awards, and three Meritorious Honor Awards. He also received the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Joint Meritorious Civilian Service Award and the US Special Operations Command Distinguished Civilian Service Award. He earned a bachelor’s degree in history from Yale University and a master’s in law and diplomacy and a PhD from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University.

Sophie Arts is a Washington, DC-based fellow with GMF Geostrategy North. She leads the team’s research on Nordic and Arctic security and geopolitics, covering North American homeland defense against conventional and hybrid threats, and cooperation with allies and partners. She also focuses on Russian and Chinese activities in the Arctic region. 

Arts serves as co-chair on the task force for global peace and security for the Think7 (T7), the official G7 group that brings together the world’s leading think tanks and research centers. Her writing and commentary are featured regularly in international media. 

In 2017, Arts joined GMF's security and defense policy team, focusing on transatlantic security within and outside NATO. Her prior research covered the alliance’s partnerships and flexible formats, the impact of emerging technologies on NATO defense and deterrence, the dynamics of escalation within the cyber domain, and strategic stability in a multipolar world.

Arts previously worked at the Atlantic Council, GMF’s Brussels office, Spiegel Online International, and Kantar Media. Originally from Germany, she holds a master’s degree from Humboldt University in Berlin and a bachelor’s degree from the University of Freiburg. She completed coursework at Connecticut College and the University of Virginia, where she also worked as a research assistant in the media studies department and in the university’s Center for Politics, supporting Larry J. Sabato's work on "The Kennedy Half-Century".