Rima Rusnac is a member of the inaugural cohort of the Andrew Carnegie AI-Nuclear Policy Accelerator. 

Rima Rusnac is a military operations analyst in the wargaming division at the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), where she focuses on weapons of mass destruction counterproliferation and nuclear nonproliferation strategies. Originally from Moldova, she brings over 15 years of national security experience across the Defense Department, the National Security Agency, and the US Army Special Operations Command, where she led psychological operations programs in Eastern Europe.

Rima’s expertise lies at the intersection of nuclear policy, regional security dynamics, and emerging technologies. Her background includes leading Russia-focused intelligence analysis during critical geopolitical shifts, contributing to strategic assessments that informed senior defense leadership, and developing wargaming scenarios that explore nuclear escalation risks in contested regions. Multilingual, including Romanian, Russian, and French, she provides culturally informed analysis of how state and non-state actors approach WMD acquisition and deterrence.

As artificial intelligence rapidly transforms both offensive and defensive capabilities in the nuclear domain, Rima sees an urgent need for policy practitioners to develop technical fluency in AI systems. She joins the Accelerator to deepen her understanding of how AI affects nuclear command and control, early warning systems, and strategic stability, and to ensure that policymakers can effectively govern these technologies before they outpace our institutional capacity to manage them. She is currently pursuing doctoral studies in international psychology.