OUS Updates and news.
The United States Congress on Wednesday confirmed American Ravi Chaudhary as Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Air Force, one of the highest civilian leadership positions in the Pentagon.
The House voted 65-29 to confirm the former Air Force officer’s nomination with more than a dozen votes from the Republican opposition.
Chaudhary previously served as Senior Administrator at the US Department of Transportation where he was the Director of Advanced Programs and Innovation, Office of Commercial Space at the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
He is responsible for the execution of advanced development and research programs in support of the FAA’s commercial space mission. While in the transportation department, he also served as executive director of regional and central operations, where he oversaw the integration and support of airline operations in nine regions.
During his career in the US Air Force from 1993 to 2015, Chaudhary completed a variety of operational, technical, and senior staff assignments. As a C-17 pilot, he performed international flight duties, including several combat missions in Afghanistan and Iraq, and a ground deployment as a personnel recovery center leader in a multinational unit in Iraq.
As a flight test engineer, he is responsible for the flight certification of military avionics and equipment for energy retrofit systems supporting aircraft safety.
Earlier in his career, he supported space launch operations for the global positioning system (GPS) and led the third phase and flight safety operations to ensure the full operational capability of the first GPS constellation.
As a systems engineer, Chaudhary supports NASA’s International Space Station security operations to ensure the safety of NASA Astronauts. He also served as a member of the President’s Advisory Council on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders during the Obama Administration. In this role, he advises the president on executive branch efforts to improve veterans’ support for the AAPI community.
Chaudhary holds a PhD in Executive Leadership and Innovation from the Georgetown University DLS Program, an MS in Industrial Engineering from St. Engineering from the US Air Force Academy.
He is a graduate of the Federal Executive Academy and holds Department of Defense certifications in program management, test and evaluation, and systems engineering.
.