Ben Wallace was Secretary of State for Defence of the United Kingdom, until August 2023. His four year tenure at the Defence department makes him the longest serving Defence Secretary in NATO, and the UK’s longest servingConservative Defence Secretary since Churchill. He is the UK’s most experienced politician in the fields of Defence,Security and Foreign Affairs. His time in office saw him steer both the domestic and international response to the war in Ukraine, the withdrawal of Allied Troops from Afghanistan, the Salisbury poisoning, the WannaCry Cyberattack, as well as NATO and defence reform. Ben has witnessed firsthand the emergence of new technologies in defence and the impact on security. Whilst in office, Ben published the country’s first Defence AI strategy, as well as establishing the National Cyber Force. Ben has worked alongside the Pentagon, CIA and two US Presidential administrations. He was a key facilitator in AUKUS – the US/UK/Australia nuclear and technology alliance between all three countries. Before his time as Defence Secretary, he spent three years as the UK’s Security Minister, where he led on counter-terrorism, cyber-security,

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