In December 2004, Dr. Victor D. Cha joined the National Security Council as Director for Asian Affairs (Japan/Korea/Australia/New Zealand). Before entering government, Dr. Victor Cha (Ph.,D. Columbia, BA/MA Oxford) held the D. S. Song-Korea Foundation Chair in Asian Studies and Government in the Edmund Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University. He is the award-winning author of Alignment Despite Antagonism: The United States-Korea-Japan Security Triangle (Stanford University Press) (winner of the 2000 Ohira Book Prize) and co-author of Nuclear North Korea: A Debate on Strategies of Engagement (Columbia University Press, 2003). Dr. Cha has written articles on international relations and East Asia in journals including Foreign Affairs, International Security, Political Science Quarterly, and Survival.

Dr. Cha is a former John M. Olin National Security Fellow at Harvard University, two-time Fulbright Scholar, and Hoover National Fellow and CISAC Fellow at Stanford. Before entering government, he served as an independent consultant, testified before Congress on Asian security issues, and was a guest analyst for various media including CNN, ABC Nightline, Newshour with Jim Lehrer, CBS, Fox News, BBC, National Public Radio, New York Times, Washington Post and Time. He served on the editorial boards of several academic journals and wrote columns for CSIS Comparative Connections; Joongang Ilbo-International Herald Tribune (English Edition); Chosun Ilbo, and Japan Times. He directed the American Alliances in Asia Project at Georgetown until 2004. Dr. Cha is a native of New York and a weekend roadracer.