William J. Burns

William J. Burns (Bill Burns) was officially sworn in as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency on March 19, 2021, making him the first career diplomat to serve as Director. Director Burns holds the highest rank in the Foreign Service—Career Ambassador—and is only the second serving career diplomat in history to become Deputy Secretary of State.

September 9, 2026

Editor's Choice/Geopolitics

Why Tamil Nadu Keeps Killing Its Own Projects

The Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) government has announced the cancellation of a series of projects initiated by the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), which governed Tamil Nadu from 2021 to 2026. Among them

Artificial Intelligence

OpenAI’s Mathematical Breakthrough Triggers a Battle Over Credit and Ethics

OpenAI has claimed to have solved one of the most celebrated problems in the history of mathematics: the “existence and smoothness” problem of the Navier–Stokes equations, one of seven Millennium Problems identified by the Clay Mathematics Institute, each carrying a

September 9, 2026

Anthropic Researcher Resigns, Warning AI Race Could ‘Gamble With Our Lives’

Artificial Intelligence

A young researcher at Anthropic, Jacob Coxon, has resigned from the company, warning that the race to develop increasingly powerful artificial intelligence systems is

Germany’s Far-Right Surge Tests, But Does Not Upend, Democracy

Geopolitics

The German Embassy in Colombo has sought to clarify Germany’s political situation following news of a surge for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD)

Heads of Top Western Intel Agencies Confront Emerging Threats to Global Order

September 9, 2024

Columns

Editorial Note: This article, originally published in the Financial Times, features insights from Bill Burns, Director of the US Central Intelligence Agency, and Richard Moore, Chief of the UK Secret Intelligence Service.

A World Transformed and the Role of Intelligence

July 2, 2023

Defence/Diplomacy

The following essay is based on the 59th Ditchley annual lecture delivered by the author as the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Director I must admit that my memory of the conference itself