COL Christopher M. Whelan is the Senior Integrtator – Nuclear and Combating WMD, US Army Combined Arms Center (CAC), Fort Leavenworth, KS. He is responsible for ensuring the CAC considers the nuclear and WMD issues in their training, education, and doctroine and operations. Previously he served as the Commandant of the Defense Nuclear Weapons School, a part of the Defense Threat Reducation Agency. He was responsible for the Department of Defense’s premier educational institution for the preservation and education of nuclear weapons, nuclear accident/incident command, control and response; explosive ordnance disposal; threat awareness and assessment; weapons of mass destruction; chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear modeling and related expertise.
Colonel Whelan was commissioned in May 1995 as a graduate of the Army Reserve Officer Training Corps at Bucknell University, Lewisburg, PA, into the Chemical Corps. After serving for 17 years as a Chemical Officer, he transitioned in the FA 52 (Nuclear and Counterproliferation Officer) Branch. He has extensive experience in all levels of Weapons of Mass Destruction planning and policy, to include budget, nonproliferation, and treaty activities. COL Whelan has considerable expertise in military education, having served as an Assistant Professor at both the United States Military Academy and the Command and General Staff School. He has also worked in a variety of staff positions at the 20th CBRNE (Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and High Yield Explosives) Command, The Joint Staff at the Pentagon, and as a Foreign Affairs Officer at the Department of State.
