Directors of the Bureau of Counterterrorism
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Updates to the Principal Officers and Chiefs of Mission database are currently suspended. For information about the Department’s current and recent leadership, we recommend visiting the Department of State homepage’s Biographies of Senior Officials and List of U.S. Ambassadors.
Notice posted on January 12, 2024.
Last
updated March 14, 2024.
On Aug 1, 1976, the Department of State elevated the position of Special Assistant to the Secretary of State and Coordinator of the Office for Combating Terrorism to that of Director of the Office for Combating Terrorism, with rank equivalent to an Assistant Secretary of State. All Directors have been designated by the Secretary of State, not commissioned. The Department had established the earlier position in October 1972 to head an interagency working-level committee charged with addressing the problem of international terrorism. The Department has changed the incumbent’s title three times since 1976: to “Ambassador at Large for Counter-Terrorism” on Nov. 4, 1985, to “Coordinator for Counter-Terrorism” on May 1, 1989, and “Director of the Bureau of Counterterrorism” on Jan. 4, 2012.
- Louis Douglas Heck (1976–1977)
- Heyward Isham (1977–1978)
- Anthony Cecil Eden Quainton (1978–1981)
- Robert Marion Sayre (1982–1984)
- Robert Bigger Oakley (1984–1986)
- L. Paul Bremer III (1986–1989)
- Morris Dempson Busby (1989–1991)
- Albert Peter Burleigh (1991–1992)
- Philip C. Wilcox Jr. (1995–1997)
- Christopher W.S. Ross (1995–1998)
- Michael E. Sheehan (1999–2000)
- Francis Xavier Taylor (2001–2002)
- J. Cofer Black (2002–2004)
- Henry Crumpton (2005–2007)
- Dell L. Dailey (2007–2009)
- Daniel Benjamin (2009–2012)
- Tina S. Kaidanow (2014–2016)
- Justin H. Siberell (Nomination of September 19, 2016, not acted upon by the Senate.)
- Nathan Alexander Sales (2017)