Bernard Siman
Biography
Bernard Siman is a Senior Associate Fellow at the Egmont Institute and is Head of the Hybrid & Cyber Threats, Warfare and General Resilience Focus Group. Regionally, he is responsible for the Greater Middle East, the Gulf, the Mediterranean and Black Sea regions and Maritime Geopolitics.
He is Adjunct Professor at the Brussels School of Governance (BSOG) of the Vrije Universiteit Brussels (VUB). He teaches regularly at the Belgian Royal Military Academy. He is a Member of the Management Committee of the Eastern Mediterranean Programme at St Antony’s College, University of Oxford. He also lectures regularly at the European Security and Defence College (ESDC) and various NATO Centres of Excellence.
He was one of the authors of one of the first applied research reports on Hybrid Warfare in the Middle East, published by LSE Ideas, the foreign policy and security think tank of his alma mater, the London School of Economics and Political Science.
His background spans both the private sector, academia as well as public service. He has also worked in financial services in London, Tokyo, Turkey, the Mediterranean region, and the Gulf (where he lived for 13 years). Japan is a key area of direct interest both geopolitically but also culturally.
He obtained, inter alia, an MPhil in Government from the LSE and a Graduate Diploma in Civil Engineering from Kyoto University, Japan where he lived and worked for 10 years.
He was honoured by HM The Queen as an Officer in the Order of the British Empire, and by HM King Filip of the Belgians as a Knight in the Order of Leopold.
In addition to English and Dutch, he speaks Japanese, Arabic, and some German. He has a lifelong interest in military history.
Publications
- Countering FIMI: A Critical Imperative for Mission Safety Commentaries
- Ukraine: Perception Shapes Victory and Defeat Commentaries
- Russia’s Hybrid Wars Come to Sudan Security Policy Briefs
- New technologies, new threats, new budgets Commentaries
- EU Ukraine Strategy should include the Eurasian Spine Security Policy Briefs
- Hybrid Warfare: Attribution is Key to Deterrence Commentaries
- No Security for Ukraine or Europe without a Secure Black Sea and Mediterranean Commentaries
- Balancing Conventional and Hybrid Threats in (Future) State Competition: Potential policy pitfalls stemming from the Ukrainian conflict Security Policy Briefs
- Tanks versus Banks: Russian Military versus EU Geoeconomic Power Security Policy Briefs
- A Russia Strategy Must Look South: The Caucasus Impacts Europe through the Eastern Mediterranean Commentaries
- For Russia, the Ukraine Front Stretches to the Mediterranean Commentaries
- Hybrid Warfare Is not Synonymous with Cyber: The Threat of Influence Operations Security Policy Briefs
- The Eastern Mediterranean: Calm before the Storm in a Core European Strategic Zone Security Policy Briefs
- Afghan refugees: Europe should develop an ambitious and collaborative structure Commentaries