CAPT Shiho Rybski serves as the Deputy Regional Advisor for Arctic and U.S. European Command. She is a national security professional and hybrid threat expert with almost 30 years of active, reserve, and civilian service with the US Navy and US Department of State. A designated Naval Aviator, Electronic Countermeasures Officer, and Mission Commander in the EA-6B Prowler, CAPT Rybski’s early career included tours with VAQ-136 Gauntlets in Atsugi, Japan, multiple PACFLT deployments, and combat operations aboard USS Kitty Hawk in support of Operation Southern Watch and Iraqi Freedom. Her operational and instructional billets have included Flag Aide to Commander, Strike Group FIVE; Aircrew Department Head and Radar Systems Instructor at the Aviation Electronic Warfare School, Whidbey Island, WA, and ethnographer and wargame analyst at the U.S. Naval War College.
Transitioning to the Navy Reserve in 2009, she has held senior Reserve billets supporting US Naval Forces Europe, U.S. Fleet Forces Command, U.S. Navy Information Operations Command Norfolk, and the U.S. Navy Warfare Development Center, where she was part of the training development, Naval and Amphibious Liaison Element, and fires programs, and non-kinetic plans to integrate information operations and electronic warfare into fleet and theater-level exercises.
From 2019 to 2026, she served as U.S. government representative and Director of Training and Exercise at the European Centre of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats in Helsinki, Finland, leading training, exercise, and wargame design for NATO, EU, and participating states, and directing a cognitive wargame simulation series to educate practitioners against Russian and Chinese influence operations. Other notable work includes designing and facilitating custom IW exercises for the governments of Austria, Slovakia, Canada, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Assistant Secretary General, Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, the European Union (EU) Rapid Alert System, the EU Horizontal Working Party on Hybrid Threats, and a hybrid threats awareness course for mid-career military operational planners. She is a regional specialist in the Arctic and the Western Balkans and a member of the NATO System Analysis and Studies working group, Winter Storm 2030.
Shiho is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy and holds a Master’s of Arts from Chapman University; currently, she is completing a Master’s of Military Science at the United States Army War College (Graduating June 2026) and a Ph.D. researcher at the University of Vaasa, Finland, where she examines national comprehensive security/total defense strategies through wargaming.
Join us at this year's IW Symposium
Irregular Warfare in the Homeland: Adapting for a Secure Future
August 4-6, 2026
The Irregular Warfare Center (IWC) is hosting a 2.5-day symposium on the Defense of the Homeland. This symposium embodies the NDS's call for a clear-eyed realism that leverages all elements of national power.
