After running into a bit of controversy over statements made in Bob Woodward’s Obama’s War, National Security Adviser General James L. Jones (SFS ’66) is stepping down from his duties within the next two weeks.

Jones, a former NATO commander (and Hoya basketball player), had been at the post since the beginning of the Obama administration.

During a White House press conference, President Barack Obama credited Jones with reshaping the national security staff to make the country better equipped to handle the new types of threats facing the nation. The president also said that he relied on Jones on a daily basis for advice.

Despite Jones’ departure, the national security office will not be without a Georgetown alum. Obama appointed Jones’ deputy Thomas Donilon to replace him and appointed Denis McDonough (MSFS ’96) as the new deputy national security adviser.

McDonough previously served as the National Security Council chief of staff, an adviser to Obama’s 2008 campaign, and as an adviser to former visiting professor Senator Tom Daschle.

Photo: AP

h/t Professor Anthony Clark Arend

This morning, a commenter republished an email about changes within the School of Foreign Service administration. We decided to put on our journalism pants and investigate the claims.

According to the email, which was sent to SFS faculty and staff by Dean Carol Lancaster, Associate Dean Mitch Kaneda replaced Senior Associate Dean James Reardon-Anderson on July 1 as director of the Bachelor of Science in Foreign Service program.

SFS Director of Communications Beau Boughamer confirmed the changes via email earlier today.

“We are extremely proud and fortunate to have a teacher and advisor of Mitch Kaneda’s quality and character taking on this role,” Reardon-Anderson said of Kaneda, who has advised students as an associate dean for almost a decade.

However, don’t expect Reardon-Anderson to leave the SFS. As Senior Associate Dean, he now “[oversees] all curricular programs, academic appointments and finance,” according to a comment written by Lancaster. Reardon-Anderson’s duties will extend to serving as acting dean when Lancaster is out of the office.

“I didn’t want anyone to somehow get the impression that Jim Reardon-Anderson had left,” Lancaster wrote in an email to Vox.

Jennifer Windsor, former Executive Director of Freedom House, will step in on August 23 as Associate Dean of Programs. Windsor, who previously taught for MSFS, will be in charge of “administration, communications, the career center, the Georgetown Journal, Fellows in Foreign Service, alumni affairs, [and] new initiatives (including putting together an executive education degree),” according to Lancaster.

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Master of Science in Foreign Service Professor Joseph Cirincione went on the Colbert Report this past Monday to discuss the Ploughshares Fund, a group which advocates against nuclear proliferation.

Cirincione, who is president of the Fund, was probably prepared for Colbert-level provocation, but not for anything on the order of Colbert’s epic, 51-second impression of total nuclear annihilation. (It begins at the 3:30 mark).

On the program, Cirincione seemed less than amused. He came around the next day on Twitter: “Stephen Colbert does the best imitation of a nuclear explosion I have ever seen.”

Next, he and Colbert played “sanction, bomb, or marry.” And the real fun began.

Via Anthony Clark Arend’s blog.