Leonid Ryabikhin was an Air Force Academy instructor in the Soviet Air Force. He is an expert in arms control, non-proliferation, and aviation and missile technology.Leonid Ryabikhin was born in 1945 in Mongolia. In 1961 he joined the Soviet Air Force as a civilian serviceman. He graduated from the Moscow Institute of Technology, Department of Electronics and Computational Techniques, in 1968. In 1967 he was promoted to lieutenant-engineer of the Air Force Reserve and in1968-1970, Ryabikhin served as an Air Force Academy instructor. In 1970 he graduated from the Political University of the Air Force Academy and served as Senior Science Fellow in the USSR Flight Safety National Committee from 1971-1972.
After retirement from the service, he worked in different departments of the USSR Council of Ministers and the USSR Copyright Agency, where he oversaw science and technology information foreign exchange. Ryabikhin negotiated the publication of many scientific and technical journals in the U.S.S.R. and abroad. His efforts include the publication of ten Soviet Academy of Sciences journals in the USA and the“Scientific American” in Soviet Union. In 1984-87, he worked in the U.S.S.R. Embassy in India as a Chief-of-Section. In 1989 he became a Committee of Soviet Scientists staff member, and in 1999-2005, he was a Senior Science Fellow in the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Diplomatic Academy. In 1999, he was elected the Committee of Scientists’ Executive Secretary and was a Visiting Fellow at Stanford University’s Center for International Security and Arms Control, in 1994 and 1996.
Ryabikhin wrote and published many articles and reports on international security, arms control and non-proliferation, aviation and missile technology and ABM issues. He has lectured abroad and made many presentations at national and international conferences and seminars.