By Louie Estrada
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, February 1, 2006; B06
Christopher James Makins, 63, a former British diplomat who since the 1970s was a leading authority on European security and defense for nonprofit foreign policy organizations in Washington, died of cancer Jan. 28 at his home in Georgetown.
Most recently, Mr. Makins was a senior adviser to the German Marshall Fund of the United States, a Washington-based organization that promotes transatlantic studies. Previously, he had been president of the Atlantic Council of the United States, vice president and executive vice president of the Aspen Institute and vice president of the Roosevelt Center for American Policy Studies.
"He had an incredible breadth of knowledge, a wide network of friends and contacts, and great judgment on questions of strategy," said Craig Kennedy, president of the German Marshall Fund. "He was one of these very wise people who you depend upon in big decisions."
A tall man with a slim physique, gracious manners and a booming voice, Mr. Makins helped shape public policy debate on a range of issues, including Middle East stability, antiterrorism, NATO security and globalization. For many, he seemed uniquely positioned to analyze policy differences and areas of cooperation on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.
Although his accent and mannerisms easily identified him as an Englishman, he was adamant that he was just as American as he was British.
He was born July 23, 1942, in Southampton, N.Y., and raised mostly in Britain. His father was Sir Roger Makins, a distinguished diplomatic figure who served as Britain's ambassador to the United States during the Eisenhower administration, a crucial time of the post-World War II era.
Mr. Makins's mother, Alice Davis, was an American, the oldest daughter of Dwight Filley Davis, founder of the Davis Cup international tennis competition. She lived in England until her father, fearful of the bombing in London, persuaded her to live in New York for the duration of World War II.
Mr. Makins, who spent part of his childhood in Washington's embassy environment, was educated at Winchester College and Oxford's New College, where he earned first-class honors in modern history in 1963. That year, he was elected a fellow of Oxford's All Souls College.
He spent the first 11 years of his career in the British diplomatic service with assignments in Paris and Washington. His firm grasp of international affairs helped him gain a reputation as one of the brightest and most knowledgeable officials on defense, arms control and other security issues.
In the mid-1970s, he left the diplomatic service and a potential career in the House of Lords. (His father had become Lord Sherfield of Sherfield-on-London. He died in 1996.) Instead, Mr. Makins chose to settle in Washington with his new wife and tackle many of the same policy issues, only this time through nonprofit organizations.
After working for the Trilateral Commission, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Science Applications International Corp., he spent four years as vice president of the Roosevelt Center.
He then joined the Aspen Institute in 1989 and played an important part in its development of partner institutions in Europe and Asia.
From 1999 to 2005, Mr. Makins was president of the Atlantic Council, where he brought in funding, started programs in transatlantic relations and authored or co-authored a number of public policy articles, including "Power and Weakness or Challenge and Response" in 2003. He also helped organize the Pan-Atlantic Student Summits, held in conjunction with NATO summits in Prague (2002) and Istanbul (2004).
Over the years, he developed a strong interest in art, baseball, theater and opera.
He occasionally watched the Baltimore Orioles play at Camden Yards and was president of the boards of the Phillips Collection and the Washington Concert Opera.
He also loaned to U.S. museums and galleries works of art from a large collection of mainly Victorian paintings he had inherited. The collection included works by Sir John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and William Holman Hunt, members of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.
Survivors include his wife of 31 years, Wendy Whitney Makins of Washington; a daughter, Marian Makins of Philadelphia; two stepdaughters, Elisabetta "Tina" Cortesi of Winchester, Mass., and Isabella Cortesi of Oakland, Calif.; a brother; four sisters; and two grandchildren.