Kenneth Allard

His military career as an operational intelligence officer also included service on the faculty of the United States Military Academy, as special assistant to the Army Chief of Staff, and as dean of students at the National War College.

A command and control expert, he served in 1996 on special assignment with the U.S. 1st Armored Division in Bosnia. Colonel Allard is regarded as an expert in security issues related to Western Europe, Iraq, Bosnia, and Somalia. He is currently an expert scholar with the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, DC.

Allard also played key roles in two of the most significant reform efforts in Pentagon history. As a congressional fellow he helped draft the landmark 1986 Goldwater-Nichols Act, which enabled the development of a cohesive fighting force through a system of command and control that ensures that the President and the Secretary of Defense receive the best possible military advice. The bill enables the advice to be rapidly translated into effective strategy on the battle field by alleviating the myriad levels of bureaucracy between the decision makers and the field commanders.

Colonel Allard was the director of the study that produced the sweeping procurement reforms of the 1994 Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act. FASA is an act that vastly reduces the paper work and bureaucratic web that had previously defined military expenditures and operations, in addition to providing incentives for defense contracts to be awarded to small businesses and minority owned businesses.

A noted author and lecturer, Allard's many publications include two books, Somalia Operations: Lessons Learned, and Command, Control and the Common Defense, which won the 1991 National Security Book Award. Colonel Allard holds a Ph.D. from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, an M.P.A. from Harvard University, and he is an adjunct professor in the National Security Studies Program, Georgetown University.