Mr. David Cattler

Assistant Secretary General for Intelligence and Security, NATO

David Cattler is NATO’s Assistant Secretary-General for Intelligence and Security. He took up his post on 2 December 2019. He ensures the NATO intelligence organizations operate as an enterprise to meet the challenging demands of the Alliance. He also is the senior advisor to the Secretary-General for intelligence and security matters.

Prior to his appointment as Assistant Secretary-General, he was a senior national and defense intelligence official of the United States.  He served multiple times as an intelligence enterprise mission manager and led complex efforts across organizational and functional boundaries.  He has significant collection management and analytic experience at the national, joint, and service levels and has advised the President, civilian agencies, the Defense Department and military leaders, and operational forces.

He helped form and coordinate national policy as Deputy Assistant to the President for Regional Affairs within the US National Security Council.  He ensured unity of effort, advised national, interagency, and military policy and action, and was a senior advisor to the Director of National Intelligence in multiple roles, including serving as the Chairman of the National Intelligence Management Council, National Intelligence Manager for the Near East, and Principal Deputy National Intelligence Officer for Military Issues.  He advised strategic decision-making and supported combat operations within the Department of Defense while directing the Defense Intelligence Agency’s counterterrorism efforts and serving as the Joint Staff’s Deputy Director for Intelligence.

He began his career as a naval surface warfare officer and served in operations, combat systems, and engineering roles in two Aegis cruisers, USS ANTIETAM and USS CHANCELLORSVILLE, and ashore as a military and civilian officer with the Office of Naval Intelligence.  He joined the Navy staff at the Pentagon in 2003 and served as the Deputy Assistant Director of Naval Intelligence for Intelligence Support and Director of Deep Red.

He has earned academic degrees from the United States Naval Academy (Bachelor of Science, Political Science, 1993) and Georgetown University (Master of Policy Management, 2008). He also is a graduate of the National Intelligence University, the US Naval War College, and was a Senior Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Seminar XXI: Foreign Politics, International Relations, and the National Interest.