David Wilson CB CBE
Consultant
Email: d.wilson@berwicksconsultants.com
David recently completed two and a half years in Afghanistan as the Director of a United Nations programme engaged in disarming warlords and disbanding illegal armed groups – an assignment that carried with it automatic membership of the United Nations Security Management Committee. Prior to that had undertaken consultancy work for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in support of the Iraqi Interim Government, essentially advising on civil/military aspects for inclusion in the new Constitution.
However, the majority of his working life was spent in the Armed Forces and, in a career spanning 35 years, he alternated between tours of duty as a field operator and staff officer dealing at the operational and strategic level. Most often he was to be found leading, training or supporting both conventional and unconventional forces (military and police, national and international) in politically sensitive, high profile and frequently high risk operations and training deployments worldwide.
His more senior appointments included: Commander United Kingdom Amphibious Forces, Commandant General Royal Marines, Senior British Military Adviser to Commander-in-Chief United States Central Command - with a remit to further the United Kingdom strategic interest as principal coalition partner in the global ‘War on Terror’. When serving with NATO, he led a 900 strong international civil and military staff operationally deployed in Kosovo with responsibility for directing and co-ordinating all theatre-wide operational output by a multi-national force of 38,000 personnel – an appointment in which he became co-chairman of the Kosovo Security Committee. He was also privileged to have commanded the Special Boat Service, 45 Commando Group, 3 Commando Brigade and the United Kingdom/Netherlands Amphibious Force.
Various assignments in MoD and operational headquarters included responsibility for co-ordinating all policy issues relating to national security objectives in Northern Ireland, co-ordinating UK Special Forces overseas security assistance training in the furtherance of foreign policy objectives and participation as a permanent UK delegate to several international counter-terrorist working groups and seminars. He was routinely engaged in national security crisis response management and contingency operations, both home and abroad.
As a member of the Royal Navy’s Trident Nuclear Security Working Group he was closely involved in everything to do with storage and movement of nuclear material. This involved not only security arrangements at sensitive fixed sites and movement on land or at sea, but also contingency response training for associated civil and military authorities, the staffing of operational policy, doctrine and procurement of specialist equipment.
Nominated by the Chief of Defence Staff as one of the UK’s senior mentors to NATO and, as a civilian, by the United Nations Development Programme as a mentor to its senior management deployed globally, he has been closely involved with training – in all its manifestations – throughout his working life. This has ranged from training recruits and lecturing at Service colleges, to presiding at the Admiralty Interview Board responsible for the selection of future Royal Marines officers and sitting as a member of the Royal Naval Senior Promotions Board.
