Robert P. Ashley Jr.

Robert Paul Ashley Jr. is a retired lieutenant general in the United States Army who served as the Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency from 2017 to 2020. He previously served as Deputy Chief of Staff of the Army G-2. He received a commission through ROTC as a 1984 graduate of Appalachian State University. He retired from active duty on October 1, 2020. He currently serves as Senior Advisor to the Chairman of Arcanum, a global strategic intelligence company. He is the son of a United States Air Force veteran of the Korean War who later lived in North Carolina and worked a sewing machine mechanic. Ashley is a commissioner on the Afghanistan War Commission.

Education

 * Bachelor of Science degree in political science, Appalachian State University, Boone, North Carolina.
 * Master of Science degree in strategic intelligence management, National Intelligence University, Bethesda, Maryland.
 * Master of Science degree in strategic studies, US Army War College, Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania.

Operational deployments

 * Intelligence Analyst, Allied Land Forces Southern Europe, Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe, Izmir, Turkey
 * Secretary to the Joint Military Commission, Stabilization Force, Operation Joint Forge, Bosnia-Herzegovina
 * Commander, Office of Military Support, Washington, D.C., Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom
 * Commander, 525th Battlefield Surveillance Brigade(Airborne), XVIII Airborne Corps Operation Iraqi Freedom
 * Deputy Chief of Staff, Intelligence, International Security Assistance Force and Director of Intelligence, United States Forces-Afghanistan