General (Retd.) John Allen

John Allen is a retired U.S. Marine Corps four-star general and former commander of the NATO International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan.

Immediately following retirement from the Marine Corps, General Allen was the senior advisor to the Secretary of Defense on Middle East Security, and in that role he led the security dialogue with Israel and the Palestinian Authority. He served as President Obama’s Special Presidential Envoy to the global coalition to counter the Islamic State. General Allen also served as the President of the Brookings Institution from 2017 to 2022. He is a Distinguished Graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, a permanent member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and a Fellow in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He served in the Balkans, Iraq, and Afghanistan.

General Allen is a strategic advisor to the Microsoft Corporation, and a Senior Fellow at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory. He advises several tech start-ups. General Allen is the co-author of the books: Turning Point: Policymaking in the Era of AI (Brookings Press) and Future War and the Defense of Europe (Oxford University Press 2021). He has received multiple U.S. awards and decorations, and ten decorations from other countries.