Joseph Dunford, Joint Chiefs Nominee, Known to Maneuver Between Roles - nytimes

WASHINGTON — Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr. took the same punishing combat fitness test the lowest-ranking Marine must pass, and dressed in his formal uniform in Afghanistan to meet with that nation’s president.

The man President Obama nominated on Tuesday to be the next leader of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is known for his ability to maneuver between the disparate roles of battlefield commander and military strategist with a deft political touch.

General Dunford, 59, served as the top American commander in Afghanistan before taking over ascommandant of the Marine Corps last fall. If confirmed by the Senate, where his nomination won praise on Tuesday from lawmakers in both parties, he would be only the second Marine to hold the highest leadership post in the armed forces.

Mr. Obama chose General Dunford as his top military adviser to help him juggle a range of global challenges, including winding down one grinding war in Afghanistan and figuring out how to win another conflict against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.

“I know Joe, I trust him,” Mr. Obama said on Tuesday at a formal ceremony in the Rose Garden of the White House, where he announced General Dunford’s nomination. “He’s already proven his ability to give me his unvarnished military advice based on his experience on the ground.”

When General Dunford was commanding American and NATO forces in Afghanistan, he impressed Mr. Obama during hundreds of hours of secure video conferences, and an easy rapport developed between the two men — the president seated in the White House Situation Room in Washington and the commander in Kabul. Mr. Obama appreciated the general’s quiet, matter-of-fact manner while he handled numerous crises, administration and defense officials said.

On Tuesday, Mr. Obama alluded to those sessions, saying he had been “extraordinarily impressed by Joe — from the Situation Room, where he helped to shape our enduring commitment to Afghanistan, to my visit last year to Bagram, where I saw his leadership firsthand.”

The president also admired how General Dunford delicately made the case to keep as large a force as possible in Afghanistan for as long as possible without antagonizing the president or his team.

General Dunford would succeed Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, who is retiring after four years as the nation’s top general. General Dempsey was a favorite of the president’s and the go-to person at the Pentagon for White House officials who grew disenchanted with Chuck Hagel as defense secretary. Mr. Hagel has since been replaced by Ashton B. Carter.

A Boston native who graduated from Saint Michael’s College and was commissioned in 1977, General Dunford took the unusual step of going outside the military staff colleges where senior leaders typically pursue academic honors and earned master’s degrees from Georgetown University and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University.

The grandson of a World War I veteran whose four uncles served in World War II, General Dunford has the added credibility that comes with being the son of an enlisted man; his father, a retired Boston police officer, fought with the Marines in the Korean War.  Read More at NYT

Joseph Dunford, Joint Chiefs Nominee, Known to Maneuver Between Roles

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