A. DENIS CLIFT
President
Joint Military Intelligence College
A. Denis Clift was appointed President of the Joint Military Intelligence College in 1994. The College, in the Department of Defense, is the nation's only accredited academic institution awarding the Master of Science of Strategic Intelligence degree and the Bachelor of Science in Intelligence degree. In 1999, in his role as president of the college, Mr. Clift was elected to serve as a Commissioner on the Commission on Higher Education of the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools for the term 2000-2002. In 2002, he was re-elected for the term 2003-2005. Since 1992, he has also served as a U.S. Commissioner on the U.S.-Russia Joint Commission on Prisoners of War/Missing in Action, a commission created by Presidents Bush and Yeltsin with the humanitarian goal of accounting for servicemen still missing from past conflicts.
Mr. Clift was born in New York City, New York. He was educated at Friends Seminary, Phillips Exeter Academy (1954), Stanford University (B.A. 1958), and The London School of Economics and Political Science, University of London (M.Sc. 1967). He began a career of public service as a naval officer in the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations and has served in military and civilian capacities in ten administrations, including 13 successive years in the Executive Office of the President and The White House. From 1971-1976, he served on the National Security Council staff. From 1974-1976, he was head of President Ford's National Security Council staff for the Soviet Union and Eastern and Western Europe. From 1977-1981 he was Assistant for National Security Affairs to the Vice President of the United States. From 1991-1994, he was Chief of Staff, Defense Intelligence Agency, following service as an Assistant Deputy Director and Deputy Director for External Relations of the Agency. He is a veteran of two Antarctic expeditions, including the 1961 Bellingshausen Sea Expedition. From 1963-1966, he was Editor, United States Naval Institute Proceedings.
His awards and decorations include the President's Rank of Distinguished Executive, awarded by President George W. Bush in 2001, the President's Rank of Meritorious Executive, awarded by President Ronald Reagan in 1986, the Department of Defense Medal for Distinguished Public Service, the Department of Defense Distinguished Civilian Service Medal, the Secretary of Defense's Meritorious Civilian Service Medal, the Secretary of the Navy's Commendation for Achievement, the Oceanographer of the Navy's Superior Achievement Award, and the Director of Central Intelligence's Sherman Kent Award and Helene L. Boatner Award. He directed the production of the film "Portrait of Antarctica" screened at the Venice Film Festival. His published fiction and nonfiction include the novel A Death in Geneva (Ballantine Books of Random House), Our World in Antarctica (Rand McNally), With Presidents to the Summit (George Mason University Press), and Clift Notes: Intelligence and the Nation's Security (JMIC Writing Center Press).
Board Memberships
Advisory Board, Joint Force Quarterly, Institute for National Strategic Studies, National Defense University, since 1994.
Editorial Board, Studies in Intelligence, DCI's Center for the Study of Intelligence, since 1995.
Steering Committee of the Intelligence and Policy Project, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, since 2000.
Board of Trustees, Consortium of Universities of the Washington Metropolitan Area, since 2002.