Detlev Simons has been working at the Netherlands Ministry of Defence since 1987. During these years, he mainly worked in the broader information domain as commander and in advisory functions.
After his training at the Royal Military Academy, he held various positions at tactical and operational level as subaltern officer. He alternated several company-level commander positions in signal units with Royal Netherlands Army and Military Intelligence Service staff positions. As a subaltern officer, he was deployed within EFORCE in Macedonia and KFOR in Kosovo.
Following completion of the Netherlands Advanced Defence Studies in 2005, he worked at the strategic level as a planner in the Netherlands Defence Staff, followed by a deployment to Afghanistan. As team leader in CSTC-A, he assisted and mentored the strategic planners within the Afghan General staff and Ministry of Defence. After this mission, he was posted in the media information domain as Head of the Army Media Office and spokesperson for the Commander of the Royal Netherlands Army. These positions were followed by two command positions, during which he lead information units and effectors, first as commander of 101 Communications and Information Systems Battalion and then of the Joint Media Centre.
After these two operational functions, promoted to the rank of Colonel, he returned to the strategic level. He became head of the Command Advisory group and Policy Support Division of the Joint Support Commander, moving thereafter to Head of the Office and Advisory Group of the Chief of Defence. Both these functions focused on processing and managing information for commanders operating at the strategic and political level. During these two roles, he completed a Master of Strategic Studies at the US Army War College. From May 2021, promoted to Brigadier general, Detlev Simons was the Director of the office and senior advisor to Chair of the NATO Military Committee in Brussels (Belgium). As of November 2024 he was promoted to Major General and is the Chief of Staff of NATO’s Joint Support & Enabling Command in Ulm (Germany).
Although he has a broad interest in culture, science and arts, military history is his favourite subject, He enjoys a nice meal, board games and conversations in good company. Detlev Simons is married to Andina and they have two sons.
Major General Simons was awarded service medals for missions on the Balkans and in Afghanistan. For his performance recently at the NATO HQ and earlier in Afghanistan he received meritorious service medals from respectively NATO and the United States. In addition, he received a medal for 30 years of service as an Army officer, the Army Service Medal and the Army Commanders Coin in silver for his service in in the Netherlands Army.
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