Robert Andrews

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Robert Andrews most recently served as the Special Assistant to the Secretary of the Army from September 2007 through October 2009. A Presidential appointee, Andrews advised the Secretary of the Army on policy matters requiring the Secretary’s personal attention. He is a consultant to the Ashcroft Group, providing expertise and advice to our clients with an interest in national security programs. Andrews is based in Washington, DC.

He has more than 40 years of experience inside and outside of government. Besides being an accomplished author of numerous books, Andrews is an expert in national security and intelligence matters.

As a Special Forces officer in Vietnam,  Robert Andrews established intelligence networks in the villages of South Vietnam and conducted long-range reconnaissance missions along the Lao and Cambodian borders. Subsequently, Andrews directed operations for a Special Forces Group with missions in the Middle East during the 1967 Arab-Israeli Six-Day War. Returning to Vietnam, he carried out covert operations against the communist political infrastructure as an operations officer in the top secret Studies and Observations Group. Following his years in Vietnam,  he served in a wide variety of assignments in the 82nd Airborne Division and at the Pentagon.

  From 1975 until 1980, Andrews held a succession of senior positions at the Central Intelligence Agency as National Intelligence Officer for East Asia,  Assistant Legislative Counsel, and Product Review Division officer. Serving as one of the CIA’s senior liaison officers with the Departments of State and Defense and the White House, he developed and coordinated national intelligence requirements in support of U.S.  policy.

In 1980, Andrews accepted a position as Senator John Glenn’s national security advisor. In this capacity, he was responsible for recommending and coordinating Senator Glenn’s legislation on intelligence and other national security issues. Andrews arranged for and accompanied Senator Glenn on Congressional delegations to meet with the heads of state of Israel,  Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and the United   Arab Emirates on issues regarding U.S.  intelligence and foreign policy.

Leaving the U.S.  Senate in 1982, Andrews directed Rockwell International’s Washington congressional relations and strategic analysis until 1995. That year he accepted an offer from the McDonnell Douglas Company to become Vice President for Program Coordination. In 1997, with the merger of McDonnell Douglas and the Boeing Company, Andrews assumed the senior executive position of Vice President for Government Programs.

In 2001, Andrews was appointed as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict. He was in the Pentagon on 9/11. During the period July 2001 – July 2002, he advised the Secretary of Defense during the Afghanistan intervention. In March 2005, Andrews was again appointed Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict. Andrews also served as the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Counterintelligence and Security from April 2006 to September 2007.

In 2007, the Secretary of Defense awarded Andrews the Department of Defense Award for Outstanding Public Service, and in 2009, the Secretary of the Army presented Andrews with the medal for Distinguished Civilian Service to the United States Army.

Andrews holds a degree in chemical engineering from the University of Florida and an advanced degree in Asian history from Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri. He is the author of The Village War(University   of Missouri Press), a study of communist political warfare. His articles and editorial commentary on defense and national security issues have appeared in The Washington Post,  USA Today, The International Herald Tribune, Readers Digest, The Washington Times, Washingtonian Magazine, and Military Review.

His novel, A Murder of Honor, was published by G.P. Putnam’s Sons in 2001 as part of a four-book commitment. His second novel, A Murder of Promise, came out in hardcover in 2002, and appeared in paperback in 2003. His third novel, A Murder of Justice, was published in August 2004.

Previous works include Center Game, Last Spy Out (Bantam-Doubleday), To Kill the Hangman (a screenplay in collaboration with Victor Gold), Death in a Promised Land, and The Towers (Simon & Schuster-Pocket Books). Andrews’s short story,  “Solomon’s Alley,” was chosen by Carl Hiaasen for inclusion in The Best American Mystery Stories of 2007 (Houghton-Mifflin).