The North Atlantic Treaty Organization reached a major
milestone recently, when it consolidated its military and
civilian research advisory groups under a new Research and
Technology Board.
For four decades, the NATO Military Committee oversaw the
Advisory Group on Aerospace Research and Development (AGARD).
AGARD provided advice and studies in the field of aerospace.
Similarly, the civilian Conference of National Armaments
Directors (CNAD) oversaw the Defense Research Group (DRG) that
provided advice and studies in military technology.
Following on the heels of a reorganization that transformed
the SHAPE Technical Center into the NATO Consultation, Command
and Control Agency (NC3A), NATO combined AGARD and the DRG and
have the new organization serve both the Military Committee and
the CNAD.
The panels and subordinate working elements of both
organizations were integrated into a streamlined structure with
the permanent staffs combined and governed by the Research and
Technology (R&T) Board.
The R&T Board replaces the management
boards that governed the two predecessor organizations.
The inaugural meeting of the NATO R&T Board was held in
Brussels November 21 and opened by NATO Deputy Secretary General
S. Balanzino from Italy.
The R&T Board elected Dr. Michael
Yarymovych, the former chairman of the AGARD Board as board
chairman.
Dr. Yarymovych, an aeronautical engineer, is a former
Air Force chief scientist and a former president of the American
Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.
The R&T Board also selected Dr. Ernst van Hoek as director
of the new staff, subject to confirmation by NATO's Secretary
General.
Dr. van Hoek is the immediate past chairman of the DRG
and is director of research and development in the Netherlands
Ministry of Defense.
He is well known for his work in NATO and
as the chairman of a panel of the Western European
Armaments Group.
A physicist, Dr. van Hoek served as chairman of
the Society of Defence Engineers in the Netherlands, and he is
currently on the board of the defence technology division of the
Royal Society of Engineers.
He will oversee a 50-member NATO
staff, some located at the Brussels NATO Headquarters, but the
majority located near Paris.
The senior U.S. representative on the R&T Board is Mr.
George Singley III, deputy director of defense research and
engineering in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for
Acquisition and Technology.
The other U.S. representative is Dr.
Donald Daniel, deputy director for science and technology at
Headquarters, Air Force Materiel Command, Wright-Patterson Air
Force Base, Ohio.
