Paul Van Slett

Department of Defense Satellite Communications Chief (DoD SATCOM Chief)

U.S. Department of Defense (DOD)

Mr. Paul M. Van Slett is the Satellite Communications (SATCOM) Chief for the Command, Control, and Communications Infrastructure (C3I) Directorate of the Deputy Chief Information Officer for Command, Control, and Communications (DCIO(C3)), Office of the Department of Defense Chief Information Officer. As DoD SATCOM Chief, Mr. Van Slett provides technical expertise, oversight, and guidance on policy, programmatic, and technical issues relating to DoD SATCOM to integrate and synchronize defense-wide communications programs that achieve and assure information warfare dominance and warfighter lethality. He is also DoD CIO’s focal point and advocate for SATCOM interoperability and resource sharing with International Partners, including formal support to Allies via NATO SATCOM Services 6th Generation (NSS6G) activities. Mr. Van Slett leads the team of SATCOM experts responsible for defining DoD policies and strategies for design, architecture, interoperability standards, capability development, and sustainment of DoD SATCOM. This includes synchronizing Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) SATCOM ground teleport and Airborne Intelligence, Surveillance, & Reconnaissance (AISR) SATCOM infrastructure with a diverse array of military service architectures, capability requirements, and fielding roadmaps. Mr. Van Slett spent seven years as a Navy SATCOM Electronics Technician providing operational wartime SATCOM, voice, and data from Bahrain and Italy to hundreds of deployed ships, expeditionary, and ground mobile force units. Mr. Van Slett began contracting for the Navy and Army in 2002 where he honed his SATCOM and IP network engineering expertise over 11 years in Bahrain, Yokosuka, Japan, Fort Monmouth, NJ, and Charleston, SC before entering civil service as the Technical Lead for the Navy’s SATCOM Integrated Product Team at Naval Information Warfare Center (NIWC) Atlantic. He engineered and fielded multiple enterprise IP network and SATCOM modem systems for the Navy, DISA, and Missile Defense Agency designed to improve assured command and control, SATCOM cybersecurity, and homeland defense capabilities. Prior to joining the CIO, Mr. Van Slett served as the Navy’s Wideband and Protected SATCOM Requirements Officer ensuring Navy and Joint tactical and strategic SATCOM future warfighting needs are formally documented and funded. He successfully advocated for, and funded, the expedited fielding of a new shipboard multi-band, multi-orbit, hybrid SATCOM terminal. In this role he also led an effort to formally capture all DoD SATCOM wideband capability requirements for the first time in a memo endorsed at a 3-star level by the Army, Navy, and Marine Corps.

Mr. Van Slett earned a M.S. in Telecommunications from Southern Methodist University in 2006, a Cisco Certified Networking and Design Professional (CCNP & CCDP) designation in 2004, and a B.A. in English from the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee in 1992.

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