USA — Odierno Selected to Lead U.S. Joint Forces Command

WASHINGTON, May 24, 2010 — Pres­i­dent Barack Oba­ma has nom­i­nat­ed Army Gen. Ray­mond T. Odier­no, the present com­man­der of U.S. Forces Iraq, to head U.S. Joint Forces Com­mand, Pen­ta­gon offi­cials announced today.

Sec­re­tary of Defense Robert M. Gates announced that Oba­ma has nom­i­nat­ed Odier­no for reap­point­ment to the rank of four-star gen­er­al and assign­ment as com­man­der of Jfcom, based at Nor­folk, Va. 

Before assum­ing com­mand of U.S. Forces Iraq in Sep­tem­ber 2008, Odier­no was com­mand­ing gen­er­al of U.S. Army III Corps, at which time he served a 15-month deploy­ment as com­mand­ing gen­er­al of Multi­na­tion­al Corps Iraq. At that time Odier­no was the oper­a­tional archi­tect of the U.S. troop surge in Iraq that led to a dra­mat­ic decrease in vio­lence there. Odier­no, a 1976 grad­u­ate of the U.S. Mil­i­tary Acad­e­my at West Point, N.Y., is known as one of the few Army gen­er­als ever to com­mand a divi­sion, corps and an entire the­ater-of-oper­a­tions in the same conflict. 

Source:
U.S. Depart­ment of Defense
Office of the Assis­tant Sec­re­tary of Defense (Pub­lic Affairs)