Nicole Alexander

LTC Nicole Alexander is a Special Operations Civil Affairs officer in the U.S. Army with nearly 20 years of service. Prior to serving in Civil Affairs, she spent the first half of her career as a combat engineer with two deployments in Iraq in 2006 and 2008. As a Civil Affairs officer she has deployed to Afghanistan twice, first as a Civil Affairs Team leader conducting Village Stability Operations along the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan and later as the Director of Governance in the NATO Special Operations Component Command during the 2013 Afghan National Election where she was responsible for the Special Operations support to elections. Nicole was also chosen to deploy and stand-up the Knowledge Management Team as part of the Interagency Syrian Transition Assistance Response Team (START) which led the US response to the Syrian Crisis. Nicole was an ARSOF Company Commander for 27 months, commanding all 3 branches of Army special operations forces during two deployments in the Balkans and Caucuses regions of Europe. She also served as the operations officer for the 92nd Civil Affairs Battalion. She was selected to be the Secretary of the General Staff and later the Executive Officer for the Command General of 1st Special Forces Command. In both roles, she supported the command group in daily operations and administrative functions for the largest division in the Army of 23,000 Soldiers across 11 states. She recently relinquished Battalion Command for the 92nd Civil Affairs Battalion (Special Operations)(Airborne). The battalion has Soldiers deployed across Europe competing against our adversaries. She is currently a stabilization policy advisor in the Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict directorate of the Office of The Secretary of Defense for Policy.

Nicole holds a Bachelors of Arts degree from the University of Washington in Political Communication and Community and Environmental Planning. She also holds a Masters of Science in Environmental Management from Webster’s University and Masters of Science in Political Warfare and Information Operations from the Naval PostGraduate School.

Nicole is a published author, former Center For New American Security Fellow, and she regularly speaks to group on topics of Diversity, Mentorship, and Ethics. She is also the Co-founder and Former Director for Strategic Initiatives for PROMOTE, a non-profit focused on inclusive leadership and mentorship with the national security community.

She is married to retired a Special Forces Officer and together they have two young daughters.