CDR Collin R. Fox

Chief Strategy Officer, Task Force Hopper

U.S. Department of the Navy

Collin R. Fox grew up near military installations in Florida, California, Virginia, and Belgium. He
was commissioned as an Ensign in 2004 upon graduation from the United States Naval Academy
and designated as a Naval Aviator in 2006. He holds a Master of Systems Analysis degree from the
Naval Postgraduate School, where his team’s project on alternative anti-submarine weapons won
the John Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory Award for Excellence in Systems
Analysis. He also holds a Master of Naval and Maritime Science from the Chilean Naval War
College, where his capstone project focused on the implications of regional security environment on
fleet design through the year 2045.
His early operational assignments included service as a helicopter pilot, gaining tactical experience
in anti-submarine warfare and combat search and rescue with Helicopter Anti-Submarine Squadron
Seven (HS-7), and later supporting developmental test and evaluation with Air Test and Evalutation
Squadron Three One (VX-31). He flew 8 fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft through 8 years of flying
assignments, accumulating over 1,400 flight hours and conducting 3 rescues. His assignment to
Expeditionary Strike Group Two (ESG-2) as Air Planner broadened his experience in amphibious
operations, multinational exercises, and operational planning, while his subsequent tour with U.S.
Fleet Forces Command as the Foreign Liaison Officer program manager added major staff
experience.
He was redesignated a Foreign Area Officer (FAO) in 2015 while at U.S. Fleet Forces Command,
and became a fully qualified Foreign Area Officer (Western Hemisphere) upon graduating from the
Chilean Naval War College in 2017. He led air and naval security cooperation efforts at the United
States Embassy in Panama from 2018 through 2020, building crucial partnerships, gaining
experience in Foreign Military Sales (FMS), and reviving the place of the Panama Canal in theater-
level strategy. He gained further interagency experience at the Department of State as a military
advisor to the Bureau of Arms Control, Verification and Compliance, in the Office of Euro-Atlantic
Security Affairs, with a portfolio covering the Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe and the
OSCE Vienna Document. He also served in the Department of State task forces for the withdrawal
from Afghanistan in August 2021 and for support to Ukraine in early 2022. He was subsequently
assigned to Commander, U.S. Naval Forces Europe and Africa, within the N52 Africa Campaign
Integration division, supporting naval security cooperation plans and operations in the AFRICOM
AOR. He also urgently deployed aboard the USS MOUNT WHITNEY with JTF 406 in support of
coalition contingency operations following the attacks of October 7, 2023. He is currently assigned
to U.S. Naval Surface Forces as the Chief Strategy Officer for TF HOPPER.
In a personal capacity, CDR Fox has published more than 20 articles with the U.S. Naval Institute’s
Proceedings, the Center for International Maritime Security (CIMSEC), War on the Rocks, and the
U.S. Army War College’s The War Room. As a fully qualified Foreign Area Officer, he maintains
professional working proficiency in Spanish and French.

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