2018 MILCOM

Joseph M. Wassel
Executive, Cyberspace Operations (CyberOps) Directorate
Defense Information Systems Agency


Mr. Joseph M. Wassel is the Executive for the Cyber Operations (CyberOps) Directorate, Defense Information Systems Agency. The CyberOps Directorate is responsible for synchronizing and directing the delivery and operation of the agency’s enterprise capabilities with over 2,300 personnel located at 53 locations in 8 countries. Mr. Wassel is the former Director of C4 Resilience & Mission Assurance in the Department of Defense (DoD) Chief Information Officer’s (CIO’s) office. He was responsible for overseeing the development of an Enterprise Environment that informs risk management decisions across all the functional areas of mission assurance. His portfolio within DoD CIO focused on combining critical infrastructure knowledge management, intelligence, and alerts to enable analytic views of critical infrastructure, DoD vulnerability assessments, dependency analysis, and threat reporting. He strived to continuously improve the resilience of the nation’s critical assets by sharing information and collaborating across military and non-military partners. Mr. Wassel was also the Chair of the DoD Public Safety Communications Working Group. In that capacity, he led the Services, Joint Staff, National Guard, NORTHCOM and other DoD partner activities for the Department’s public safety communications efforts to include FirstNet planning and implementation, 911 services and Defense Support to Civil Authorities (DSCA) communications. Additionally, he was the Program Director for the Global Mission Assurance Portal and was responsible for developing classified portals, which provided senior leaders with critical infrastructure decision support through dynamic geospatial visualization. Prior to assuming his former positions, Mr. Wassel was the Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Communications and Deputy Chief Information Officer for OSD. In that capacity, he served four Secretaries of Defense (Perry, Cohen, Rumsfeld, and Gates) as the Secretary’s principal liaison and single focal point to all agencies providing the required global communications support. He was responsible for connecting and informing the SecDef during every major crisis the Department and the Nation faced for over a decade. During his tenure, he traveled worldwide on Secretary of Defense travel missions to over 100 countries, logging over 900 days deployed and several thousands of hours as the Senior Communications Official on the National Airborne Operations Center, E4-B, and other VIP aircrafts supporting the Secretaries of Defense. A retired Air Force Officer, he has commanded troops during several tours in the US and overseas and deployed as a reservist in support of Operation Enduring Freedom as the Chief, Command and Control Operations, International Security Assistance Force, Combined Joint Operations Center, Kabul Afghanistan. Mr. Wassel’s military and civilian decorations include the Defense Superior Service Medal, The Secretary of Defense Meritorious and Exceptional Civilian Service Medals. He was decorated for his actions during the attacks on the United States, September 11, 2001.

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