Rear Admiral (RDML) Bob Little is the 20th Director, Joint Interagency Task Force West (JIATF West), U.S. Indo-Pacific Command. RDML Little coordinates with the U.S. interagency and international partners to identify, monitor, and target illicit and malign activities that enable cartels and Transnational Criminal Organizations (TCOs) to produce and traffic deadly narcotics that harm U.S. citizens. With a focus on synthetic opioids like fentanyl and associated precursor chemicals traveling from the Indo-Pacific to the Western Hemisphere, JIATF West reduces risks to American lives and threats to a free and open Indo-Pacific. RDML Little has served aboard six Coast Guard Cutters, held three afloat commands, accumulated over 13 years of sea time, and operated in both the Atlantic and Pacific areas of operations.
RDML Little’s operational career has been focused on securing the U.S. maritime border, conducting alien migrant and narcotics interdiction, defense operations, combating criminal networks, and safeguarding U.S. maritime commerce. His most recent afloat command was the National Security Cutter STRATTON, among the most capable and technologically advanced ships in the Coast Guard’s surface fleet. In STRATTON, RDML Little deployed to the Western Pacific for defense and security operations with the U.S. Navy’s Seventh Fleet, the Arctic Ocean and Bering Sea to protect National sovereign interests, and the Eastern Pacific to support the U.S. Southern Command’s counter narcotics surge of 2020, that resulted in 1,000 arrests and seizure of 120 tons of narcotics.
He has led numerous combined military and law enforcement operations afloat to strengthen relationships with international allies and partners. RDML Little has also served in several shore-based staff tours, most recently as the Executive Assistant to the Commandant of the Coast Guard. In this capacity, he was a principal advisor on policy, strategy, and resource initiatives across all operational and mission support activities. He served as the Chief of Maritime Forces for the Coast Guard’s Pacific Area. In this role, he was responsible for providing mission ready cutters and aircraft to Coast Guard and Combatant Commanders in support of national strategic priorities. Other staff assignments include Special Assistant to the 28th Vice Commandant of the Coast Guard, Appropriations Manager in the Office of Resource Management, and Deputy Comptroller at the Coast Guard’s Training Center in Yorktown, Virginia. RDML Little is a 1995 graduate of the U.S. Coast Guard Academy where he earned a Bachelor of Science in Management.
He has been awarded a Master of Business Administration by both the College of William and Mary and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He is a 2012 graduate of the Air Command and Staff College and in 2015 completed the Sloan Fellows Program in Innovation and Global Leadership at the MIT Sloan School of Management. RDML Little’s awards include the Legion of Merit, six Meritorious Service Medals, three Coast Guard Commendation Medals, and one Coast Guard Achievement medal, along with several additional personal, unit, and operational awards.