We are excited to welcome aboard Ken Martin to the R3 family.  He retired from the United States Navy after twenty-three years of service and was piped ashore during a retirement ceremony held at the Navy Diving and Salvage Training Center (NDSTC) in Panama City, Florida.  See a retirement photo at this link.  Ken began his service as a Navy Diver at Trident Refit Facility Bangor, WA.  He served onboard USS Simon Lake in La Madalena, Italy and at Naval Operational Medicine Institute, Pensacola, FL.  He was commissioned in 2000 through the Enlisted Commissioning Program after graduating from the University of Washington and subsequently joined the Special Operations Officer Community.

Post commissioning, Ken continued to serve in a variety of areas including Explosive Ordnance Disposal, Navy Diving, Surface Warfare, and Mine Warfare.  He is well versed in Irregular Warfare, Counter Insurgency, Counter IED / Anti-Terrorism, Security Force Assistance, and NATO / Coalition partnership. He completed two combat deployments to Iraq working directly with coalition and Iraqi forces where he earned two Bronze Stars.  Specifically, his Platoon was assigned to train the Iraqi Bomb Disposal Forces.

In the area of training and education, Ken served as Executive Officer (Acting) at the Center for EOD and Diving (CEODD).  He coordinated the establishment of a PEP instructor position at Naval Diving and Salvage Training Center with an exchange Master Diver position in Cartagena, Spain.  Ken also headed the initiative to revamp the EOD Officer warfare qualification and associated standards; creating an EOD Officer Qualification as well as a Department Head level qualification.

Ken’s formal education includes a Bachelor of Science in Psychology from the University of Washington and a Master’s degree in Operational and Information Science from the Naval Postgraduate School in the Special Operations for Low Intensity Conflict Department.