John de Chastelain: General; overseer of IRA disarmament

Since November 1995, de Chastelain has been involved in the Northern Ireland peace process and since 1997 he has been Chairman of the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning, which is responsible for ensuring the decommissioning of arms by paramilitary groups in Northern Ireland. He has made an impact on the way that Britain has viewed the IRA since the decommissioning has begun. As part of the Good Friday Agreement an independent neutral adjudicator was selected to look over the disarmament of Republican and Loyalist paramilitary weapons in Northern Ireland. He is a member of the Board of Directors of the Forum of Federations, the global network on federalism.

De Chastelain was born in 1937 in Romania of a Scottish father and an American mother. He immigrated to Canada in 1955 and was became a citizen in 1962. De Chastelain is married, and he and his wife MaryAnn (née Laverty) have two children, Duncan and Amanda, and five grandchildren. De Chastelain was educated at Fettes College in Edinburgh, at Mount Royal University in Calgary and the Royal Military College of Canada. He graduated in 1960 with a BA in history and was commissioned to the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry. In 1970 he was commanding officer of the Second Battalion PPCLI. He was also Deputy Chief of Staff of the United Nations Force in Cyprus and Commander of the Canadian contingent there. As a brigadier-general, he was successively Commandant of the Royal Military College of Canada, Commander of the 4th Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group in Lahr, Germany, and Director General Land Doctrine and Operations at National Defense Headquarters in Ottawa.

As a major-general, he was Deputy Commander of the Canada Land Force then called Force Mobile Command) and Commander of the Mobile Command Division, which was exercised as such in 1985 on Exercise RV '85. As a lieutenant-general, he was Assistant Deputy Minister for Personnel, and then Vice-Chief of the Defence Staff. In 1989, he was promoted to the rank of general and appointed Chief of Defense. In 1993, he transferred to the Reserves and was appointed Ambassadors to the United States. In 1994, he was recalled to Regular Force duty after the departure of Admiral Anderson, and re-appointed Chief of the Defense Staff, from which post he retired in December 1995.

In 1985, de Chastelain was appointed Commander of the Order of Military Merit and in 1991, Commander of the Order of St. John; in 1993, he received the Commendation Medal of Merit and Honour of Greece, and was appointed Officer of the Order of Canada; in 1993, the was appointed Commander of the Legion of Merit (U.S.A.), and in 1999, he was made a Companion Of Honour from the British Government. General John de Chastelain was a recipient of the Vimy Award, which recognizes a Canadian who has made a significant and outstanding contribution to the defense and security of Canada and the preservation of our democratic values.