Rockwell in one of the U. S. Air Force’ s air operations centers. Photo by U. S. Air Force. leadership roles as chief counsel for major military installations around the world. He has lived on three different continents and relocated his family 15 times over the past 30 years, and he remains passionate about serving alongside his fellow service members.
“ In terms of time, half of my career has been spent overseas, and in terms of location, I’ ve probably been to more countries than I haven’ t been to,” he says.“ Service and country connotes team and being part of something that represents something bigger than oneself. As part of that team, every member has an important role in bridging disciplines, expertise, diversity of views and history. With regard to the last, as one of the elders in a force made up of much younger generations, I do have more of a historical perspective from serving during the Cold War, two Gulf Wars and in operations involving the Balkans, East Timor and Libya. Bridging this span of time, capturing lessons learned and evolving to the future is important. As for the practice of law itself, while time has given me experience to share and teach the law, the young airmen and JAGs have a lot to share and teach us elders about facts, particularly in an age of information and technology. There is also a bridging that occurs with practicing the art of law in a predominantly STEM organization like the Air Force. It’ s fascinating to reconcile the differences in disciplines, approach and analytical thinking.”
Over the course of his career, Rockwell has authored various national security laws
and articles, advancing Department of Defense( DoD) and U. S. government interests in military justice, government liability for civilian use of global positioning systems, customary international law, European Union law, rule of law development in Romania, the solidarity movement in Poland, interagency legal capability for rule of law development and state building and the politics of strategic aircraft modernization. He also wrote several chapters in the DoD Law of War Manual, Army Operational Law Handbook and Air Force Operations and the Law Handbook.
Before becoming deputy JAG, he served as the senior legal advisor to the Air Force Special Operations Command, U. S. Air Forces in Europe and Air Force Space Command— three of the 10 major Air Force command organizations. He has also served as the commander of the Air Force Legal Operations Agency, which provides full-spectrum legal support to commands worldwide, including criminal justice and civil law litigation expertise, and legal education to the force through the judge advocate general’ s school.
Rockwell has been highly decorated during his service, receiving awards and honors such as the Legion of Merit, Defense Meritorious Service Medal, Department of State Medal, Air Force Meritorious Service Medal with four oak clusters and Air Force Commendation Medal with one oak leaf cluster. While he has clearly carved out a successful career, he maintains that the success has little to do with him personally.
“ Before I joined the greatest Air Force in the world 30 years ago, I attended the greatest university in the world for seven years. Before that, I was raised by the greatest parents, grandparents and family in the world. Along the way, I married the greatest woman in the world, and we had the two greatest children in the world,” he says.“ I’ m a big fan of Malcolm Gladwell’ s thesis in his book,‘ Outliers,’ positing that environment, opportunity and mentoring lead to individual success. Any success I’ ve experienced has little to do with me individually. It’ s the environment I’ m blessed to be part of, provided by my family, my education and the organization and service I belong to.”
While he has traveled the world and currently resides in Washington, D. C., Rockwell is still loyal to his alma mater, West Virginia University( WVU), where he received a bachelor’ s degree in accounting and his Juris Doctor from the WVU College of Law. He also earned master’ s degrees in air and space law from McGill University in Montreal and national security studies from the National Defense University( NDU) in Washington, D. C.
“ McGill and NDU are fantastic institutions, but I would have attended WVU for all of my formal education if I could have,” he says.“ I’ m a Mountaineer through and through. My wife and I are from southwest Pennsylvania, about 25 miles from Morgantown. We’ re both Mountaineers, and we’ ll always be Mountaineers.” •
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