A native of Illinois, Colonel Ed Sullivan was commissioned in 1994 through the NROTC federal scholarship program from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Colonel Sullivan’s command assignments include Motor Transport Maintenance Company Commander, 1st Maintenance Bn; Commander, Marine Detachment Monterey, CA; and Commanding Officer, 2d Intelligence Battalion, II Marine Expeditionary Force.
Staff assignments include various logistics billets within 1st Marine Air Wing at Marine Corps Air Station Futenma, Japan; Operations Officer, Headquarters and Services Battalion, 1st Force Service Support Group, Aide de Camp to Commanding General, 1st FSSG, and Operations Officer, 1st Maintenance Battalion. Following designation as a Middle Eastern Foreign Area Officer (FAO) he served with Regimental Combat Team 1 as a FAO in Fallujah, Iraq 2004; with 2d Marine Division G2 in Ramadi, Iraq in 2005; and following a lateral move to Intelligence in late 2005, he served as the senior intelligence analyst for the Marine Corps in the Tactical Fusion Center, Fallujah, Iraq in 2007/2008. After joining Defense Intelligence Agency in 2008, he served as the US Naval Attaché to the Sultanate of Oman from 2008-2011. Following Top Level School he served as Assessment Director for all C4ISR systems for US Special Forces, from within SOCOM J-8. 2018/2019 returned him to the Middle East as the Deputy Intelligence Officer for Combined Joint Task Force – Operation Inherent Resolve (CJTF-OIR)(the counter ISIS fight in Iraq and Syria) before reporting as the Senior Intelligence Officer for 3d Marine Air Wing in summer 2019.
Colonel Sullivan holds a B.S. in Teaching from the University of Illinois; a Master’s in Regional Security Studies (Middle East) from the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey; and a Master’s in Strategic Studies from the US Army War College at Carlisle, PA. As part of his FAO designation, he also completed 18 months of intensive Arabic Language training at the Defense Language Institute in Monterey before completing a 12-month Middle East immersion experience based out of Cairo, Egypt which saw him traveling alone throughout much of the Middle East and East Africa. A distinguished graduate of the Army War College his units have also twice received the “Intelligence Unit of the Year” award for his work with 2d Intelligence Battalion in 2013 and 3d MAW G2 in 2020.
His personal awards include the Legion of Merit, Defense Superior Service Medal, Bronze Star, (2) Defense Meritorious Service Medals, (2) Meritorious Service Medals, (3) Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medals (one with V), Combat Action Ribbon, Navy Achievement Medal, (6) Sea Service Deployment Ribbons, (2) Overseas Service Ribbons and various unit awards.