Rear-Admiral J.R. (Bob) Auchterlonie
Rear-Admiral - OMM CD - Commander Maritime Forces Pacific / Joint Task Force Pacific
Inducted March 7, 2020
Comox Valley Walk of Achievement is pleased to announce the induction Rear-Admiral J.R. (Bob) Auchterlonie, OMM CD / Commander Maritime Forces Pacific / Joint Task Force Pacific
Rear-Admiral Bob Auchterlonie was born in Cumberland, British Columbia in 1969. His family has strong ties with the history of Cumberland and the Comox Valley; the family Bakery established in the early 1920’s has remained a fixture in Cumberland for the past century and, on his maternal side, his grandfather worked with Canadian Collieries (Dunsmuir) Ltd. for decades before retiring. Bob spent his youth in the Valley playing every sport available, riding bikes and motorcycles on the former mining spurs in the mountains surrounding Cumberland or spending time in the rivers, lakes and ocean that surround the Comox Valley. He attended both Cumberland Elementary and Cumberland Junior and graduated from George P. Vanier Secondary in 1987. He entered the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) upon graduation from High School as an ROTP cadet and graduated from the Royal Military College of Canada in 1991 with a BA in Economics and as Captain of the Varsity Hockey Team.
Since his commissioning in the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN), RAdm Auchterlonie has seen the world! He has spent time in every province and territory in Canada, sailed in every ocean around the globe and touched every continent. Operationally, RAdm Auchterlonie completed his Naval Warfare Officer training in 1992 and was fortunate to spend the bulk of the next two decades at sea in Her Majesty’s Canadian Ships in both the Pacific and Atlantic Fleets. He has spent considerable time in our local BC waters and has deployed five separate times to the Indo-Asia Pacific Region engaging with all of our partner nations.
RAdm Auchterlonie has commanded ships and formations within the RCN and CAF at every senior rank level. He had the honour to Command HMCS FREDERICTON (2007-2009) as a Commander, CFB Esquimalt (2012-2013) as Captain(N), the Canadian Pacific Fleet (2013-2015) as Commodore and Maritime Forces Pacific / Joint Task Force Pacific (2018-2020) as Rear-Admiral. He has also been fortunate to serve in senior Joint command appointments including as Deputy Commander of Canadian Joint Operations Command (2016-2018) and Deputy Commander of the Coalition Combined Joint Task Force RIMPAC in 2018.
RAdm Auchterlonie has spent his share of time in Ottawa serving 4 tours in NDHQ; namely as a Staff Officer within the Naval Staff, as Director within VCDS Chief of Programme, as Director General within the Strategic Joint Staff and as Deputy Commander Canadian Joint Operations Command.
RAdm Auchterlonie’s career has enabled lifelong learning. He is a graduate of the Canadian Forces Command and Staff College, the Naval Command College at the US Naval War College and has completed a Master’s Degree in Defence Studies (MDS) at the Royal Military College of Canada. He is also a graduate of the Senior Executives in National and International Security program at Harvard University (2016), a fellow of the US GOFO Capstone (2016) and Pinnacle (2019) Programs and is an alumni of both the Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies (2018) and Near East Centre for Security Studies at National Defence University (2019). He was invested as an Officer of the Order of Military Merit in 2013.
Remarkably, RAdm Auchterlonie is still married to his very supportive and understanding first wife Tammy and they have managed to raise two well-travelled, reasonably well adjusted and exceptional young men, Michael and Fraser. Bob used to golf, play hockey and spend time on his boat and will return to those activities when he retires back in the Valley.
