Lord George Robertson

Senior Counselor

grobertson@cohengroup.net

Lead, UK Strategic Defence Review (2024–2025)
Secretary General, NATO (1999–2003)
Secretary of State for Defence, UK (1997–1999)
Member, House of Commons, UK (1978–1999)

In 2003, the Right Honorable Lord George Robertson of Port Ellen completed a stellar career in public service, culminating at the highest levels of the Government of the United Kingdom and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). He joined The Cohen Group as a Senior Counselor in April 2004, advising and assisting our clients globally.

In 2024, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer named him to lead the Strategic Defence Review, for which he was on a one-year leave of absence from The Cohen Group. In this role, he headed the Strategic Defence Review with General Sir Richard Barrons and Dr. Fiona Hill. The Review provides the first comprehensive review of UK Defence in 25 years and has been praised as a serious overhaul for deterrence and defence in an increasingly complex security landscape. 

Lord Robertson began his career as an official of the General, Municipal and Boilermakers' Union, responsible for the Scottish Whisky industry in 1968. After a decade of service, he was elected as a Labor Party representative to the House of Commons for Hamilton and Hamilton South at the age of 32. He earned a reputation as a focused and committed public servant, resulting in his five-time reelection. His service and leadership during the Maastricht Treaty ratification merited his selection as joint Parliamentarian of the Year in 1993. He was elected to the Shadow Cabinet and served as Principal Opposition Spokesman on Scotland (Shadow Secretary of State for Scotland).

After the 1997 UK general election, Prime Minister Blair named Lord Robertson as Secretary of State for Defence. During his tenure, he led the UK's active and crucial military role in the Kosovo conflict. He also drove a highly regarded series of reforms and modernizations of British forces during his tenure and managed the UK participation in East Timor and in Operation Desert Fox.

In 1999, Lord Robertson was invited to serve as the tenth Secretary General of NATO and Chairman of the North Atlantic Council. In the four turbulent years that followed, he presided over the dramatic restructuring and enlargement of the Alliance to Central and Eastern Europe. He was the first leader of NATO to invoke the Article V mutual defense provision, responding to the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States. He oversaw the involvement of NATO in Afghanistan, managed the question of providing Turkey with defense assets as the war in Iraq approached, and helped to broker an end to the armed conflict within Macedonia in 2001 through the use of NATO peacekeepers.

In 2003, President George W. Bush presented Lord Robertson with the US Presidential Medal of Freedom, America's highest civilian honor rarely presented to foreign nationals. In 2004, he received one of Britain's highest awards, the Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George. In 2005, he was made one of the Knights of the Thistle, chosen personally by Her Majesty The Queen, the highest honor in the UK. He has the highest national honors from several countries, including Italy, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Poland, the Netherlands. Since 1997, he has served as a member of Her Majesty's Privy Council.

He was Joint President of Chatham House for a decade and currently serves on its Panel of Senior Advisors and its North American Committee. He is an Elder Brother of Trinity House, on the Councils of the European Council on Foreign Affairs and the International Institute of Strategic Studies. He is a Prime Ministerial appointee to the World War One Commemoration Advisory Board, a Trustee of the Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Trust, and on the Board of the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo. He is Honorary Regimental Colonel of the London Scottish Regiment.

Lord Robertson was born in the village police station in Port Ellen, Isle of Islay, Scotland. He attended the University of Dundee and received a Masters Degree with honors in economics in 1968. He has been awarded Honorary Doctorates by the Universities of Dundee and Bradford, St Andrews, Glasgow Caledonian, Lincoln, Robert Gordon University, Stirling, Cranfield University (Royal Military College of Science), Baku State University of Azerbaijan, the Academy of Science of the Kyrgyzstan Republic, European University of Armenia, and the Romanian National School of Political and Administrative Studies in Bucharest. He is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. He resides in Scotland and London.