Charles Metrolis

Charles Metrolis is a senior aerospace and defense leader with over four decades of operational, strategic and executive experience across NATO, allied governments and industry. He is a former USAF Colonel, diplomat, combat fighter pilot, Combat Rescue Officer and Pararescueman. Since leaving military service, he has operated at board and executive levels as Boeing’s sole trusted advisor to EUCOM, AFRICOM and NATO-aligned governments, specializing in air and space power, autonomy, ISR, advanced training and future combat air systems. He combines strategic vision, political acuity and operational credibility with extensive experience engaging NATO and allied national defense stakeholders.

Metrolis served 40 years in the USAF, retiring as a Colonel. He began his career as a Pararescueman with the 39th Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Wing at Myrtle Beach Air Force Base, S.C. He subsequently received his commission, attended pilot training and served as an F-15C command pilot, instructor and evaluator at Bitburg Air Base Germany; RAF Lakenheath, United Kingdom; and Langley Air Force Base, Va. He was selected to fly the Mirage 2000 for the French Air Force at Cambrai Air Base, France, then attended professional military education and served as a staff officer at Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska. Metrolis then became one of the first Air Force combat rescue officers and was a two-time squadron commander of the Air Force’s elite rescue squadrons during the Global War on Terror. He then served an unprecedented three consecutive diplomatic assignments as U.S. Defense and Air Attachés in Europe’s most high-profile embassies in Paris, Stockholm and London.