Brigadier General Dr. Tomasz Kowalik

Deputy Chief of Staff for Security, Multinational Corps Northeast

Brigadier General Tomasz Kowalik, PhD – born on 10 March 1974 in Gdańsk – joined the Polish Armed Forces in 1993 and was promoted to second lieutenant in 1998. and began his professional military career in 1999 as commander of an assault platoon in the 7th Battalion of the 25th Air Cavalry Brigade in Tomaszów Mazowiecki.

In 2000-2002, he served as a specialist in the Department of Science and Military Education of the Ministry of National Defence (MON), where he was involved in the reform of the military education system and was a member of the Central Foreign Language Examination Board. For the next four years, he served in the Secretariat of the Secretary of State – First Deputy Minister of National Defence and National Director for Armaments, dealing with international affairs. In 2006, he was appointed senior specialist in the J-5 Strategic Planning Directorate at the General Staff of the Polish Army. Between 2008 and 2012, he served as military assistant to two Chiefs of the General Staff of the Polish Armed Forces. Subsequently, between 2012 and 2015, he was seconded to NATO Headquarters in Brussels, serving as special assistant to the Chairman of the NATO Military Committee.

From 2016 to 2019, he was Director of the Department of Military Foreign Affairs at the Ministry of National Defence, supervising, among other things, bilateral relations and Polish defence attachés. From 2020 to 2021, he served at the Armed Forces Operational Command, where he was Deputy Chief of Staff for Support (DCOS Support). After his appointment in March 2021 to the rank of Brigadier General, he was assigned to the Multinational Corps Northeast Eastern Corps in Szczecin, where he took up the position of Deputy Chief of Staff for Support (DCOS Support), overseeing matters related to the Corps' resources, logistics and communications, including the J1, J4, J6, J8 and JMED support departments. General Kowalik is a graduate of the Józef Bem Military Academy in Toruń. He holds a bachelor's degree in political science from the United States Military Academy at West Point and a master's and doctorate in education from the Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin. He also completed postgraduate studies in National Security at the University of Warsaw and postgraduate studies in Defence Policy at the National Defence Academy in Warsaw.

He completed specialist training at the U.S. Army Air Assault School in Tomaszów Mazowiecki in parachute jumping and a course in case study teaching at the International Faculty Development Programme at the IESE Business School in Barcelona. He also participated in NATO Staff Officer Orientation, Senior Officer Policy, Resources Management Education Programme (RMEP) and NATO Logistics Operations Course (NLOC) at the NATO School in Oberammergau, as well as the Generals, Flag Officers and Ambassadors' Course at the NATO Defence College in Rome. He also completed the Top Public Executive Course at the National School of Public Administration (KSAP) and IESE Business School, the European Security Seminar – North (ESS-N) at the George C. Marshall Centre in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, and the Senior Leaders' Course at the Baltic Defence Academy. General Kowalik is the author of three books and dozens of articles on NATO, international security, military affairs and military education, and English idioms published both in Poland and abroad. He also occasionally teaches classes for various audiences, including lectures in English on the history of Polish arms. He is fluent in English and German (both at level 4) and French (level 2+). He is married to Izabela and they have three children. Throughout his school and university years, Brigadier General Tomasz Kowalik was involved in competitive sports: basketball, handball, table tennis, racquetball, orienteering and long-distance running.

Currently, he limits his activity to running, swimming and playing table tennis. His hobbies include military history, international relations and collecting miniature soldiers. He has been awarded the Silver Cross of Merit, the Military Cross of Merit, the Medal for Long Service (3rd class), the Medal for Merit to National Defence (1st class), the Armed Forces Medal (2nd class), the General Staff Centenary Medal, and the Blessed Father Jerzy Popiełuszko Medal. His foreign decorations include the French Ordre National du Mérite (chevalier), the Lithuanian Medal of Merit of the National Defence System, the German Ehrenkreuz der Bundeswehr (silver) and the Estonian Cross of Merit of the Air Force (2nd class).