Ronald S. Moultrie was the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence and Security from June 2021 through February 2024, placing him over the Defense Department intelligence and security enterprise during the creation of AOIMSG and AARO.123
His UAP significance is institutional rather than testimonial: he helped move the subject from a Navy-led task force into a formal Defense Department office with defined reporting, analysis, and oversight duties.4567
Defense Intelligence Role
The Senate confirmed Moultrie as Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence and Security on 28 May 2021, and the Defense Department states that he was sworn in on 1 June 2021.12 In that role, he served as the principal intelligence, counterintelligence, and security advisor to the Secretary of Defense, with authority over major defense intelligence organizations including NSA, DIA, NGA, NRO, DCSA, and the intelligence components of combatant commands and the military services.2
The Defense Department biography also records that Moultrie was dual-hatted as Director of Defense Intelligence in ODNI, which made his office a bridge between DoD and the wider Intelligence Community for issues requiring shared collection and analysis.2 Secretary Lloyd Austin later said Moultrie would step down at the end of February 2024 after nearly three years in the position and 44 years of public service.3
AOIMSG Establishment
On 23 November 2021, Deputy Secretary Kathleen Hicks directed the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence and Security to establish the Airborne Object Identification and Management Synchronization Group, known as AOIMSG, inside OUSD(I&S).5 The Defense Department described AOIMSG as the successor to the Navy-led UAP Task Force, with a mission to synchronize detection, identification, attribution, and threat mitigation for objects of interest in special use airspace.5
The same announcement directed the USD(I&S) to lead an Airborne Object Identification and Management Executive Council, or AOIMEXEC, giving Moultrie's office oversight responsibility for the new structure.5 The stated purpose was practical and security-focused: improve processes, policies, technologies, and training for reports near DoD ranges and installations after the June 2021 ODNI UAP assessment identified gaps.5
May 2022 UAP Hearing
Moultrie appeared with Deputy Director of Naval Intelligence Scott Bray before the House Intelligence Subcommittee on Counterterrorism, Counterintelligence, and Counterproliferation on 17 May 2022, during the first open congressional UAP hearing in more than fifty years.4 His prepared statement emphasized that service members had encountered UAP, that such reports could raise flight-safety and security risks, and that DoD wanted to determine their origins while protecting sensitive sources and methods.4
During questioning, Moultrie said AOIMSG was being stood up, that a director had been selected, workspace had been identified, and DoD and Intelligence Community personnel were working toward a standardized methodology for bringing in and analyzing data.4 He also framed unresolved cases mainly as a data problem, noting that insufficient event, object, or cross-agency data limited attribution in many cases.4
AARO Transition
On 15 July 2022, Hicks amended the original AOIMSG direction to establish the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, or AARO, because the FY 2022 NDAA required a broader office than AOIMSG had been designed to provide.67 The Defense Department announced the change on 20 July 2022 and stated that Moultrie informed the department of AARO's establishment within OUSD(I&S), naming Sean Kirkpatrick as AARO director.7
AARO broadened the focus from airborne objects in special use airspace to anomalous objects in, on, or near military installations, operating areas, training areas, special use airspace, and other areas of interest, including space, airborne, submerged, and transmedium objects.67 The AARO Executive Council, led by Moultrie as USD(I&S), was assigned oversight across surveillance, reporting, system capabilities, intelligence analysis, mitigation, governance, science, and technology.7
Reporting Process Role
The 2022 ODNI annual UAP report states that AARO became operational under USD(I&S) in July 2022 as the single DoD focal point for UAP efforts, leading whole-of-government coordination for collection, reporting, and analysis.8 The same report summarized the FY 2022 NDAA duties requiring standardized procedures, a centralized repository, timely reporting, threat evaluation, interagency coordination, ally coordination, and reports to Congress.8
At a December 2022 Defense Department media roundtable, Moultrie said DoD had established mechanisms to receive current reports near bases, installations, and across domains, and that AARO was cataloging and analyzing incoming incidents.9 Kirkpatrick credited Moultrie for leadership in establishing AARO, and described the office as expanding, standardizing, and integrating UAP reporting after receiving the UAP Task Force data and responsibilities.9
Assessment
Moultrie's record supports a conservative assessment: he was a senior official who formalized UAP intake, analysis, and reporting, not a public claimant of extraordinary conclusions.489 In the 2022 hearing and later media roundtable, he treated UAP as a safety, intelligence, and operational security problem, while repeatedly pointing to data quality, source protection, and interagency deconfliction as the hard parts of the work.49
He also publicly rejected stronger interpretations not supported by the materials he had seen, saying in December 2022 that AARO had not found evidence then of alien origin, alien visitation, or an alien crash in reviewed holdings.9 On the available official record, his importance is that he helped build the bureaucratic machinery for future UAP accountability, while keeping the department's public posture disciplined, cautious, and evidence-bound.56789