Robert C. Kingston

General Robert C. Kingston, 1984.

Robert Charles Kingston (born July 16, 1928 , † February 28, 2007 in Alexandria , Virginia ) was a general in the US Army and from 1983 to 1985 the first commander of the US Central Command in charge of the Middle East .

Military career

Kingston joined the US Army in November 1948 as a soldier . The following year, however, he graduated from the Officer Candidate School at Fort Riley , Kansas , and received his officer license as a second lieutenant in the infantry on December 20, 1949 . He commanded troops at every level from platoon to brigade .

In 1970 he was transferred to the US Army Headquarters in Washington, DC , where he served as Assistant Secretary of the General Staff in the office of the Chief of Staff of the Army , General William C. Westmoreland . In June 1972, it was used abroad in South Vietnam during the Vietnam War . Kingston was promoted to Brigadier General and served as the deputy commanding general of the Second Regional Assistance Command of the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam and as the deputy senior advisor to the II Corps and Military Region 2 . In January 1973, Kingston took command of the Joint Casualty Resolution Center in Nakhon Phanim , Thailand . On his return to the United States in 1974, he took over the post of assistant division commander of the 1st US Infantry Division and was promoted to major general in September 1975 . In the same year he took over command of the US Army John F. Kennedy Center for Military Assistance / US Army Institute for Military Assistance in Fort Bragg , North Carolina . In June 1979 he left Fort Bragg to take command of the 2nd US Infantry Division in Dongducheon , South Korea , until June 1981 .

In 1981 Kingston was promoted to Lieutenant General and took command of the Rapid Deployment Joint Task Force at MacDill Air Force Base , Florida . This command was regrouped in 1983 and is an independent Unified Combatant Command and has been called US Central Command since then . Kingston was therefore promoted to general on November 6, 1984 and held the command for another year, until he handed it over to General George B. Crist on November 27, 1985 and retired shortly afterwards.

Kingston's wife Josephine Cody "Jo" Kingston, with whom he was married for 36 years, died in 1992. They had two children, a son and a daughter.

General Robert Charles Kingston died of a fall on February 28, 2007 at the age of 78 in Alexandria , Virginia .

Selection of decorations, sorted based on the Order of Precedence of Military Awards :

personal data
SURNAME	Kingston, Robert C.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Kingston, Robert Charles
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	American general, first in command of US Central Command
DATE OF BIRTH	July 16, 1928
DATE OF DEATH	February 28, 2007
Place of death	Alexandria , Virginia