Celebrating 135 years as the nation's oldest continuously serving intelligence agency, former Office of Naval Intelligence commanders and senior intelligence leaders came together at the National Maritime Intelligence Center for a ceremonial cake-cutting, awards ceremony and a history lesson from its present commander.

"It's a great Navy day because we get to come together and I get to talk about two of my favorite things," ONI Commander Rear Adm. Robert Sharp said at the March 23 ceremony. "First we get to talk about naval intelligence ... and then we get to talk about some of our fantastic people."

Sharp recalled when ONI's first chief intelligence officer championed creating an organization to collect information on the latest technological developments from the world's leading naval powers in order to modernize the American navy.

"As we face today's challenges, it's really important that we look at who we are, who we've been and what makes us strong," he said.

He talked about the devastation caused by the Civil War and the lack of money available for the U.S. Navy in the two decades that followed.

"We are a maritime nation at heart," Sharp said. "We rely on global trade. One small part of our effort to rebuild our Navy was to stand up an Office of Naval Intelligence."
He described how ONI's missions and workforce evolved, expanded, and reorganized within the context of changing security imperatives in war and peace.

"The world constantly changes and we throughout our history have constantly changed," he said. "We have constantly transformed and evolved into what our navy and nation needed to be at that time."
He said ONI's sustained success was, and is, derived from the attributes of its talented and diverse civilian and military workforce.

"I am just amazed each and every day when I look at the schedule and I look where some of our analysts are being asked to go," he said. "Support over in the Pentagon informing decisions, over in the White House informing decisions, over in Congress talking about what the challenges are and what we need to be building for the future."

On any given day, he said, we are deployed globally. "We are on ships, we are ashore, we have people doing important things in important places."

Joining in on the celebration at ONI headquarters in Suitland, Maryland, were retired former ONI commanding officers Rear Adm. Tony Cothron, Rear Adm. Samuel Cox and former Directors of Naval Intelligence Rear Adm. Thomas Brooks and Rear Adm. Richard Porterfield. Adm. (Sel) Michael Studeman, former ONI's Hopper Information Services Center commanding officer, was also recognized.

"It's just tremendous having you join the wardroom, Mike, and we look forward to the great things you do and it is great to have an ONI alum and a former CO of one of our centers leading the future of Naval Intelligence." Sharp's remarks were followed by the traditional awards ceremony recognizing the outstanding contributions of ONI military and civilian personnel.