About us

Byron “Chris” Pateras was born on 3 February 1973 in Fort Myers Florida into a government family. His grandfather served 20 years in the Navy and 20 more in the FBI. His mother and father are both retired CIA personnel with 34 years of service. Chris has 30 years of Special Operations experience. Chris Pateras began his military career in 1990 as an Infantryman with the 3rd Battalion 75th Ranger Regiment, rose to the rank of Sergeant and was commissioned through The Citadel ROTC program on 12 May 1998 as an Infantry Officer.

Most recently, Chris has served as the United States Special Operations Command Joint Task Force – Special Reconnaissance and Enabling Command’s Strategic Effects Director. In this Flag Officer-level staff director position, he is responsible for globally synchronizing, integrating, enabling, and selectively employing US Special Operations Command capabilities to generate options for the Joint Force. Chris leads a 72-member joint Special Operations Forces, multi-domain, multi-discipline Uniformed Service Member and Civilian directorate that develops Special Operations Forces operational campaign framework, prioritized application of Special Operations Forces toward National-level, trans-regional priorities, synchronize and integrate Special Operations Forces operations with Interagency and Department of Defense-level mission partners resulting in trans-regional coherency of Special Operations and awareness for United States Special Operations Command.

Prior to arriving to SOCOM Chris was selected by the G-2 of the Army as the Senior Defense Official & Defense Attaché (SDO/DATT) to Honduras. Chris served as the personal representative of the Secretary of Defense, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Commander of U.S. Southern Command to the HonduranPresident, Minister of Defense, Vice Minister of Defense, and Chief of Defense in a senior diplomatic capacity. Prior to Honduras Chris was selected in the top 30 percent of all COL’s selected for War College. He was selected as a Army War College Fellow to the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Chris was selected by the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence to serve as the Senior Military Officer on an Intelligence Committee team at the CIA focused on an in-depth understanding of Asia. He constructed a framework for a worldwide strategic vision focused on aggressive identification of operational resources to create a plan forced on Asia for the next 10 to 15 years.

Chris’s previous Special Forces assignments include Chief of Staff on the Army Staff to the G-3/5/7 in the Pentagon, ODA Commander in 1st Battalion 7th Special Forces Group, and has served multiple tours as an advisor in Ecuador and Colombia.

Chris is fluent in 4 languages, is passionate about ultramarathons, ironman, and Brazilian jiujitsu.