Knud Bartels

Knud Bartels (8 April 1952 in Copenhagen) is a Danish general.

Bartels was the Danish Chief of Defence and was appointed on 16 November 2009 (announced on 10 November). He succeeded admiral Tim Sloth Jørgensen who resigned after being involved in the controversy around a fake Arabic translation of Jæger – i krig med eliten, a book by a former special forces soldier which he tried to suppress.

Chair of NATO's Military Committee
As chief of Defence (CHOD) and Denmark's former Permanent Representative on NATO's Military Committee, General Bartels was Denmark's candidate for the post as Chairman of NATO's Military Committee. The new chairman succeeded Admiral Giampaolo Di Paola (Italian Navy) on 1 July 2012. General Bartels' tenure as chief of defence was due to expire on 30 April 2012.

Although other Chiefs of Defense were considered for the top NATO job, in the final week before the vote the other candidates - as is the custom - sensing a lack of majority support for their own candidacy, withdrew from consideration so that the election of General Bartels could be unanimous when the Committee met to vote on Saturday 17 September 2011. The new chairman is appointed for a 3-year term, near the end of which he is normally approved for a one-year extension (serving a total of 4 years as chairman.)

Upon his election on 17 September 2011, General Bartels announced that he planned to step-down as Danish CHOD on 30 April 2012 in order to prepare to take over as NATO Chairman effective 1 July 2012. However, following the resignation of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi on 12 November 2011, Italy's new Prime Minister, Mario Monti, announced on 16 November that he had appointed Admiral Di Paola as Italy's new Defense Minister: at the time of this announcement, Admiral Di Paola was in Kabul, Afghanistan on NATO business. The admiral resigned as NATO Chairman on 18 November, turning over to his deputy Lieutenant General Walter Gaskin (U.S. Marine Corps), and flew to Rome. It was then announced that General Bartels would take over in Brussels on 2 January 2012, even though the new Danish government had not yet selected his replacement as Danish chief of defense.