Constantine "Dean" Pappas,  Colonel, USAF, Founder Air Force Wging Center

In 1979, Colonel Pappas joined the Air War College faculty as Chief of Wargaming; and in 1981 he became Director of the Air Force Wargaming Center and Program Manager for the Command Readiness Exercise System (CRES), AU Center for Aerospace Doctrine, Research, and Education. He devoted the remaining 8 years of his military career to the development and implementation of the Air Force Wargaming Center. In 1987, he received the Hoyt S. Vandenberg Award, the Air Force Association's highest honor in the field of Aerospace education, "for his initiative and vision in creating, and his sustained effort to implement the Air Force Wargaming Center, widely acclaimed as the best war fighting, decision making laboratory available in the free world". Colonel Pappas' decorations include the Meritorious Service Medal with one Oak Leaf Cluster and the Air Medal with four Oak Leaf Clusters.

He was born 10 November 1936 in Chicago, Illinois. In 1960, he was graduated from New Mexico State University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Physics and received a commission through the Air Force ROTC. After reporting for active duty, he completed pilot training and became an instructor pilot in the T-37 and T-38. He was a Distinguished Graduate of the Academic Instructor School at Randolph AFB, Texas Base. In 1967, he served the United States as a fighter pilot in Vietnam where he flew 59 combat missions. Other accomplishments in aviation include Chief of Flight Test and Chief of Aircraft Maintenance Quality Control at the Air Defense Weapons Center, Tyndall AFB, Florida. Colonel Pappas has logged over 3,000 flying hours. In 1973 he received a Master of Science degree in Industrial Engineering from the University of Alabama. A Distinguished Graduate of the Air Command and Staff College, he became the Chief of the Educational Computer Science Division and completed a Master's degree in Business Administration from Auburn University at Montgomery.  After founding the Air Force Wargaming Center he retired as a full Colonel from his 28-year career in the USAF, he chose to enter the private business sector in high technology. In 2005, he retired from Hewlett-Packard as The Americas Consulting and Integration Project Management Office (PMO) Manager.

Colonel Pappas passed away on October 28, 2005, at his home in the loving care of his family.

(Last Updated 30 Sept 2011.)

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