Ian Platz has a thriving career in defense and antiterrorism initiatives. He says it wouldn’t have happened without a unique Missouri State school and an internship facilitated by a faculty member.

At 2 a.m. one night in February 2024, Ian Platz was in his hotel room in Ukraine when his phone alerted him to suspected drone and rocket strikes from the Russian military.

Jumping up from his bed in the darkness, he grabbed his two most important items: his American passport and a faded maroon tote, with the letters peeling off and a faint outline of a bear. It was from the Missouri State Bookstore, and once held heavy textbooks.

Now, it had his phone charger, journal and a tactical medicine kit. The tote had been with him at every class on campus, and was now with him in every war zone he entered and border crossing he made.

“I always liked bringing Missouri State with me,” he said.

He scurried to the basement to meet his colleagues. As he waited for the barrage to end, he sent a text to his wife telling her he was OK.

Platz, ’11 & ’13, has been in national security for more than a decade. He has worked in irregular warfare (conflicts in which combatants are not regular military forces), strategic communications, security cooperation and defense governance. His work has taken him to Europe, the Horn of Africa and beyond.

Looking back, Platz sees a life that still feels a little improbable. What began in southwest Missouri became a career engaging in some of the hardest security challenges of the past decade, often at close range. Platz says his Missouri State mentors helped make that life possible.

TWO BEARS MARRY, THEN START THEIR NEXT STEPS IN D.C.
Platz, who grew up between Buffalo, Missouri, and Springfield, was interested by foreign policy when he was younger, but it seemed like a distant prospect.

While working part time at a retail store to help pay for school, he met his future wife, Allison Ackland-Coletta ’11. She was pursuing education. Her sense of purpose and commitment to serving others left a deep impression on him.

He decided to earn a bachelor’s degree in education. But as graduation approached, Platz began seriously considering what might come next.

That’s when he learned about Missouri State’s School of Defense and Strategic Studies, or DSS, located near Washington, D.C. It offered something he had not seen before: a direct path from the Ozarks to the heart of national security policy.

He and Allison married and moved to Virginia, where he began his studies and she was an elementary art teacher.

“We made some big sacrifices to get Ian to D.C., but I knew it would be worth it if he was doing something he truly enjoyed,” Ackland-Coletta said. “I was lucky enough to discover my calling in college, and it felt important that Ian would have an opportunity to find his.”

FACULTY CONNECTIONS OPENED DOORS FOR HIS FUTURE
Retired Army Brigadier Gen. John P. Rose, then-director of DSS, stressed the importance of internships and professional connections for students hoping to build careers in national security.

For Platz, that guidance mattered. He had no existing ties to D.C. or the broader U.S. national security enterprise, and the transition felt daunting. At DSS, though, faculty helped bridge that gap. Rose played a key role. After Platz expressed an interest in Africa, Rose personally drove him to the National Defense University
for an interview with the Africa Center for Strategic Studies at Fort McNair in D.C.

“I met with them, hit it off,” he said. “I ended up doing 10 months there as an intern. That opened me up to a State Department internship. Then, that opened up working in the Secretary of Defense office. It really came about because Rose facilitated the meeting. It’s hard to get into a lot of these places without name recognition.”

HE’S COUNTERED TERRORISM WITH AGENCIES AROUND THE WORLD
After graduation, Platz was recruited almost immediately to go to Booz Allen, a management and technology consulting firm that serves U.S. defense and intelligence agencies.

He later joined the State Department’s Bureau of African Affairs, where he worked on military assistance and security cooperation across Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda and Somalia. Much of the work focused on aviation assistance. It’s an often overlooked but essential element of security in a region where distance and terrain can define what governments are able to do, Platz said. The job meant travel to remote locations and direct engagement with partner forces.

“East Africa sits along one of the world’s most important strategic corridors,” Platz said. “Security there shapes access to the Indian Ocean, the movement of commercial shipping, regional stability and the ability of partners to respond to threats that can spill across borders. At the time, piracy was also a major concern, which only reinforced the importance of maritime and regional security.”

He later moved to the U.S. Bureau of Counterterrorism. Platz helped partner governments investigate terrorist networks, coordinate intelligence, build cases and prosecute terrorists through their own legal systems.

Platz played a role in shaping the State Department’s support for Kenya’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, working with the U.S. Embassy in Kenya, the FBI and the Kenya Anti-Terrorism Police Unit.

The Kenyan-led task force began producing investigations, cases and arrests tied to terrorist activity in Kenya and internationally. His work also extended into detention and prison rehabilitation, reflecting the broader challenge of building durable counterterrorism systems.

MOVING BACK TO D.C. FOR PEACEBUILDING JOB
Around that time, with their first child on the way, Platz and his wife were ready for him to stay closer to home.

He joined the United States Institute of Peace, a congressionally established, nonpartisan organization. His work reflected a broader shift in national security itself, from security cooperation and counterterrorism toward questions of resilience, resistance and the strength of partners’ defense industrial bases.

He oversaw a wide range of work across Europe, Asia and Africa, helping translate complex security challenges into research and recommendations for policymakers.

Among the most significant pieces of that work was a sustained research and engagement effort on Ukraine’s defense sector. He led initiatives focused on emerging technology, irregular warfare and the wider question of how the United States and its partners prepare for a new era of conflict.

While working at the institute, Platz was named to the Aspen Security Forum’s Rising Leaders program, a selective year-long initiative. He spent three years as a senior program officer for security sector governance and reform before that chapter was abruptly interrupted in 2025, when the institute was temporarily shuttered amid a legal fight that remains unresolved.

Today, he serves as chief communications officer for the Irregular Warfare Initiative. It is a leading nonprofit focused on irregular warfare and contemporary conflict. He helps shape their voice and strategic messaging. Platz also recently stepped into a full-time role supporting the United States Air Force.

He and his wife live in Arlington, Virginia, with their two children, Malcolm, 4, and Cameron, 18 months. Even now, one of the old Missouri State totes remains in the mix. Ackland-Coletta still laughs about the time one of the many maroon bags went through the wash and turned Ian’s white undershirts pink.

He kept the shirts — and, of course, the tote.

WHY IS A MISSOURI STATE SCHOOL LOCATED IN WASHINGTON, D.C.?
About the School of Defense and Strategic Studies

The School of Defense and Strategic Studies, or DSS, was established in 1971 by Dr. William R. Van Cleave, a political scientist and advisor to President Ronald Reagan.

He started it as part of the University of Southern California.

He moved it to Missouri State in 1987 when he was appointed as a professor in the then-SMSU interdisciplinary studies program.

In 2005, DSS relocated classes to Virginia under the leadership of Dr. Keith Payne. It was now part of the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area and could take advantage of resources near the nation’s capital.

Payne started out with roughly 35 students. DSS has grown to more than 300 students from around the world.

DSS offers doctoral and master’s programs. The student body is diverse, with a mix of traditional students, mid-career professionals and active-duty military. All programs are offered 100% online. Students can also take seated classes, or a hybrid of seated/online classes.

Dr. John P. Rose, a retired Army brigadier general, has been the department head since 2020. He is retiring this July.

The new department head will be Dr. Christopher Ford. A Rhodes Scholar with degrees from Harvard (summa cum laude), Oxford and Yale, Ford has been a professor with DSS since 2023.