David Manning

Sir David Manning GCMG KCVO
Sir David Manning during an interview with Donald Rumsfeld and Jack Straw, on 9 May 2005.
British Ambassador to the United States
In office 2003–2007
Monarch	Elizabeth II
President	George W Bush
Prime Minister	Tony Blair Gordon Brown
Preceded by	Christopher Meyer
Succeeded by	Nigel Sheinwald
UK Permanent Representative on the North Atlantic Council
In office 2001–2001
Prime Minister	Tony Blair
Preceded by	Sir John Goulden
Succeeded by	Sir Emyr Jones Parry
British Ambassador to Israel
In office 1995–1998
Prime Minister	John Major Tony Blair
Preceded by	Robert Andrew Burns
Succeeded by	Francis Cornish
Personal details
Born	(1949-12-05) 5 December 1949 (age 67)
Alma mater	Oriel College, Oxford Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies

Sir David Geoffrey Manning, GCMG, KCVO (born 5 December 1949) is a former British diplomat, who was the British Ambassador to the United States from 2003 to 2007. He authored the so-called "Manning Memo" summarising the details of a January 2003 meeting between American president George W. Bush and British prime minister Tony Blair during the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. He has since been appointed to the Household of TRH The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and Prince Harry.

Manning was educated at Ardingly College and went on to study at Oriel College, Oxford, and at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies of the Johns Hopkins University. He began his career as a civil servant in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) in 1972. He has served in UK Embassies in Warsaw, New Delhi, Paris, and Moscow, and within the FCO he has worked on the Central American desk, the Russian desk and held several senior positions. He has represented the UK in Brussels and also at the International Conference on the former Yugoslavia in 1994.

Between 1995 and 1998, he was British Ambassador to Israel; from 2001, he was a foreign policy adviser to British Prime Minister Tony Blair. During this time he developed a close relationship with his counterpart, then US National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice. Blair selected him to replace Christopher Meyer as the British Ambassador to the United States. Manning took up the post in 2003. Ambassador Manning visited numerous states, as well as the US territory of Puerto Rico, during his term as Ambassador to the United States and was instrumental in planning Queen Elizabeth's most recent visit.