Admiral Sir John David Luce, (23 January 1906 – 6 January 1971) was a Royal Navy officer. He fought in the Second World War as a submarine commander before taking part in the Dieppe Raid and becoming Chief Staff Officer to the Naval Forces for the Normandy landings. He also commanded a cruiser during the Korean War. He served as First Sea Lord and Chief of the Naval Staff in the mid-1960s and in that role resigned from the Royal Navy along with Navy Minister Christopher Mayhew in March 1966 in protest over the decision by the Labour Secretary of State for Defence, Denis Healey, to cancel the CVA-01 aircraft carrier programme.
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Naval career
Born the son of Rear Admiral John Luce and Mary Dorothea Luce (née Tucker), Luce was educated at the Royal Naval College, Dartmouth. He joined the Royal Navy as a cadet in 1919 and, having been promoted to midshipman on 15 January 1924, he went to sea in the battleship HMS Iron Duke.
Promoted to sub-lieutenant on 30 January 1927, Luce trained as a submarine specialist in 1927 and was posted to the submarine HMS L23 in April 1928. Promoted to lieutenant on 16 October 1928, he transferred to the submarine HMS H49 in October 1929. He joined the battleship HMS Queen Elizabeth in the Mediterranean Fleet in December 1930 and became First Lieutenant in the submarine HMS Osiris on the China Station in September 1933. Having attended the Submarine Command Course in Summer 1935, he was given command of the submarine HMS H44 in August 1935. Promoted to lieutenant commander on 16 October 1936, he attended the Royal Naval Staff College in Spring 1937 and then became Staff Officer (Operations) for the 4th Submarine Flotilla on the China Station in January 1938. He was given command of the submarine HMS Regulus in December 1938 and the submarine HMS Rainbow in March 1939.