Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, generally referred to simply as
the Brigadier, is a
fictional character in the British
science fiction television series
Doctor Who, created by writers
Mervyn Haisman and
Henry Lincoln and played by
Nicholas Courtney. He is one of the founders of
UNIT (United Nations Intelligence Taskforce, later Unified Intelligence Taskforce), an international organization that defends Earth from
alien threats, and serves as commander of the British contingent. Presented at first as reluctant to accept the continuing aid of the Doctor, over time the Brigadier became one of the Doctor's greatest friends and his principal ally in defending the Earth. The Brigadier has received a
DSO and a
CBE.