View Full Version : Too Busy to Learn
The Reaper
02-20-2010, 10:57
Interesting perspective on professional military education and civil schooling versus time deployed.
I may not always agree with MG Scales, but I always have to consider his perspective.
Thought provoking article, though I disagree with requiring foreign language fluency for promotion in all branches. Some people just do not have an affinity for language, their brains are not wired that way. Like IMC. His preferences would seem to indicate that he feels our leaders need more military and civil schooling, as well as combined service to go with joint.
TR
http://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/story.asp?STORY_ID=2195
Too Busy to Learn
By Major General Robert H. Scales, U.S. Army (Retired)
When the current wars begin to wind down, which they inevitably will, we need to take a closer look at reforming-possibly even by congressional mandate-professional military education (PME).
When I started my PhD dissertation at Duke University in the mid-1970s, Dr. Ted Ropp, my faculty adviser, asked me to do research on how the post-Napoleonic industrial revolution affected the evolution of doctrine in the British Army. Much had been written by that time about the transition from sail to steam in the British Navy. He presupposed that the introduction of smokeless powder, rifled quick-firing artillery, and the machine gun would have had a similar impact on the perceptions of British Army officers during the interval between the heyday of Victorian small wars and the beginning of World War I.
I remember the day I had to tell Professor Ropp that his hypothesis was wrong. I discovered that the issue wasn't the ability or inability of the army to embrace the technologies. Actually, I learned that the British Army had become an institution that ignored most everything that characterized modernity because it had become an army too busy to learn.
Success, promotion, and public acclaim came with active service in a series of popular and not terribly stressful imperial campaigns against native peoples throughout the empire. Time spent in the staff college was time wasted. Publishing was bad form and was best done under a pseudonym. Talk in the mess was about sport, not the art and science of war. The great names of that era; Wolseley, Roberts, Napier, Robertson, Kitchener, and Haig all gained public adulation from a press that worshiped the colorful deeds of these men of action.
The reckoning came at the battles of Mons and Le Cateau in 1914, when this army disappeared under the guns of a force that had spent the last half-century studying war rather than practicing it. The cultural bias toward action rather than reflection so permeated the British Army in World War I that the deaths of more than a million failed to erase it. Some scholars contend that this tragic obsession still left its dulling mark until well after World War II.
My great fear is that we are suffering a similar fate for a similar reason.
Circling the X
Units whose operational tempo causes a backlog in maintenance routinely "circle X" minor faults to keep their equipment moving. All of us know that deferring maintenance too long eventually leads to catastrophic materiel failure. My sense is that the military has begun to circle X its officer seed corn. A bias toward active service in our protracted small wars is making our military an institution too busy to learn.
The evidence is disturbing. Throughout the services officers are avoiding attendance in schools, and school lengths are being shortened. The Army's full-term staff college is now attended by fewer and fewer officers. The best and brightest are avoiding the war colleges in favor of service in Iraq and Afghanistan. The average age of war college students has increased from 41 to 45, making this institution a preparation for retirement rather than a launching platform for strategic leadership.
Most disturbing is the disappearance of experienced officers as instructors. Service schools produce two classes: students and instructors. Students graduate with knowledge, valuable to be sure. But instructors return to the force with the wisdom accumulated from long-term immersion in a subject and an amplified appreciation of the art and science of war that comes from time to reflect, teach, research, and think. Perhaps that's why 31 of the 35 most successful corps commanders in World War II served at least one tour as an instructor in a service school. Arguably the most successful, Lieutenant General Troy Middleton, taught at a series of schools for ten years.
Today, the condensed wisdom that comes from teaching and research is increasingly being contracted out to civilians. Ask any upwardly mobile major or lieutenant colonel what he thinks about his career prospects after being assigned as a service school instructor today.
Action versus Intellect
Equally troubling is the sense that our growing intellectual backlog is not causing much of a stir in the halls of power. Our culture has changed to value and solely reward men and women of action. Just like their British antecedents, the personnel system rewards active service, not demonstrated intellectual merit. Spend too much time thinking and reflecting and the rewards system denies promotion and opportunities to command. Don't get me wrong. Combat service is important, particularly at the junior grades. War is our profession, and every self-respecting young warrior needs to "pet the elephant" to prove he or she has the right stuff.
This bias toward action has caused our learning system to atrophy and become obsolescent. Thirty years ago the Department of Defense led the world in progressive learning. The case-study method was invented at the Army War College. The services pioneered distance learning and the use of diagnostics, as well as objective means for assessment and measurement. Business schools today slavishly copy our method of wargaming and the use of the after-action review. But sadly, atrophy has gripped the school house, and what was once the shining light of progressivism has become an intellectual backwater, lagging far behind the corporate and civilian institutions of higher learning.
Virtually all attempts to reform professional military education have failed principally because these efforts have been driven by academics who focus reform on curricula and faculty hiring. The truth is, PME reform is not a pedagogical problem. It's a personnel problem that can be addressed only by changing the military's reward system to favor those with the intellectual right stuff.
All is not lost. Sandwiched inside past failures are some real demonstrable successes. Perhaps we can build on them. So far I've found five. It's instructive to note that all five at their inception were strenuously resisted by service personnel bureaucracies, in part because of their success.
Five Successes
The first PME success is the "Petraeus Model" of strategic preparation for higher command. This includes attendance at a top-tier civilian graduate school to study history or social and behavioral science followed by a teaching assignment at a service academy. Petraeus is joined by a remarkably successful cadre of leaders who have demonstrated exceptional talent in the chaotic environments in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Some names are familiar because they reached three or four stars: Chiarelli, Stavridis, Dempsey, Ward, and Dubik. All of these leaders (along with fellow intellectual travelers such as Admiral Mike Mullen, Marine General Jim Mattis, and Army General Stanley McChrystal) share a lifelong obsession with reading history and studying the art of war. At some time in their careers, they ignored the caution of personnel officers about spending too much time in school while under scrutiny for command selection.
The second successful innovation is the Foreign Area Officer (FAO) Program. The services' personnel reward systems liked this idea even less than the Petraeus Model. With the exception of a few survivors like Karl Eikenberry, the system has habitually ground off even the most successful and well-regarded FAOs at the colonel level with few if any opportunities for command. Yet the very four stars who routinely advised subordinates not to become FAOs (and, sadly, routinely ranked them below their operational brethren in fitness reports) discover once in command that officers who understand alien cultures and speak their languages fluently are essential multipliers when fighting irregular wars at the strategic level.
(Cont.)
The Reaper
02-20-2010, 10:57
The third reform was so sweeping and threatening that only the legislative hammer could have driven it though the service personnel systems. In the mid-1980s, Representative Ike Skelton (D-MO), as part of the Goldwater-Nichols legislation, forced the services to learn how to operate efficiently-the essence of "jointness." Skelton's effort gained traction because of the services' failure to fight together as a team during the invasion of Grenada in 1983. Skelton leveraged the law to hold the services' reward systems for promotion and command hostage unless they made a meaningful commitment to jointness. To ensure that his reforms would last, Skelton legislated that staff and war colleges bring together student officers from all services to study joint as well as service-specific subjects.
The fourth reform was born during the Cold War and only survived the personnelist's ax by the fortuitous arrival of war. Prior to Operation Desert Storm, General Norman Schwarzkopf created a small cell of four majors and a colonel to act as his intimate brain trust to plan his campaign. The group became known as the "Jedi Knights." All were graduates of the School of Advanced Military Studies (SAMS), essentially the Army staff college's second-year honors program. SAMS sought to create true operational artists by a strenuous year-long immersion in military history using the proven case-study approach to learning. The school's success spawned parallel programs within all service staff colleges.
In 1998 the Army War College created the fifth pedagogical reform with the Advanced Strategic Art Program, basically a strategic-level SAMS that used the same history-based case-study methodology to produce world-class strategists at the lieutenant colonel level.
Start by Building a Bench
Any holistic effort at reform must start by rewarding and selecting those with the greatest intellectual gifts at commissioning. Experience in today's wars has proved the value of the human component in war. We have learned, often painfully, that war is not a science project. Officers like Petraeus who are successful in the chaos and uncertainty of small wars tend to be innovative, creative, empathetic, and non-linear thinkers. Unfortunately, the services still tend to favor a technical rather than a humanist preparation for commissioning. All services, to include the Navy and Air Force, should readjust the percentage of officers educated in the physical and the social sciences to favor the latter.
Again following the Petraeus Model, once young officers have proved their ability to command at the tactical level, they should be offered a "soldier's sabbatical," a fully funded two-year hiatus to study military art, behavioral science, and alien culture and language at a top-tier civilian graduate school. Their spouses should also be supported as long as they are able to meet admission requirements. This time away should be "free," in that it would be a reward for successful command and incur no additional service obligation. If students are able to pass the preliminary requirements for a Ph.D., they should be fast-tracked though statutory requirements for joint qualification.
Personnelists will object to such a sweeping dedication of the force to learning by arguing that so many junior officers away from units will harm readiness. To counter their objections, Congress should legislate the program and increase officer strength to cover academic absences.
The services begin to find their flag officers at the grade of major/lieutenant commander. Therefore, any officer selected early for that grade who does not hold a graduate degree in the social and human sciences should be sent immediately to a first-tier graduate school before returning to the operational force. Every graduate program must require the study of a foreign language, and no officer should be promoted beyond the grade of lieutenant colonel/commander without demonstrating proficiency in a foreign language.
It took the legislative hammer of the Skelton reforms to break the back of individual service parochialism 20 years ago. The same hammer must be invoked again to drive the services to reward intellectual merit. To that end, the law must be revised to reflect the requirement that no officer can be selected for flag rank without first serving a two-year tour as an instructor at a service school.
Officers Should Teach
The insidious creep of the civilian contractor must be reversed such that virtually all ROTC, service academy, and staff and war college faculty positions be filled by uniformed officers. Those positions at service PME institutions better suited to civilian instructors should be filled with long service professionals from government agencies such as State, Agency for International Development, Commerce, Homeland Security, or the Office of Management and Budget, as well as a liberal infusion of professional staffers from congressional committees.
Not every officer loves to learn. But those who do are a special breed often ground off at the tactical level only to be sorely missed at the strategic level when their skills are needed most. Strategic genius can best be preserved by expanding service honors programs at the staff and war colleges. Successful completion of a second-year staff college program would qualify majors to compete though examination for selection for service on joint and coalition staffs, in addition to selection for tactical commands at the lieutenant colonel/commander level.
Those who succeed at both staff and command would then be eligible to compete (again by examination) for selection to the National War College, an institution in this scheme reserved solely for those officers (and selected government civilians) who have shown unique intellectual merit. A certain proportion of all key joint, combatant command, coalition, and interagency billets at the flag level would be reserved by statute for these gifted cohorts of the Jedis.
Institutional Changes
Today, professional military education has no real champion. Learning policy is set by the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness. The title of this position really highlights the problem. However well meaning this person may be, his or her first priority is to man the force rather than to educate it. And we have learned that these two imperatives are not intrinsically compatible.
Thus, we need reform that would create a Chief Learning Officer at the Assistant Secretary level within DOD. This person would be charged with the intellectual health of the force and would report both to the Secretary of Defense and the chairs of the Armed Services Committees. To be complete, the learning function needs a military champion as well, preferably at the four-star level.
The most likely candidate for this job would be the commander of Joint Forces Command, who would be held responsible for joint learning by all services. The person in this position would set standards for learning and would pass on all service command and promotion lists to ensure that those selected meet the intellectual requirements for positions of higher responsibility.
Today, the efficiency/fitness report is an officer's scorecard for rating "manner of performance" on the job. Officers do receive academic fitness reports after completing a program of study, but these have no real impact on career prospects. This must change. Intellectual achievement must be graded and assessed with the same rigor and objectivity as manner of performance.
An officer's learning record should reflect class standing in all PME and civilian institutions. It should contain confidential evaluations of an officer's ability to think critically, innovate, write, speak, and act with intellectual agility. The record would list the officer's publications and research and a separate evaluation by a joint academic selection board of an officer's fitness report as an instructor. Promotion and command selection boards would be required by statute to report out the collective intellectual achievements of selected officers to Congress and the various service secretariats.
A Window of Opportunity
History suggests that the greatest opportunity for reform occurs as wars wind down and the institution has time to reflect and reset itself for future conflicts. The demand for excellence in coalition warfare came out of the painful experience with the British in World War II. Radical changes in how the services educated their officers and enlisted personnel emerged from the painful lessons of Vietnam.
We will be fighting in Afghanistan and elsewhere for some time, to be sure. But soon we will begin to find some breathing room to close the learning gap that has grown so wide and insidious since 9/11. Unfortunately, the gap will never close as long as the learning function is held hostage to the services' systems of reward. We could rely on the tender mercies of individual service personnel systems to fuel intellectual reform. But the fight to inculcate jointness within the services warns that real PME reform can only happen through the blunt instrument of legislative action.
General Scales is currently president of Colgen Inc., a consulting firm specializing in issues relating to land power, war gaming, and strategic leadership. One of the nation's most respected authorities on land warfare, he served more than 30 years in the Army, commanded two units in Vietnam, and ended his career as Commandant of the Army War College.
He paints with a broad brush.
The British officers he gives short shift to were an intersting lot from the mid 1800s to 1950s. You would almost have to break it out into home service Bns, Bns in foreign lands and the officers in service with colonial troops.
What is worth more? Chatting in the Mess about it or reading about the subject after you're retired for the night.
Some of the better information on North African trails and water holes was gathered by British junior officers on Holiday in the 20s and 30s.
This boils down to what do you need to do your job and what will make you more well rounded. Will being well rounded make you do your job better?
Could you become so well rounded you don't remember what your job is?
Just wondering.
craigepo
02-20-2010, 14:25
Clearly, General Scales is an intelligent guy. However, I wonder if his proposals are not just a little too "university-centric", as well as not being very realistic.
Initially, I don't think many officers, especially the butt-kicking types, are going to be very eager to leave a warzone to return to college for post-graduate work. There's a time for studying and a time for fighting. If you would have asked General Patton, Sherman, or others to let their better younger officers return to the rear for a year or two of college, I would wager Patton would have pulled his pistol and shot you.
Secondly, few if any professions pull practitioners out for a year or more of additional training. A surgeon or trial attorney, at the top of his game, is not going to drop his practice for a year. This is just not feasible.
However, all professionals at the top of their game do engage in a constant learning process. In fact, most professions mandate yearly continuing-education training. An example of this is yearly trial colleges put on by top trial attorneys. These colleges last approximately one week, and are put on by some of the best in the business. During the day, the instructors put on some fantastic classes. When classes are over, there is some type of forced-togetherness, whereby all of the attendees gather around and discuss experiences, lessons learned, etc.
These seminars are ubiquitous. Generally anytime a professional has a week to get away, he/she can find a good seminar to attend to sharpen skills.
I mentioned that the author's outlook seemed "university-centric". In my experience, after a professional has left a professional school, he/she does generally not return(clearly, a physician can return for a fellowship, but these are extremely time-consuming, not profitable, and not the norm). Instead, the professional school comes to the graduate. Law schools, medical schools, etc., often put on continuing education programs for local practitioners, as the professional has neither the time nor the money to go back for refresher stuff.
Soldiers spend a lot of time in military schools, which is great during peacetime. However, during a time of war, the country needs soldiers on front lines, not dusting a chair with their ass in a classroom.
I would suggest something of a paradigm shift. The officer corps has fallen in love with degrees. Maybe they should look also at some other professions, and emulates what works there. Treat the soldiers as professionals. Professionals(soldiers, engineers, lawyers, physicians) don't leave their "fight" for long periods to go back to a classroom---the classroom comes to them, in ways that contribute to the professional's continuing growth and proficiency.
These short-term soldiering seminars could be put on by guys fresh from the warzone, after time to collect their thoughts and put them to paper in an organized fashion. Possible subject matter could be limitless. Imagine how good such a seminar would be for a bunch of junior combat arms officers if it was put on by a bunch of crusty, 4-deployment team sergeants! The students could be in and out in a week, not greatly deplete a unit's combat effectiveness while gone, and probably pick up some good stuff to bring back to their units. While it is great to be able to discuss Macarthur's landing at Inchon, the curriculm at these seminars would be lessons learned relevant to the present battlefield.
OK, done rambling.
Again following the Petraeus Model, once young officers have proved their ability to command at the tactical level, they should be offered a "soldier's sabbatical," a fully funded two-year hiatus to study military art, behavioral science, and alien culture and language at a top-tier civilian graduate school. Their spouses should also be supported as long as they are able to meet admission requirements. This time away should be "free," in that it would be a reward for successful command and incur no additional service obligation. If students are able to pass the preliminary requirements for a Ph.D., they should be fast-tracked though statutory requirements for joint qualification.
Personnelists will object to such a sweeping dedication of the force to learning by arguing that so many junior officers away from units will harm readiness. To counter their objections, Congress should legislate the program and increase officer strength to cover academic absences.
The services begin to find their flag officers at the grade of major/lieutenant commander. Therefore, any officer selected early for that grade who does not hold a graduate degree in the social and human sciences should be sent immediately to a first-tier graduate school before returning to the operational force. Every graduate program must require the study of a foreign language, and no officer should be promoted beyond the grade of lieutenant colonel/commander without demonstrating proficiency in a foreign language.
And while the Officers are doing that. The operators will be sweating it out on the Ranges and Shoot Houses around the World. Either training themselves or others to fight. Remember Education doesn't make you smart or competent. It just makes you educated.
A few comments:
MG Scales provides a well argued and thought provoking article regarding the PME of senior officers.
Remember - the focus of the article is on further developing those officers who have proven themselves to be adept at the tactical level of warfare to perform equally well at the operational and strategic - and even political - levels.
His views on the FAO program are spot on - although it was my experience that it was more at the 0-5 than the 0-6 level that FAOs are 'culled' from the normal command path within their basic branches.
I agree with TRs assessment of the fallacy of a required foreign language proficiency for senior officer promotion.
Richard's $.02 :munchin
Roguish Lawyer
02-20-2010, 22:58
Top trial lawyers don't attend CLE seminars for training. They go to satisfy the attendance requirement, to present (teach) and to develop business. The people attending the week-long training programs described above are junior lawyers.
craigepo
02-20-2010, 23:19
I'll have to disagree with you RL. Those top-notch trial colleges are, indeed, top notch. The guys there, teaching and students, are guys(and gals) who are on top of their game, and put out some great info. Next time you're doing voir dire with a top-tier personal injury attorney, check and see if his jury selection outline is handwritten or comes from one of these seminars.
I was on a panel at one of these seminars last summer(why I have no freaking idea---the attorneys and other judges present were brilliant). The info and "lessons learned" was stuff most attorneys would never think of, not to mention never learn.
These seminars have really changed the profession, especially jury practice. They have allowed a large disemination of information between practitioners, greatly increasing the numbers of "excellent" attorneys. They have also encouraged specialization in the field.
This was precisely my thought with the above post. Sort of a "cross-pollenation" with all the lessons being learned today OCONUS would be a great boon to our soldiers, both today and in the future.
Clearly, General Scales is an intelligent guy. However, I wonder if his proposals are not just a little too "university-centric", as well as not being very realistic. I wonder if MG Scales is making a case for using advanced professional education to enhance civil-military relations? He did make the following point although it was a bit buried within the rest of his essay.
The services pioneered distance learning and the use of diagnostics, as well as objective means for assessment and measurement. Business schools today slavishly copy our method of wargaming and the use of the after-action review. But sadly, atrophy has gripped the school house, and what was once the shining light of progressivism has become an intellectual backwater, lagging far behind the corporate and civilian institutions of higher learning.Could MG Scales be subtly suggesting that civilians would benefit at least as much as professional officers if the latter were to participate more often in graduate programs? (I am convinced that country would be in much better shape if civilians had not appropriated the concept of "strategy" from the armed services. A century from now, cultural, intellectual, and military historians will be astounded by profligate use of that word since the end of the Cold War.)
FWIW, as for his not being realistic, I agree with you on the following point.
...[A] "soldier's sabbatical," a fully funded two-year hiatus to study military art, behavioral science, and alien culture and language at a top-tier civilian graduate school. Their spouses should also be supported as long as they are able to meet admission requirements. This time away should be "free," in that it would be a reward for successful command and incur no additional service obligation. If students are able to pass the preliminary requirements for a Ph.D., they should be fast-tracked though statutory requirements for joint qualification.This suggestion might be problematic. While graduate programs might welcome with open arms students who do not need any financial assistance, top graduate programs may not look too kindly on applicants who may just be there to earn a master's degree. Additionally, if professors learn graduate students are preparing for and taking doctoral qualifying exams just to get their ticket punched, future officers participating in that program may have an increasingly hard time finding advisers.
On the other hand, I like the statement "officers should teach" albeit in a way beyond what Scales wrote. As an undergraduate, some of the best instructors I had were professional armed service officers. A benefit of MG Scales's proposals are that, as graduate students, officers might have opportunities to teach civilian undergraduates. For those who worry about a left-leaning Ivory Tower, the Scales proposal could serve as something of a corrective.
YMMV.
The Reaper
02-21-2010, 09:00
It occurs to me that this might not be a good plan for every Swinging Richard in the Army, but for SF officers, it could be just the ticket.
We already have a force structure in SF that has limited opportunities for time with troops after detachment command.
What about sending young SF majors to grad school, and a teaching assignment or perhaps a FAO tour before returning for BQ jobs?
I could see this paying off, most of the 18As I know feel like Naval Postgraduate School is a great experience.
On the other hand, there are already a lot of external requirements for joint education and service placed on our Os already.
I do agree that the current evaluation and promotion system leaves a lot to be desired and fails to promote/reward a lot of good officers who were in the wrong place at the wrong time, who didn't have the right mentor, or who were busy "taking one for the team".
Thoughts?
TR
1stindoor
02-21-2010, 13:59
To quote Richard..."And so it goes"
I'm certainly not as old as some on this board, but I'm old enough to see us go full circle and start making our second lap. Ten years ago all DA cared about was your civilian schooling. If you didn't work towards your degree you were doing so at the risk of future promotions. Meanwhile a lot of good people were spending time with the troops, on the range, in the motorpool, on the DZ, etc. and couldn't care less about a "degree" because they understood their job and their mission.
For forty years, or more, we lived and breathed soviet doctrine, and soviet weapon systems and employment. We expected our Soldiers to be able to recognize soviet tanks, helos, and fast movers simply by their silhouette. We studied the mindset of communism and recognized that our system of government, dare I say our culture was superior to that of Russia's. Now we're all equal...no system is better than someone else's, no cultural advances are more important than another's and we (as a nation) willingly watch rogue elements build up until such a time as they can strike and then look around stupidly trying to figure out who to blame for the shortsightedness.
Where were all these "educated" officers when those of us on the line were trying to explain the inherint dangers we were getting ready to face? Where were they when our Servicemen and women went into battle without any knowledge of their enemy or how they fight. Where were they when the belief system of their country was being torn apart from the very academia they want to embrace.
Honestly...after spending nearly 6 months at USASMA and seeing the emphasis that's still put on a stupid piece of paper I'm fed up with the lot of them...Officer and Enlisted. I'm surrounded by dumbasses that have Bachelors, Masters, and more that couldn't find a mispelled word in this diatribe without a "spell-check" function, do not have a clue on grammer, and can't find Afghanistan on a map despite having deployed there.
I'm astounded everyday when I see senior "leaders" that know more about Tiger's transgressions than they do about what's going on in their nation's capitol.
I'm all for professional education, both civilian and military...but let's put it in it's proper perspective. If an Officer (or senior NCO) has no concept of taking care of Soldiers and accomplishing a mission towards a greater good, then adding to his framed diplomas isn't going to help him or his unit either.
Okay...Rant's over...I'll go back to sitting in the corner.
Roguish Lawyer
02-21-2010, 22:46
Your Honor:
Lots of lawyers, practice areas and jurisdictions out there. What you described does not happen (to my knowledge, anyway) in my world, even for the top PI guys (who I deal with only in the rare instances when they venture outside the PI area). I have no doubt that it may elsewhere.
Respectfully,
RL
Which schools/programs should be eligible for taxpayer funding?
Can the near-future crop of candidates compete with their civilian peers on a purely academic basis?
What do you do with the ones that can't?
How do the military post-graduate schools compare in terms of rigor with their civilian counterparts?
Which schools/programs should be eligible for taxpayer funding?
Wellllll...I've known logistics officers who went to Harvard Business School for an MBA, engineer officers who went to Berkeley for an MEE, etc.
The program I attended dictated one of 6 schools for West European FAOs (WEST) - Georgetown, Columbia, Cornell, Illinois, Minnesota, and Indiana. I took the GRE while in CAS3, applied to and was accepted to all six, and opted for Indiana University. There were other officers at IU for Russian studies, engineering, and some other programs. The WEST program I attended required 30 hrs in the area of concentration, 2 languages (mine were German and Hebrew - which also allowed me to dabble with Yiddish which was still a trans-national language of use in Eastern Europe at that time), a Thesis and its defense (mine was Great Britain's Uncodified Constitution: Threatening or Threatened?), and a 6 hour comprehensive exam in 3 subject areas.
Post-graduate assignment allowed for an immersion into our areas of expertise - mine was the AmEmbassy-Bonn followed by the German and Luxembourg Plans Officer for Wartime Host Nation Support under the 21st Theater Army Area Command's Assistant-Chief of Staff for Civil-Military Ops. The advance degree program was Congressionally mandated and the selection process was highly selective (less than 2% of the officers within a YG).
Can the near-future crop of candidates compete with their civilian peers on a purely academic basis?
:confused: We did. When finishing my undergrad in Bootstrap, I was voted by faculty as the top History student for my graduating class and honored with induction into Phi Kappa Phi and Phi Alpha Theta. I don't see it changing...and might become a bit offended by the inferences being made with that question if I choose to give it much thought.
What do you do with the ones that can't?
It becomes yet another career limiting issue under DOPMA.
How do the military post-graduate schools compare in terms of rigor with their civilian counterparts?
I'm not sure how one realistically gauges some of that as I had friends go through specific FAO post-grad schooling at NPGS because there were no civilian universities offering programs similar to the one I attended for their designated areas - but the NPGS, CGSCs MMA, AWC, NWC, NDU, NWC, etc are all staffed with highly qualified active duty and civilian instructors, viewed favorably among our overall national higher educational offerings, are highly selective and competetive, and are attended by qualified people who are both military and civilian.
These are my experiences and opinions only - others may vary - and so it goes...;)
Richard's $.02 :munchin
What about sending young SF majors to grad school, and a teaching assignment or perhaps a FAO tour before returning for BQ jobs? Thoughts?I was always under the impression that the FA 39 program was the prototype for a SOF graduate program (at least, that's what we were told when some of us were dragged kicking and screaming into the program back in 1990)...
Just to enlighten those who weren't around at the time, the Functional Area 39 program was essentially a refried FAO program, with a one year graduate program at Fort Bragg, conducted under contract by Troy State University. The program entailed 30 semester hours, with a thesis, comps, and all that fun stuff. The result was a Masters in International Relations...the next step in the program was the Regional Studies course, sixteen or seventeen weeks of what used to be the FAO course (at least all the course hand outs were recycled) with half of the program based on studies of one theater of operations and the remainder divided equally among the others...language school and then either the CA or PSYOP course completed the program at a minimum of two years, depending on language. Language training was not so much a matter of choice for those of us who were a little more senior...I qualified for Arabic, German and a couple of others, but was assigned to French because it was a six month program and the others were nine and twelve month courses. I was a major at the time and it was the opinion of the folks running the program that the more senior students needed to get back out to the force in order to be properly utilized.
I cannot directly ascertain the effectiveness of the program, although feedback I received through the initial program manager and peers indicated it was successful in achieving the objectives originally envisioned by the supporters...how that stacks up to a program like Richard attended or one that exists at a prestigious university is something I can't speak to...if it met the needs of the Army, how it compares to a civilian based program is irrelevant...
craigepo
02-22-2010, 18:29
When I first read the good General's article, I gave it some credit. Having re-read the article approximately ten times, I now think I was gravely wrong to have been so gracious.
I am not going to engage in a point-by-point refutation of the article. Suffice to say, I think that the article reads as if written by an Ivy League academic, with no thought given as to realistically improving the military's warfighting ability.
From day one, a military officer is paid more than an enlisted soldier, in part to be more intelligent than those he leads. If this officer is unable to think critically regarding his job, by the time he is a major, two years of East Coast grad school is not going to fix the problem.
The author wants his end-product officers to mirror some present generals. While I am sure those officers are outstanding, we have not yet determined whether the fruits of those gentlemen's minds will produce victory. Stated differently, we don't know, and will not know for some time, whether or not these generals were really worth a damn.
I have went and researched a few fairly successful generals since I initially read this article: Patton, Lee, Stonewall Jackson, Zhukov, Rommel, Alexander, the Duke of Wellington, Napolean, Chesty Puller. None took a couple of years paid leave to return to college to work on their Master's degree.
If this article had been arguing for furthering the education of select NCO's, my opinion of the article would be different.
The Reaper
02-22-2010, 20:08
I have went and researched a few fairly successful generals since I initially read this article: Patton, Lee, Stonewall Jackson, Zhukov, Rommel, Alexander, the Duke of Wellington, Napolean, Chesty Puller. None took a couple of years paid leave to return to college to work on their Master's degree.
May be true, but the U.S. generals above spent time teaching at military schools, and they probably would have been considered grad students, at least by me.
TR
None took a couple of years paid leave to return to college to work on their Master's degree.Times change, Judge...Patton took time off to participate in the 1912 Olympics and to improve his swordsmanship...
I think a key point the General was trying to make regarding professional development was the importance of being distanced from the fray long enough to have time for reflection, study, debate, writing and teaching.
Based on personal experience - I agree.
Richard's $.02 :munchin
craigepo
02-22-2010, 21:09
I think a key point the General was trying to make regarding professional development was the importance of being distanced from the fray long enough to have time for reflection, study, debate, writing and teaching.
That is a point I can agree with(as well as sword-fighting:o).
I apologize if I sounded "ranty" earlier, but having read the article quite a few times, the author's language seemed danger-close to rewarding and/or prioritizing scholarship over results. But I have misread articles before.
Damned interesting debate though.
Good job TR. Throw out some more red meat.