The Military Man in Academia

Abstract

The officer education system is in a period of overdue, dynamic change in military curricular substance and approach. Although departures from time-tested procedures are not generally welcomed in the military, this is a time of serious introspection for the armed services. They are prepared to innovate. The challenge to the officer education system is to produce the required number of officers with expertise in the management and application of military resources in deterrent, peacekeeping, advisory, and combat roles in the context of rapid technological, social, and political change. This educational system must provide training to develop specific skills and military professionalism; it must also develop broadly applicable analytical skills and critical judgment. The officer education system can define the parameters of the former far more closely than the latter. It is time for an overall assessment of training requirements for the future based upon the tasks the nation wants its military to perform and a forecast of technological change. Equally important, it is time for an assessment of the values which the nation wishes its military officers to hold and development of personnel management systems which facilitate education designed to produce and promote imaginative officers capable of balanced judgment concerning issues of priorities and trade-offs among resources and values.