The Military Assistance Training Program

Abstract

The Military Assistance Training Program has been and is a low-cost, low-risk foreign policy instrument that has served the United States interest in interstate stability and has provided a valuable channel of communication and in fluence with a significant elite, especially in the Third World. In the past 25 years, the program has reached over 450,000 officers and men from 70 allied and friendly countries. Most of them have been trained in the United States, in more than 2,000 different skills from auto mechanics and bookkeeping to computer sciences and advanced manage ment. The program has advanced the efficiency, professional performance, and readiness of the recipient military services. Perhaps more significant, it has established a continuing link between United States and host-state military leaders, many of the latter being in positions of political responsibility.