Anti-Intellectualism In The Army

[Cavguy]

All,

Found this 2002 ARMY two part article from a discussion on another thread, and thought it may be relevant to some of our other discussions:

PART 1

PART 2

Money Quotes:

My purposes in this two-part article are to trace the origins and manifestations of this anti-intellectual bias within the American military tradition; to demonstrate the existence and pernicious effects of such an attitude even in the celebrated age of information now upon us; and to suggest measures for ensuring that the intellectual potential of the officers' corps is capitalized on in optimal ways without impairing the warrior ethos of the profession.

The only external difference between the Contemplative Man and the Active Man in the officers' corps today is that the former may seek a doctorate, teaching tour, fellowship, attache assignment or other mind-expanding opportunities that the latter avoids like the plague because under the present career management system such excursions will time him or her out of transiting career wicket X, necessary if the officer is to remain competitive for brigade command and a possible star.

The Army has taken a laudable principle-getting officers off their duffs, out of their offices and down with troops where they can master their branch skills and learn to operate in the field-and implemented it with such compulsive zeal that those officers now arriving at the top know nothing but the field.

An exaggeration? Yes, but there is no question that the present system has produced a lopsided general officer corps infinitely more comfortable with practice than with reflecting on practice.

Several of the Army's brightest and most articulate captains and majors of the early 1990s survived their outspoken forays into the world of contending ideas and are doing well in their careers as they climb toward their first star. Unfortunately, however, they read the career tea leaves and have now clammed up. Their lately developed reticence recalls to mind Liddell Hart's observation concerning young British uniformed intellectuals:
Ambitious officers, when they came in sight of promotion to the generals' list, would decide that they would bottle up their thoughts and ideas as a safety precaution until they reached the top and could put these ideas into practice. Unfortunately, the usual result, after years of repression for the sake of their ambition, was that when the bottle was eventually uncorked the contents had evaporated.

The Army is doubtless correct in insisting on the man of action as the predominant model for the combat commander-let there be no mistake about that. But it is dead wrong in assuming that uniformed intellectuals-- simply because they have not negotiated every wicket in a general officer qualification course that could only have been devised by Genghis Khan's G3-cannot be men and women of action and hence are unqualified to command the higher line echelons. Moreover, the Army is on questionable ground in assuming that those who have been anointed by a zero-defects performance at each of the stations of the cross are thereby fit to serve in every general officer slot, even those for which they obviously lack the necessary intellectual qualifications. Rather than denigrating and marginalizing the uniformed intellectual, the Army should hearken to President Bush's call for a "renewed spirit of innovation in our officer corps." It should implement the necessary promotion and assignment adjustments to assure that the intellectual potential of the officers' corps is identified, cultivated and exploited in optimal ways, which would include service at the highest echelons.

It is time finally to acknowledge that the Active Man and Contemplative Man do merge in many versatile people, and that the Army has as much need for the qualities of the latter as for the former. The intellectual man-and woman-have a vital role to play in all professional endeavor, not least military endeavor, and it is thus a fool's game to squander precious intellectual capital on the basis of a historical anti-highbrow shibboleth. The army that rejects seminal thinkers, thereby depriving itself of innovative ideas and the instruments for continuous intellectual self-renewal, will ultimately be a defeated army, vanquished in the wake of foes who adapt more wisely and quickly to the ever-evolving art and science of war.

More in the links. Thoughts?