Which foreign language will be most valuable in the next 20 years?

[Abu Suleyman]

This list presumes that the language other than english that will be most useful in the Middle East will be a Middle Eastern language. However, as China supplants the US as the primary consumer of Oil in the region, they are likely to become another major player. Much like the past four hundred years, Arabs are not the masters of their own destinies but are likely to be pawns on the international stage. This will probably be true until Oil is supplanted as a major energy source.

BTW, Americans always think that foreigners speak English, because all the ones they know speak English. There are two problems with relying on that: 1) The other side controls what information you get and whom you talk to, and 2) You have no idea how well they really speak the language. The second problem is actually very common since the ubiquity of American culture (e.g. movies), it is very easy for someone to ape American idioms and even accent to the point that Americans believe that the person really understands, but in actuality doesn't.

[Schmedlap]

Suley,

Two good points. But as for Chinese in the mideast, just because the Chinese might be influential there, does that mean learning Chinese is any more important for us? The mideast population will still speak Arabic, Farsi, Hebrew, Turkish and a few other languages, right?

In regard to the second point - agreed. I was surprised at how many people in the Balkans learned English by watching re-runs of Dallas (the old "who shot JR?" soap). Carrying on a conversation with them was easy, but it was surprising to see how much difficulty they could have interpreting. It was weird. But with your second point in mind, I can see how that might have contributed.

[Abu Suleyman]

I have been posting here for over a year, and I am finally referred to informally.

I agree with your point about Arabic. I guess the question would really depend on what your perspective is. If you are trying to study things like the international relations as it applies to the Middle East, then Chinese probably wins out. However, if you are studying/in the Middle East my vote goes to Arabic, although Farsi is probably also important. After all, you are going to run into a lot more people who speak Arabic or Farsi than Chinese.

Interestingly, the other languages would rise or fall in importance depending on how you define middle east. It is interesting that in many older text from the 19th to mid 20th Century refer to Palestine, Mesopotamia and Turkey as the Near East. The Middle East was more towards the Arabian Gulf, and for some authors included India. If we use that definition, Hindi might win.

[shadow]

I originally posted this over on SWJ's Facebook thread, but I see the conversation is far livelier here:

Hindi and Urdu are actually the same language--Hindustani. They essentially have different scripts and some different vocabulary.

To the larger question, guessing where we'll be in 20 years is a fool's errand. There will doubtlessly be cause to learn any number of local languages. The best option, then, is to learn lingua francas: Modern Standard Arabic, Spanish, Russian, French, Swahili, Hausa, Persian, Hindustani, Mandarin, etc. You can narrow this list by (1) what regions interest you, (2) where you think US strategic interests lie, and (3) where instability is likely to occur.

In the near term, I'm a fan of Arabic, Somali, and Urdu. In the long term, Mandarin.

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A few responses to what people have posted on this thread--

Fuchs - I think you vastly oversimplify the process of learning foreign vocabulary. 10 words/day is VERY fast over the long term. If you're not ACTIVELY using these words, you will lose most of them, and it's likely your brain will not appropriately acquire the rest. (I.e. your brain will associate them with their English translation, vice their actual meaning.)

I also take issue with your assertion that writing deserves no emphasis in military training. I agree that verbal communication is paramount (and not just in military application) but knowledge of the script can be necessary--especially for personnel who have any dealings with official documents like IDs or who need to be able to identify propaganda materials. This means even small unit leaders--or even PFCs--could benefit from being able to read the script. Also, personnel at higher levels benefit from having a clue about the script, especially for languages where transliteration is not standardized. Finally, unless we're talking about Chinese, scripts are relatively easy to learn.

I guess I'm piling on Fuchs here, but the Indonesia comment is way off base for a few reasons. I'll just point out the most obvious one: the Strait of Malacca.

Abu Suleyman - I would think that most Chinese companies that do business in the Middle East will use English as a common language.

[Fuchs]

Inhabitant count of the strait of Malacca: 0

Distance of the strait of Malacca to the closest NATO article 5 territory: thousands of nm.

The two other states close to that strait mostly allow communication in English.



I didn't claim that officers should be fluent in languages; therefore the learning should not be too hard. They just need to have a base for rapid expansion, and they'll have enough opportunities to speak in that languages if the Sh** hits the fan.
My French is extremely rusty, yet I can still go through my French books 15 yyears after I learned it and quickly re-activate it (I have the same effect after a few hours in France). Trust me; I spoke almost never French during my education time. My most important line was "Je ne sais pas."

[Eden]

If the armed forces followed Harry Flashman's advice on learning foreign languages as a formal training regimen, we would never have to worry about fluency wherever we were sent

[Abu Suleyman]

I would think that most Chinese companies that do business in the Middle East will use English as a common language.

Perhaps, although insofar as English, Arabic, and Chinese are all from different language families, there is no advantage to any particular pairing. Nonetheless, it would be a true sign of America and Britains waining power if the Arabs started to learn more Chinese. (However, the ubiquity of Roman script and the opacity of Chinese characters do offer a barrier to such a transition.)

[George L. Singleton]

In the near term, I'm a fan of Arabic, Somali, and Urdu. In the long term, Mandarin.

Folks in Pakistan and India who speak Urdu as a rule also speak English. My experinece when stationed in Pakistan, while ancient, 1963-1965, was then, and I suspect based on friendship still in Karachi and among overseas Pakistanis here where we live in the States is that English works fine. "Against putting time into Urdu." My personal comment/opinion here. English is the defacto language of all of Pakistan and is required in all public schools in Pakistan.

Arabic, standard or otherwise, is clearly important for the forseeable future, until or unless the world runs out of oil.

Somali or French there? I'd think either or but would be lazy and go for the French if up to me individually.

Mandarin among 400 or so Chinese dialects...our children, now grown in their mid-20s, have friends who majored in "Chinese" at Vanderbilt, then did a year contract work for IBM inside China.

Another old friend, now deceased, was ultimately the US Ambassador to the EU, but was detailed to China to learn Mandarin Chinese at State Dept. expense, for one year, then returned to his European posting...being able to somewhat deal with most Europeans (he was already multi-lingual in Western languages) and then Chinese Mandarain as part of commercial dialogue. **He formerly had been Deputy US Trade Negotiator under both Presidents Carter and Reagan, made full Ambassador in his European job under Reagan...non-partisan careerist.

My life long friend the late US Ambassador to NATO, Robin Beard from Nashville, Tennessee brushed up his Vanderbilt French major at a DC area DoD/State Language Institute and did well with French dealing with all NATO Member Nations.

Just some random observations.