Mac Owens of Naval War College/FPRI fame has a thoughtful piece at the FPRI website.

His thesis is that we are looking at the civ-mil relations issue from the wrong angle. One of the key points is that we have "operationalized" military professional development to the point that we have lost the ability to function at the strategic level.

I'm not sure how much I'm buying that argument given the large strategic (little s) focus of the Army staff college and SAMS. Back in the day, both were clearly operational and tactical. Now, not so much.

The piece by Carl Builder he references is also an excellent read.

link:
http://www.fpri.org/enotes/201002.ow...relations.html