Posted on 05/27/2004 8:22:14 PM PDT by Congressman Billybob
Most aren't generals, but most want to be generals, or at least Colonels/Captains.
The vast majority are officers returning from overseas assignments who are being reassigned to teach ROTC. They are being given basic lesson plans and educational material to present to college ROTC students. They are being taught how to grade papers and use the teacher's edition of text books.
Where did you get that notion? I never attended a War College, but I did do Squadron Officers School, which is the first step of the Air Forces Proffessional Military Education ladder. It's followed by the Air Command and Staff and Air War College. Several of my compatriots were doing AWC by correspondence, and I assure you they didn't study lesson plans, nor did they discuss the best ways to produce new butter bars at their seminars.
Actually, I think you may be thinking of Command and General Staff College perhaps. I did study lesson plans there. And guys left there and within a couple of years were teaching at ROTC units across the country. I do not think CGSC would claim that as their top mission, but nevertheless I think that is one thing they do. The Army War College is different though. One comes here AFTER having completed his or her 05 command, including ROTC Professors.
For example some of what we concentrated on this year included National Strategic Policy-Making (i.e how Condi Rice earns her pay); the instruments of National Power (we call them the DIME...Diplomatic, Informational, Military, and Economic elements of National Strategy), and how they can be used together to achieve our National Strategic objectives; Interagency operations (DoD, State, CIA, FBI, etc.); Joint and Coalition Warfare; strategic and operational war plans and execution; and of course some military history and military theory. Not a full list, but we do not study any lesson plans or prepare for teaching classes aimed at anyone lower than 05 or 06. Some of us will leave to command Brigades, while most of the rest will go to a higher level staff job, either in the Pentagon on the Army or Joint Staff, or to one of the Component Commands (such as CENTCOM).
However I spent hundreds of hours in OTC brfore I was old enough to be put into kindergarten.
I will certainly put my "did NOT fall flat" two cents in here as well. I thought it was a courageous and inspiring speech.
I agree that he could and should have layed on the history a bit more, but I still think he made the points he wanted to make.
Everything is relative based on perspective.
It just didn't have the "oomph!". That "je nes se qua". The "gravitas" I'd expect. I just can't seem to find the right words to describe it. Can anyone help me out?
John / Billybob
You are, as always, a wonderful writer.
When I read the paragraph about American boys, I realized how feminized our culture has become since the days of Patton. The military services turn out wonderful, terrific fighting men, but there is more hogwash to undo than in Patton's time.
wrong, wrong, wrong...great speech
Static planning is a recipe for disaster. Every single member of the President’s audience at the War College was steeped in this concept. Why didn’t the President recognize that, and state it then and there?
That was a direct hit. Great, great point. It's an old military axiom that no plan survives the first contact with the enemy, and the idea that we could "plan" the occupation of a country of 26 million people on the immediate heels of a war of indeterminate duration is laughable. What matters is our ability to adapt, persevere, and grind out a victory.
Thanks for your insightful comments.
I believe you're confusing the war college experience with what is the course structure at the command and staff schools of the various services. The was colleges as well as the Industrial College of the Armed Forces and the national War College at Ft. Leslie J. McNair are on the Ph.D. level. These attendees go on to JCS work, command assignments at the divison, wing and battle group level of field forces and training commands and Pentagon support functions at the higher levels. These graduates do not go on the assigments at ROTC or others that are on the downhill side of the retirement gate.
As simple as the information you discussed seems to us, it is unfortunately reality, and reality is something the current American citizenry hasn't yet adapted to dealing with, especially, dare I say this, many women voters and young people steeped in kumbaya idealism from liberal brainwashing in the schools.
President Bush is the CIC and the political leader right now, and his judgment on what the American people can absorb may not always be right, but he is probably more often right than we are about this.
Right now, my view is that undermining a leader in time of war or a parent in midst of disciplining a child is a bad idea. It may sell newspapers and newsletters and increase TV ratings, but it is essentially counterproductive--it makes the problem you are facing worse, imo.
Only if you don't believe in God.
READ AND HEED - BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE!!
They are letting the media set the agenda.
I don't agree that we are letting them set the agenda. This is no more true than to say we let Clinton be a scumbag. Their agenda is out of our hands. They are thoroughly infected with the Liberal Disease.
Anything that W. says can and will be held against him, unless ignored.
This can get depressing after a while, even for a great leader. Churchill was called to lead Great Britain in their hour of greatest need, with broad public and press support. Had he had what passes for our main stream media for press, I doubt even he would have found the voice to speak as well as he did for the need to defend liberty at all costs.
This is probably more pressing on a extrovert, such as Bush. Those driven more by concept, such as perhaps Reagan and Churchill, are perhaps better prepared to weather bitter opposition from the press. Bush, while just as smart, has a temperment that thrives on people.
Fortunately, he also thrives on prayer. I urge my fellow Freepers who are so inclined to pray for him. I would pray for him myself, but for that I am a God Damned Atheist.
In fact, not all major cities in the US have a higher crime rate than Iraq!Context, people, context!!
Just remember, journalism isn't there to tell you what's going on, and what's going to happen. Journalism exists to cure boredom. From the POV of the journalist, Iraq is a wonderful source of bad news, nothing more.
If you really wanted to see Iraq in perspective, look at Afghanistan. There are casualties happening there - e.g., Pat Tilman - but Afghanistan is on journalism's back burner because there is more excitement in Iraq. But because our military operations in Afghanistan began a year before those in Iraq, the experience in Afghanistan is a salient bit of data for figuring what to expect in Iraq. Allowing both for significant local differences on the one hand, and for the application of lessons learned in one place being applied to the other - by Americans and by Al Qaeda.
A new government is being established in Iraq; a year or so ago a new government was established in Afghanistan. American forces are still in Afghanistan, and a year from now American forces will still be needed and presumably will still be present in Iraq.
Of course we will have an election in the meantime, and at present the polls are not showing a clear winner. IMHO that reflects journalism's best efforts to levitate the Kerry candidacy - and by November events such as continued improvement in the economy and progress in Iraq toward the situation now existing in Afghanistan will let the air out of that baloon.
Kerry has been on all sides of every issue, and I expect the campaign to force him to clarify his position - and lose support to Nader while Bush's support only solidifies. You can't beat somebody with nobody, and you can't beat an effective sitting president with a hollow 3-term senator who has 75,000 miles on his odometer but is otherwise indistinguishable from a typical Ivy League June grad.
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