Military Professors and the Profession

War and Staff Colleges are odd institutions of professional education: the military has no tradition of academic research. War Colleges are like many other schools of professional development such as law and medical schools. But whereas Doctors, Lawyers, heck, even Chaplains teach and research, the military has no professors as a branch within the profession.

There is a significant difference in the functioning of a War College from these other examples and it is in their relationship to the practice of study. As an aspect of the profession in fields like law and medicine, teaching and research do form an important role and a specialized, well regarded cadre within the profession itself. In the military environment, however, this part of the profession has rarely been nourished and for those who pursue such directions, it has often contributed to the ending of careers, rather than their furtherance. The expression “he styles himself an academic” is occasionally heard to criticize an officer’s intellectual pretensions rather than compliment them.

That this is so is all the more strange as War Colleges are among the oldest forms of institutionalized professional education. The growth of armies, the spread of advanced technology, the geographical expansion of the battlefield, and the growing literacy of populations in the 17th and 18th centuries all meant that the “gifted amateurs” of traditional aristocratic army staffs could hardly be relied upon to produce wartime success. The Prussian Kriegsakademie was among the very first schools devoted to the study of war for the professional enlightenment of military officers, and it was copied shortly thereafter by most of the other large powers of the day. To this institution, all War Colleges can trace their lineage, as well as their approach to education.

The military profession is marked by two characteristics in its approach to education. Military studies are informed by an inherent instrumentalism in their approach. The military studies the phenomenon of war not for its own sake, nor in the hope that some how it can be banished from human affairs. Its interest is in what has worked, why it has worked, and whether those successes can be replicated in the future (or conversely, failures avoided). Education and research are fundamentally purpose driven affairs, purpose defined by the mission of the profession as opposed to the loftier canons of the search for general truth. The second characteristic is that military officers are driven to practice their profession, the art of command. Assignments which do not allow them to practice command, therefore, are effectively less desirable positions. In this, research and teaching are often among the least desirable career positions. The odd “operator” will spend a year or two at Staff College to share their experiences, however, the practice of rotating officers through many different positions throughout their career means that only a few “non-performers” will be exiled to the wilderness of Staff College on a long term basis. Of course this means that there is no opportunity to develop a specialized teaching and research stream within the officer corps itself.

This is not to suggest that educated military officers do not exist. In fact, the number of Canadian military officers with post-bachelor credentials has increased significantly in the past few years and there are a number of military officers that have pursued distinguished academic careers. Royal Military College has a variety of teaching positions dedicated to military officers. Finally, in the War College environment, professional experience can only be conveyed by other professionals, but this is typically a one off affair, somebody with a specific experience or background in one aspect of the profession. Educators come from outside the profession, or it is a path followed by retired officers. This has significant impact on the nature of teaching in a War College.

What is a War College?

To many, the idea that Canada has a “war college” might come as some surprise. A quick word association game with “Canadian Forces” will probably elicit “peacekeeping”. We are, in the words of some of our best historians an “unmilitary people”. However, the Canadian Forces College is most definitely a college concerned with war, and not a school of peacekeeping.

Some basic terminology. Professional Military Education takes place continuously throughout a soldier’s career, as officers or non-commissioned officers. Basic education covers much of the technical information of what it is to be in the army, air force, or navy. Here, service members learn their trade and are immersed in the challenges of leadership. At this level, education is more “training” than education strictly speaking. Training is conducted to produce reliable responses to predictable situations. Learning to use a rifle, fly a plane, fix an engine all are examples of training. Education is about producing reasoned responses to unpredictable situations. At this early stage of their career, some Canadian military officers attend Royal Military College in Kingston for their bachelor’s level education.

The next major phase in an officer’s career occurs roughly midway, usually after the time they have been promoted to the rank of Major (or Lt. Commander if they are in the navy). At this point, officers attend a Command and Staff College. Here, they begin to learn about more broad issues such as international affairs, leadership, and military theory. However, the principle focus at this level is learning about Operational Planning, or how to design, set up and run military operations. The last stage of their education is at the War College level, where the focus is even broader. At this level, students are typically Colonels and naval Captains. The focus here is more like a civilian graduate school or a school of professional development. Here, students focus on leading institutions, in preparation for being promoted to Generals or Admirals. The areas of study here are solidly on international relations, command and leadership, and advanced studies on operational matters.

Canada, because it has a small military, combines several schools into one location. CFC has courses at the Command and Staff College and at the War College level. Furthermore, the College is fully “joint”, which is to say that there are no air force, naval, or land schools in Canada at this level of education. In many countries, there are still specialized schools. The US maintains colleges at the Command and Staff and War College level for all three services, as well as a set of purely joint institutions (National Defense University in Washington DC and Norfolk VA).

War Colleges and Command and Staff Colleges, particularly in Western nations, have mixed academic and military professional faculties. At CFC, there are 11 Professors from a variety of backgrounds, but with research agendas all focused on matters of defence and security. That makes us the largest such faculty in Canada, bigger than any other university! It wasn’t always this way; in 1998, I was the only one on staff, but that is another story.