Journal of Military Ethics (2004) 3(1): 68
/74

Editor’s note: The aim of these Book Discussions is to examine contemporary works in the
field of military ethics and highlight how their authors are contributing (knowingly or not) to
on-going discourse or debates on issues that may be of interest to our readers. Some
discussions will direct the reader’s attention to a single book or article, presented in a context
in which it may not have been previously considered, while others will attempt to reveal
connections among a cluster of works that are worthy of further exploration.

BOOK DISCUSSION

The Future of the Army

Profession.
Lloyd J. Matthews, ed.
Shannon E. French
Department of Leadership, Ethics and Law, United States Naval Academy, 112 Cooper Road,
Stop 7-B, Annapolis, MD 21402, USA
Tel: /1 410 293 6021, Fax: /1 410 293 4896, E-mail: [email protected]

If one speaks candidly with members of the officer corps of nearly any service
community within the United States military, one will repeatedly encounter similar
concerns and issues coming to the fore. There is plenty of sober reflection about
new, asymmetric threats, far-flung commitments of resources, increasing numbers
of Military Operations Other Than War (MOOTWs), and force protection. But
beneath these concerns, there is deep-seated uneasiness and in some ways more
urgency about the state of the military profession itself as we plunge into the 21st
century. Junior officers are especially anxious to understand what they are expected
to be. Are they supposed to be warriors? Law enforcement officials? Humanitarian
aid workers? Technicians? Bureaucrats? Is serving their country just a job
/ and a
temporary one at that
/ or ought it to be more of a calling? Is there a place for
idealism in the modern military, or is cynicism the more rational attitude to take?
Are character and professional ethics really important, or is the name of the game
just not getting caught? Can senior officers be trusted to act for the good of all, or
only to advance their own careers?
Beginning in 2000, Don M. Snider, Ph.D. (a retired career U.S. Army officer
and current Professor of Political Science at the United States Military Academy,
West Point) and Gayle L. Watkins, Ph.D. (a twenty-three-year U.S. Army veteran,
former director of the Leadership and General Management programs at the United
States Military Academy, and founder of the research and consulting firm Clove
Brook Enterprises) directed a study to address with academic rigor important
questions such as these. Their hope was to apply the skills of scholars from the social

ª 2004 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/15027570410005977

 Book Discussion 69

sciences and humanities to data from within the U.S. Army to gain precious insight
into the future of the Army profession. The results, custom published by McGraw-
Hill in 2002, are contained in twenty-two articles, three case studies, and nine
specific conclusions.
The articles in this dense anthology cover a wide range of topics, exploring
issues in civil-military relations, military training and the imparting of expert
knowledge, the effects of political and social changes on the military institution,
professional military ethics, effective leadership styles and the principles of ‘officer-
ship’, religion and the military, and the management of military personnel.
Although the study that serves as the foundation for this work is exclusively
focused on the U.S. Army, the volume contains much that will be of interest not
only to those in other branches of the U.S. military but also to those outside the
military and/or outside the U.S. To quote retired U.S. Army General Frederick M.
Franks, Jr., from the foreword to The Future of the Army Profession , ‘This anthology
will give readers issues galore to think about, and more’ (xiv), although he, like U.S.
Army Lieutenant General William J. Lennox, Jr., who penned the introduction,
warns that not all readers will agree with the authors’ conclusions regarding what
should be done to resolve the many pressing issues they raise.
In Chapter One, project directors Snider and Watkins identify what appears to
be wrong with the culture of the Army in its current state, based on the findings of
the study. Those currently serving in the U.S. Army report that since at least the
late 1990s the institution ‘has behaved more like a bureaucracy than a highly
effective military profession’ (9). They report ‘low morale caused by an excessively
bureaucratic personnel management system’ and ‘a serious gap in trust between
junior and senior Army officers’ (ibid.). This gap ‘is worsened by the rise of a ‘‘zero-
defects’’ mentality too often displayed by commanding officers at all levels’ (ibid.).
They further cite an increase in micromanagement and a lack of effective
mentoring. Snider and Watkins consider these failings to be contributing factors
to an overall inability for those in senior Army leadership positions ‘to view these
‘‘people’’ [junior officers and noncommissioned officers] as ‘‘professionals’’ and the U.S.
Army as a ‘‘profession,’’ or calling ’ (6). Insofar as readers share these worries, they
certainly will be inspired to investigate further the study’s conclusions and
recommendations. However, those unfamiliar with some of these troubling trends
also will benefit from the opportunity to consider the possible ramifications.
There is sufficient wealth of material in The Future of the Army Profession to
support a semester or more of lively discussion in a seminar course on military
leadership (or perhaps even one on leadership in general). James Burk’s excellent
essay on ‘Expertise, Jurisdiction, and Legitimacy of the Military Profession’ alone
could provide fodder for many debates. Burk offers an analysis of ‘the concept of the
‘‘professional soldier’’’ (19) that relies heavily on
/ but is not uncritical of
/ the
classic works by Huntington (The Soldier and the State , 1957) and Janowitz (The
Professional Soldier , 1960). He reminds us that Huntington’s prescription for an
effective professional military required a fairly autonomous military held under only
‘objective control’ by the civilian (political) authorities
/ and ‘by objective control
he meant that civilians would dictate the military security policy but leave the
military free to determine what military operations would secure the policy
objectives’ (26). Janowitz, on the other hand, argued for closing the civil-military
gap as far as possible: ‘[Janowitz] thought that effective civil-military relations in a
70 Shannon E. French

liberal democracy required that the military identify with and be representative of
the society it served. Isolation of the military from the larger society would reduce
professional effectiveness’ (ibid.).
In criticizing Huntington’s plea for leaving the military entirely to its own
devices, Burk charges that ‘[Huntington] ignores the possibility that professionals
(like all social groups) may act in ways contrary to the interests of the larger group’
(ibid.). Backing up this charge, Burk cites several examples, provided by sociologists,
of unhealthy patterns of behavior that can arise within any profession. These
include ‘cultivating an incapacity to grasp the insights from any perspective but
one’s own; treating the means of professional practice as if they were ends in
themselves, forgetting the original purpose they were intended to fulfill; acting to
protect the station and privileges of one’s group
/ service or branch
/ above any
other, simply because it is one’s own; shirking those tasks one is assigned to
undermine the assignment; or acting opportunistically to do what is required to
advance one’s career’ (ibid.).
This important issue of determining the optimal relationship between the
military institution and civil-political authorities is revisited later in the volume in
Section III, on ‘The Political-Social Arena’ (Chapters 10
/14). Especially good in this
section are the articles by Marybeth Peterson Ulrich (‘Infusing Civil-Military
Relations Norms in the Officer Corps’) and Lance Betros (‘Officer Professionalism
in the Late Progressive Era’). Ulrich offers two principles by which the military
profession should govern its interaction with politicians and the society it serves.
The first of these principles recognizes that ‘while there may be overlapping
competencies regarding the political leadership’s and military participants’ expert
knowledge relevant to national security, there are distinct differences in the
responsibility and authority of each within the political system’ (266). While this
point may seem self-evident, it is one often overlooked by both military and political
leaders who seek to do each other’s jobs. The second principle spotlights ‘the
military professional’s obligation to balance the functional and societal imperatives’
and cautions the military that it must remain ‘an entity that is ‘‘of’’ and not
‘‘separate from’’ the society it serves’ (ibid.). In other words, while officers ought not
to play politician, neither should they so divorce themselves from the democratic
process that they fail to appropriately advise civilian leaders or become an aloof
subculture that can no longer interact meaningfully with the broader society. Ulrich
seems to share Burk’s trepidation about allowing the military to become too isolated
and ‘in-bred’.
Betros is more occupied with the prospect that those in the military might
attempt to wield inappropriate influence in the political sphere. He addresses the
common charge that ‘the professionalism of today’s officer corps has declined, along
with its time-honored tradition of political neutrality’ (271). He acknowledges the
discomfiting impression held by many that, whether or not military leaders have
actually tried to usurp political roles themselves, they are guilty of taking sides for or
against particular political leaders or political parties. A perceived prevalence of
‘Clinton-bashing’ within the officer corps in the 1990s is cited as an example, as is
the more general military bias, especially prevalent among officers, in favor of the
Republican Party.
Taking the historical view, Betros convincingly debunks the idea that political
activism among members of the officer corps is anything new. He points to the
 Book Discussion 71

highly politicized military of the pre-World War I Progressive Era (during the first
administration of U.S. President Woodrow Wilson) and insists that ‘we must
disabuse ourselves of the notion of a mythic professionalism of an earlier age to
which contemporary critics sometimes allude in debates over the current state of
officer professionalism’ (284). He further asserts that ‘In many ways, today’s officers
adhere to higher professional standards than their forebears of the late Progressive
Era’ (ibid.). That said, Betros still sees room for improvement. Like Ulrich, he
appreciates that if political and military leaders continually try to do each other’s
jobs, neither will do their own jobs well. Therefore, he concludes with the
recommendation that ‘senior leaders must continuously reinforce the military
ethic, which embraces the notion of apolitical service to the nation and rejects
partisan efforts to mold public opinion, build political constituencies, and influence
policy decisions’ (285).
A number of other articles in the text also deal directly or indirectly with civil-
military relations, highlighting additional, pressing issues. Chapter Four, by
Leonard Wong and Douglas V. Johnson II (‘Serving the American People: A
Historical View of the Army Profession’) provides an excellent historical survey of
how the U.S. Army has evolved from 1781 to the present, trying to clear up many
misconceptions
/ including the belief that MOOTWs are a recent invention. Wong
and Johnson conclude:

Teaching the history of battles and campaigns that end with the military defeat
of the enemy’s forces is no longer adequate. The simple truth is that the Army
has spent most of its existence doing things other than war. It is time the
instruction in Army history be honestly presented to include all the other
seemingly mundane ‘stuff.’ And that is also ‘stuff’ in which the Army should
take equal pride of performance. . . . If the glory of combat operations is all that
officers are taught and acculturated to, their understanding of their jurisdic-
tion will suffer, they will mis-understand the breadth of their commitment, and
some will leave the profession feeling betrayed (73).

Along the same lines, in ‘Professionalism and Army Doctrine: A Losing Battle?’
James A. Blackwell argues that the Army ‘‘must seize the intellectual high ground’’
(120) by developing its own new ‘General Theory of War’ by which it can then
consistently train its officers from the start of their careers, giving them a clear
picture of what will be expected of them. In ‘The Army and Operations Other Than
War: Expanding Professional Jurisdiction’, Thomas L. McNaugher also urges the
Army to come to grips with the fact that ‘the Army’s operational tasks, and thus its
professional jurisdiction, seem destined to include MOOTW for the foreseeable
future’ (174). This will require the Army to figure out for itself what it will need to
successfully adjust its focus
/ which may include altering ‘force mix within the
active components and between its active and reserve components’ (ibid.)
/ rather
than allowing such changes to be forced upon them from the outside. The only real
alternative, explored in greater depth in a later chapter (Martin Cook’s ‘Army
Professionalism: Service to What Ends?’), would be for the Army to stop competing
for any jurisdictions beyond traditional war-fighting
/ understanding that, should it
do so, it may be assessed as less relevant and consequently suffer severe reductions
in resource allocation.
72 Shannon E. French

Other chapters in The Future of the Army Profession also touch on questions of
jurisdiction while addressing privatization issues, RMA (Revolutions in Military
Affairs), the Weinberger Doctrine, and joint operations. A significant percentage of
the volume, however, is focused on equally important but smaller-scale concerns
within the Army profession. ‘Trust in the Military Profession’, by Joseph J. Collins
and T.O. Jacob, includes a number of bar graphs displaying revealing data about
skepticism among the enlisted ranks, NCOs, and junior officers about their senior
leaders’ honesty, trustworthiness, and purity of motives. Collins and Jacob’s
research yields eight specific conclusions, among which are the following: ‘The
trust problem in units is evident in perceptions of quality of life, integrity, leader
selflessness, fairness in performance ratings, adequacy of rewards, the ability to
balance work and family time, the zero-defects mentality, and the level or over-
supervision, commonly known as micromanagement’, and ‘The trust problem
between people in the field and their most senior uniformed leaders revolves around
issues of plain speaking and perceived honesty or accuracy on the part of senior
leaders. Divergent perceptions of readiness (e.g. conditions in one’s unit versus what
was reported to higher headquarters or Congress) are particularly sensitive’ (56).
Chapter Five, ‘In Their Own Words: Army Officers Discuss Their Profession’, by
Gayle L. Watkins and Randi C. Cohen, contains the results from an extensive survey
of officers in the U.S. Army. The survey includes questions on the nature and
current state of the Army profession, on what it means to be a professional officer,
and also about the profession’s tasks, professional values, and the profession’s
proper jurisdiction. The collected data led Watkin and Cohen to six major
conclusions:

1. [T]he officer corps does not have a shared emphasis on or understanding of the
Army’s unique abstract knowledge, which is managing violence;
2. this lack arises from a failure to focus on the Army’s unique abstract
knowledge and an over-emphasis on another profession’s abstract knowledge,
that of social work;
3. the Army is bureaucratizing its professional expertise into checklists and forms,
thereby reducing the expertise of its officers, frustrating them in their attempts
to apply their knowledge and experience, and quite likely decreasing the
effectiveness of professional decisions;
4. social or behavioral controls over officers’ conduct are essential yet weaker
than Army officers consider ideal;
5. most officers are open to broadening the Army’s jurisdiction across the
spectrum of conflict; and
6. the Army and officers’ families are in competition over the officers’ professional
commitment: this remains an unresolved jurisdictional conflict (94).

The sociological problems brought out in these articles are, of course, closely
intertwined with corollary concerns in the area of professional military ethics.
Careerism and micromanagement, for example, can be viewed as moral failings,
springing from weak characters. The authors in Section IV of the book, ‘Ethics and
the Army Profession’ (Chapters 14
/16) tackle more explicitly the ethical dimen-
sions of military professionalism. John Mark Mattox’s article, ‘The Ties That Bind:
The Army Officer’s Moral Obligations’, is a compelling exploration of what it means
 Book Discussion 73

for an officer to be a ‘moral exemplar’ in war and in peace. Mattox’s central

assertion is that ‘By the nature of the profession of arms, only officers of firm moral
character can discharge adequately their professional obligations to the nation and
to their subordinates that they are called to lead’ (295). He does a particularly good
job of explaining how swearing their oath of office to the U.S. Constitution
/ to
ideals, not to a person
/ renders officers ‘bound to embody certain specific moral
virtues’ (301).
Returning once again to issues of civil-military relations in ‘Army Profession-
alism: Service to What Ends?’ military ethicist Martin Cook takes on the traditional
philosophical role of gadfly, challenging the way Snider and others have employed
the terms ‘professional’ and ‘professionalism’ in their analysis of the problems
plaguing the Army profession:

A number of points are striking about this analysis. First, it asserts that
‘intellectual independence from the society’ is, per se, unprofessional. I will
argue that the question of intellectual independence is considerably more
complex than this formulation suggests. Second, it presupposes that the
‘hesitancy’ of the Army to accept current missions is itself ‘cause for concern’
regarding the Army’s professionalism. Third, it offers a definition of the core
professional function ‘simply as serving the American society’. On each of
these points, I will argue that the correct analysis is considerably more
complex, and complex in ways that bear directly on a proper understanding of
professionalism for the future U.S. military (341).

By making the study’s opening assumptions fair game, Cook significantly

deepens the entire volume’s discernment. Rather than undermining the other
authors’ work, he adds another, more subtle level of understanding. In addition, he
reminds members of the military of their essential moral obligation to assert
themselves when they
/ due to their military expertise
/ recognize that their
political masters are set on a path of danger and folly. Borrowing the business
mantra ‘the customer is always right’ is not a viable option for the military. In the
case of the Vietnam War, for example, ‘the primary moral failure of the senior
officers is that they did not effectively exercise their intellectual independence and
insist, to the point of resignation if necessary, that their professional military
judgment be heard and accorded due weight by political leadership’ (343). Cook
further notes that a sound normative account of military professionalism must
include the prescriptions that members of the profession treat each other as
colleagues, that they study their own profession and its history, that they mentor
more junior members, and that they ‘create and sustain the intellectual creativity to
get ahead of environmental changes, embrace them, and. . .demonstrate the
intellectual flexibility to inspire the nation’s confidence that it can meet the
demands of the changing security environment with enthusiasm’ (353).
The Future of the Army Profession is rich with timely reflections on the true
nature of the military profession, its internal obligations to its members and its
external obligations to society, and its possible future evolution. As in any
anthology, some articles are more original and valuable than others, but there
are more than enough gems in this collection to satisfy a discerning reader. Most
importantly, this volume has the potential to help facilitate much needed
74 Shannon E. French

discussions in both military and civilian circles on how to stop the more pernicious
trends within the military profession and encourage the more auspicious ones.
Although these trends are specifically identified within the U.S. Army, they certainly
exist in other branches of the service within the U.S. military and doubtless similar
forces are at work in other military organizations worldwide. As the geo-political
climate evolves, members of the military profession everywhere must evaluate if and
how they want to evolve with it and responsible citizens must not ignore serious
concerns within the organizations designed to defend their way of life.

Reference
Matthews, Lloyd J., ed., 2002. The Future of the Army Profession . (Project Directors: Don M.
Snider and Gayle L. Watkins). Boston: McGraw-Hill.

Biography
Shannon E. French is an associate professor of philosophy in the Department
of Leadership, Ethics and Law at the United States Naval Academy. Dr. French
earned her PhD in Philosophy from Brown University in 1997. Her scholarship in
the field of military ethics includes a book on warrior values throughout history
entitled The Code of the Warrior (Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2003), reviewed
in this issue of Journal of Military Ethics .