‘I think the greatest gift anyone can give to another is the desire to know, to understand.’[1]—Louis L’Amour
The Australian Army must improve its approach to teaching defence mastery to its junior officers (JOs) to better prepare Army for now and the future. In his keynote address to the 2024 Chief of Army Symposium, Chief of Army (CA) Lieutenant General Simon Stuart introduced his intent for a ‘wholesale, holistic review of our profession’.[2] In this speech, he asked:
How do we best weave together the human elements of fighting power—the intellectual and the moral—with the physical elements, to become more than the sum of their parts? … we must ensure our profession is fit for today’s purpose … that we are ready to ‘fight tonight’.[3]
This quote highlights the central question to the CA’s review: is the Australian Army preparing itself and its people sufficiently for the next war and beyond? CA’s emphasis ‘[goes] beyond the physical component of fighting power’[4]—the equipment and platforms. Instead, it is centred on people and understanding the human face of war. As CA suggested, and this article argues, Army needs to enhance its professional expertise, its professional body of knowledge. Such a body of knowledge is essential to Army’s ‘intellectual edge’ and is fundamental to its ability to contribute to joint warfighting at a time of growing geostrategic competition and regional tension.
This article proposes that the Australian Army could be more prepared to ‘fight tonight’ and sustain long-term competition by enhancing its JO education to develop the Army mind—the individual component of an intellectual edge—and contribute to an Australian Army school of thought. As it stands, Army’s approach to JO education does not fully prepare the Army and its junior leaders for the challenges of today and tomorrow. The current system focuses JO development on technical and social mastery, excluding the deliberate teaching of defence mastery after initial officer training[5] until the Australian Command and Staff Course (ACSC)—10 years into an officer’s career.[6] While instilling the fundamentals of tactics and command is necessary for consolidating JO competency, this article contends that enhancing JO professional expertise goes beyond these things. Such measures, by themselves, are insufficient to address the complexities and challenges of today’s existing and emerging battlespace.
To enhance professional expertise as CA desires, a more structured, continuous and engaging approach to professional military education (PME) will need to be adopted—starting with reconceptualising defence mastery. For the purposes of this article, defence mastery is defined as ‘[the] deeper understanding of what, how and why Defence contributes to protecting and promoting Australia’s national interests’.[7] In considering this issue, this article treats professional expertise synonymously with the concept of professional mastery. Defence mastery is considered by the continuum of joint profession military education (JPME) to be: ‘the sum of an individual’s depth and breadth of knowledge and understanding of a profession combined judiciously with the ability to apply it through the lens of personal experience and intellect’.[8] Within Army, the study of defence mastery generally involves three topics: profession of arms, national security policy and strategy, and cognitive abilities.
This article will describe the current state of JO education and defence mastery in the Army, and the need for long-term investment in it. It will discuss the need for an intellectual edge within Army, and it will introduce the concept of the ‘Army mind’. The article will then relate this analysis to the concept of enhanced defence mastery. Finally, this article suggests ways to optimise the existing approach taken by Army to JO education programs in its efforts to foster defence mastery. Specifically, it proposes that defence mastery within Army be reconceptualised, and it provides key considerations to help achieve this. This article will not, however, address the challenges of implementing the above suggestions. Instead, it will focus on diagnosing the problem and optimising Army’s current approach to PME. This is simply the first step to better conceiving and implementing PME within the Australian Army. As part of this limitation, this article does not conduct a comparative analysis of Royal Australian Navy (RAN) or Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) PME approaches—though this is worth investigation in another body of work. Further, it does not seek to challenge the relationships established in the JPME continuum, specifically between the concepts of professional mastery and defence mastery. These relationships, and related definitions, deserve analysis; however, there is insufficient scope within an article of this nature to do so comprehensively.
The Current State of Army PME
People are the foundation of war, capability, and military advantage.[9] Given this, Army needs officers who, in the words of retired Major General Mick Ryan, have the capacity ‘to thrive in ambiguity, to exploit fleeting opportunities and the ability to continuously learn about their ever-changing environment’.[10] They must be able to interpret and adapt to changes in the character of war as new technologies affect the profession. JOs have a significant role to play in guaranteeing institutional success in the information age. This is broadly the intent of the JPME continuum, published by the Australian Defence College, which states the ‘fundamental goal [of JPME] is to develop transferable abilities for unforeseen challenges’.[11] The JPME continuum approaches this goal through a pyramid model addressing themes related to technical, social and defence mastery—each with its own sub-topics.
While the JPME continuum has a broad focus, JO education emphasises the achievement of technical mastery—core domain and specialist skills and procedures—over defence mastery.[12] This means that while the induction level of JPME taught at initial officer training provides a foundation in defence mastery for officer cadets, this does not continue in a directed or structured manner at the second JPME level: the intermediate level. Rather, at the intermediate level of the JPME continuum—between lieutenant and major—the focus is on developing tactical and technical expertise as well as the basics of leadership and command. JOs learn how to contribute to the fight within their service and specialisation.[13] The all-corps officer training continuum (ACOTC) is the main formal mechanism for developing tactical mastery. It involves a series of corps-specific and all-corps courses at lieutenant, captain and major ranks. Through ACOTC, Army systematically develops officers with strong abilities in tactics, command and leadership—that is, technical and social mastery in the JPME continuum. In addition to tactical mastery, career courses prepare students for command and staff roles in units. In this regard, ACOTC courses are useful in ensuring sufficient staff-trained officers are available to support the functioning of the Australian Army in war—and are a continuation of a long tradition of similar courses dating back to the early 1910s.[14] ACOTC produces officers who are technically and tactically proficient within their specialisation and service but have little formal development in the concept of defence mastery.
Currently, defence mastery is comprehensively introduced at the mid-career point through ACSC, otherwise known as Staff College. This approach is largely the same as that which existed in 1938, with Australia’s first Command and Staff College.[15] Prior to Staff College, defence mastery is predominantly studied through informal PME. Informal PME encompasses those learning activities which occur outside the military’s schools and formal processes. They might take place in units, in messes, or via blogs. They might also involve, for example, informal social discussions, reading, mentoring relationships, or self-study. On-the-job training (OJT) is another mechanism for developing officers. However, this type of learning takes place incidentally and is reinforced through practical workplace experience. It is not a directed and structured approach. While OJT is an important mechanism for achieving PME, it suffers from many of the same challenges as informal PME—being reliant on the specific job and supervisor as well as being siloed within posting cycles.
Although informal PME is a strength of Army and one valued by its people, it is insufficient by itself to develop defence mastery and achieve an intellectual edge.[16] The current state of informal PME is described as ‘ad hoc and personality based’.[17] This state does not adequately develop the Army mind because it lacks direction and structure. This is particularly true for achieving defence mastery. Even where significant resources exist, such as COVE+ (Army’s online PME repository), there is no core syllabus to direct learning. COVE+ is composed of a series of short courses, ranging between 10 and 40 hours of learning. These courses are grouped into modules based on broad topics, such as ‘Art and Science of War’ and ‘Art and Science of Thinking’.[18] Internally, each course is well structured to guide learners through that particular topic. However, the only structure that exists external to each course is the module groupings previously mentioned and a quasi-structure implied by hours required per course. In other words, the COVE+ does not feature any kind of syllabus to guide learners between courses to develop nested understanding.[19] While this unstructured approach can be a strength of informal PME because it enables flexible and self-paced learning, greater direction is required if learners are to fully understand organisational problems and priorities, and to navigate the plethora of resources, both credible and un-credible.[20]
The lack of focus on defence mastery and the absence of formal military education for the first 10 years of an officer’s career in the Army is untenable.[21] Students arrive at Staff College with limited awareness of their broader profession, both single service and joint—risking bad habits and misinformed views. Despite the ADF recognising that this approach is inadequate, previous reform efforts have been stymied by ‘the ADF’s unwillingness, or inability, to take ownership of core professional knowledge’.[22] The success of the ADF as an integrated force capable of joint warfare rests, in part, on the willingness of the RAN, Army and RAAF—the organs to which uniformed members belong—to invest in JPME. While JOs must master the fundamentals of technical and social mastery, focusing solely on these aspects fails to broaden their minds sufficiently and inadequately prepares them for war and command. It further denies the organisation the opportunity to be informed by fresh minds who can help shape the profession. Improving the direction and structure of Army’s approach to defence mastery will enhance its professional expertise and intellectual depth. Achieving this begins with affirming the need and purpose of developing an ‘Army mind’ before addressing a more clearly defined and structured framework for Army PME.
An Intellectual Edge and the Army Mind
Achieving enhanced defence mastery will contribute to generating Army’s intellectual edge and will develop the Army mind. Defence mastery develops judgement, both practical and intellectual, which can offset declining technological advantage. An intellectual edge is ‘a relative state of collectively performing at a higher cognitive level than our adversaries’.[23] This collective performance is gained through institutional and individual intellectual practices.[24] An intellectual edge goes beyond thinking and adapting more quickly than an adversary. It is also about anticipating (not predicting) changes in war. It involves understanding those elements of both change and continuity as part of an organisation’s ability to anticipate and adapt before, during and after conflict. It does not simply entail the achievement of better cognitive abilities; it also requires knowledge of the Army profession to identify and address the tactical, operational and strategic problems which inhibit military effectiveness now and into the future. An intellectual edge matters across the entire span of competition and conflict, both short and long term.
PME helps develop an intellectual edge through the expertise it imparts, the cognitive skills it grows, and the problems it helps to solve. When General James Mattis, USMC, wrote on the importance of reading (as self-study), he was also alluding to the value of PME. His famous remarks are a simple yet profound articulation of its importance:
By reading, you learn through others’ experiences, generally a better way to do business, especially in our line of work where the consequences of incompetence are so final for young men. Thanks to my reading, I have never been caught flat-footed by any situation, never at a loss for how any problem has been addressed (successfully or unsuccessfully) before. It doesn’t give me all the answers, but it lights what is often a dark path ahead.[25]
The Army mind is the individual component of the intellectual edge and embodies an understanding of the fundamentals of land power and the Army profession. The Army mind is one that can think both tactically and strategically, and do so at the right time, to make effective decisions.[26] Through developing the Army mind, JOs master the propositional and conceptual elements of professional expertise—not simply its procedures. The Army mind assists in creating officers who continually refine their trade to achieve excellence across tactics, operational art, and strategy—similar to how a generation of British naval officers, embodied by Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson, refined their profession to create the peak of British sea power at the turn of the 19th century.[27] The problems facing joint warfighting, land power and even individual corps’ tactics have not decreased. Trends in the character of war, such as increasing technological parity, new forms of mass, and changing appreciations of time, demand an intellectual edge to win.[28] Further, technological change will complement—not replace—the need to develop professional expertise to address the challenges of combat and conflict. Humans are the users of technology,[29] and militaries will always need to connect technologies with concepts to achieve military advantage. This is why developing the Army mind matters—it is a key part of every individual’s intellectual edge.
By enhancing defence mastery—and thus officers’ intellectual edge—JOs can be employed more effectively across the span of competition and conflict. Their job in war, as already established, is tactics and command with the aim of winning battles. Grounding officers in tactics and command is clearly important to military effectiveness. Nevertheless, issues such as emerging technologies, climate change and social trends—as well as the constantly changing character of war—all demand more of military leaders. Creating officers who have the professional expertise to think about and solve the problems they confront, tactical or otherwise, is the essence of an intellectual edge. Defence mastery should complement tactical mastery by providing the intellectual foundation and arguments to engage in debates around changes in the character of war. JOs can bring their recent experience and fresh perspectives to debates about tactical, operational and strategic challenges. JOs can also elevate the perspectives of soldier practitioners to the staff officers who lead and manage capability. Yet too often, JOs are left without the professional intellectual foundation to influence these debates. Their insights remain an untapped resource that should be harnessed to help generate Army’s intellectual edge—especially through the development of a collective intellectual framework such as an Army school of thought.
JOs have the potential to contribute more to an Australian Army school of thought to help solve institutional challenges in the face of a changing character of war—it is part of the institutional component of an intellectual edge. A school of thought is described as ‘a way of thinking’[30] or ‘a set of ideas and opinions that a group of people share about a matter’.[31] A school of thought is part of the collective, or institutional, component of an intellectual edge. It does not comprise simply doctrine and concepts (which might be inputs or outputs); nor is it simply a component of strategic culture—although this is an obvious influence on any military school of thought. Whereas doctrine is considered to be a command and planning tool,[32] an Army school of thought is an intellectual framework to identify, frame, and address contemporary and future military problems. A school of thought informs concepts, which are the ‘agreed ideas to address a future military problem’.[33] An Army school of thought is as much about the agreed problems to be solved as it is about the shared intellectual culture and foundations of the institution—it encapsulates the approach Army takes to the challenges it faces. The agreed problems of a school of thought might be unique to Army or might be common among the three services, RAN, Army and RAAF. Examples of this latter type of problem might be command and control or joint fires. Army will have a different view on how to achieve joint interoperability when compared to the RAN or the RAAF, and even when compared to other nations’ armies. The Australian Army’s distinct perspective on both problems and solutions contributes to intellectual diversity and the competition of ideas, both within and beyond Army. An Australian Army school of thought contributes to effective institutional problem-solving and innovation for future military effectiveness.
JOs, with strong intellectual foundations, can contribute to solving operational and tactical problems. In The Arms of the Future, Jack Watling describes the difficulties militaries face in effective transformation. He argues that current visions of the future are inadequate—overly focused on technical possibility and strategic impact—and thus fail to address the operational and tactical challenges of future war. Watling contends that the absent elements of institutional problem-solving mean militaries struggle to envision alternatives to their current models and thus tend to optimise for existing concepts over pursuing new ones.[34] JOs can be armed with the knowledge and language to offer their experiences and observations to staff officers tasked with developing Army’s future capabilities, concepts, and doctrine. Furthermore, junior members of the profession may be less constrained by prevailing wisdom—adding to the innovativeness of Army. JOs may help to answer the questions of ‘what new tools are available, what does it take to employ them in a coherent manner, and therefore what pieces are available to be assigned by operational planners?’[35] JOs may not solve complex military problems alone, but they can better contribute to a bottom-up approach in efforts to analyse the future character of war by virtue of their tendency to focus on tactical and technical expertise. Innovation is an important output of an intellectual edge, but this innovation only serves to sustain military effectiveness and advantage. The Army school of thought developed through defence mastery helps create an institutional intellectual edge by bringing together diverse perspectives to solve common problems.
An Investment in the Future
Some within Army may consider that efforts to improve Army’s approach to defence mastery, and PME generally, for JOs are distractions from core business. They are not. A more clearly defined PME pathway for defence mastery would be part of a long-term investment in officers as military professionals—more than a ‘quick win’ with immediate rewards. It would provide officers with a broader military context to support their pursuit of excellence within their assigned roles, without seeking to make them into operational artists[36] or strategists at the wrong time. Knowledge gained through PME remains relevant throughout an officer’s career regardless of the length of time they serve or the professional pathway they take. Furthermore, there is a long lead-time for intellectual development—it requires years of nurturing. It takes time for individuals to achieve sufficient knowledge and experience to make expert judgements. Providing courses to officers just prior to their commencing a role may be adequate when their responsibilities are limited to procedural duties and training, but it deprives individuals and Army the opportunity to think deeply about military effectiveness and advantage. Enhancing defence mastery provides several benefits to individuals and the institution in the short, medium and long term.
In the short term, defence mastery reinforces the fundamental relationship between the military functions of tactics, operational art, and strategy. In practice, these functions are mutually supporting and involve interdependent activities—they are not discrete ‘levels of war’ as they are often conceptualised.[37] Sir Lawrence Freedman describes how distinctions between strategy and tactics are blurred in practice. This is because their dialectic relationship creates a feedback loop that shapes one another.[38] This dialectic makes it important for JOs to better understand defence mastery so they can appreciate the broader aspects of the Army profession. While JOs may focus on tactical activities, the quality of the tactical outcomes they produce within their domains and specialisations inevitably shapes the strategic options available to higher command.[39] Similarly, ensuring JOs understand the interconnected relationship between tactical decisions and strategic outcomes helps avoid a disconnect developing between strategy and tactics if institutional weaknesses exist at the operational level. In this regard, Major General Andrew Hocking’s review of Australia’s Afghanistan campaign noted:
Failure to invest at the operational level generates increased risk that sacrifices made at the tactical level will not align with or contribute to desired outcomes at the strategic level.[40]
Connecting strategy, operational art, and tactics will be important to unifying military efforts, particularly as the notion of an operational level of war is being increasingly challenged as inadequate.[41] While structural and procedural changes to methods of warfare may work to resolve this, JOs with enhanced defence mastery are an equally, if not more, important investment.
In the medium term, earlier introduction to defence mastery would prepare JOs for their next career stage, when they need to become operational artists. Such a measure would allow for a new vision for the ACSC—one in which it focuses on domain consolidation and joint integration.[42] ACSC is typically the point at which officers ‘transition from tactically focussed activities to building excellence in higher level joint activities’.[43] Ryan notes this is also the point where education ‘nurtures the capacity for more strategic understanding while building expertise in the operational art’.[44] Developing the Army mind at a junior level leads to a more nuanced approach to the concept of operational art and generates officers who are better able to contribute to the joint operational echelons of the ADF that focus on ‘achieving a convergence of military tools across warfighting domains’.[45] Instead of providing an introduction to these broader professional ideas, ACSC could shift its focus towards consolidating and integrating them within the three services. A revised ACSC curriculum could also complement civilian analysis and existing ADF efforts (such as those led by the Future Land Warfare Directorate) by acting ‘as think tanks and idea incubators for the wider military institution’.[46] This approach would see a portion of the ACSC curriculum used to solve real institutional problems, akin to how the US Naval War College was used prior to the Second World War to develop War Plan Orange across the plan’s various iterations.[47] ACSC students would be guided and mentored by experts and supported by resources. This framework would position the ADF to apply collective mental effort to problems informed by material that is not available in, for example, open-source PME blogs.[48]
In addition to preparing officers for career progression, the study of defence mastery would assist them to assume higher responsibilities in the event of mobilisation. In a wartime scenario, it is likely that Army will rapidly grow, requiring officers to assume greater responsibility than in peace. Rapid organisational expansion may preclude many officers from attending military educational institutions, such as ACSC. Instead, they may be offered an abridged course focusing on the immediate practicalities required to join a staff, with an emphasis on standardised solutions (rather than broader aspects of war), and inducting them into a community of thought.[49] History has shown that this can occur due to the demand for more people forcing education and training establishments to emphasise quantity over quality, as occurred in the British Army during the First and Second World Wars[50] and in the United States Navy in the Second World War.[51] As with any effort to develop strategic understanding, developing professional expertise on the broader aspects of war, and inculcating a community of thought among military personnel, cannot be surged in crisis. Introduction to defence mastery at an early stage in a JO’s career would ensure a baseline of professional expertise is achieved at all levels, resulting in Army being better prepared to accept the inevitable challenges of mobilisation.
In the long term, achieving defence mastery is part of the continuous development of professional expertise. PME cannot stop at ACSC. PME is a career-long endeavour for all Army professionals, both soldiers and senior officers—in this, the need for sound PME programs does not dissipate beyond O4 (major) rank. Although such programs of learning already exist, they tend to be for star-ranking officers. This situation has led Evans to comment on the existence of a second 10-year gap in professional education between ACSC and the senior Defence and Strategic Studies Course.[52] Improving institutional efforts to achieve defence mastery throughout the officer career continuum can help address this gap by enabling officers to continue their professional education between O4 and star ranks. Enhancing defence mastery also supports the identification and development of strategists. Writing in 2021, Ryan discussed the failure of the ADF to consistently generate strategic thinkers and strategists. He noted that many individuals in strategic roles, particularly senior leaders, only receive training immediately prior to assuming their leadership positions. This is too late to be developing strategic thinkers—something that Ryan notes cannot be surged in a crisis but requires long-term investment.[53] Senior officers must master operational art and develop strong strategic thinking skills before they become eligible for star-rank, not at the point of promotion.
The investment in JOs through defence mastery has several enduring applications beyond those benefits mentioned above, such as enabling mission command, preparing officers to cope with surprise, and facilitating organisational change (adaptation and innovation). These three enduring aspects of defence mastery are detailed below. In the case of mission command, defence mastery augments the capacity of JOs to understand and contextualise the commander’s intent, which improves the quality of their decision-making. This observation applies to JOs in both command and staff roles. The importance of mission command in staff roles is perhaps less discussed, but the continuous evolution of the modern battlefield makes this aspect increasingly important, as BA Friedman describes:
The difference on the modern battlefield isn’t the number of troops or tanks, but the right kind of teams sharing the right information … It’s less about staffs that can feed information to the commander, and more about staffs that can run an OODA loop based on the commander’s intent.[54]
Friedman’s description clearly indicates the importance of mission command in contemporary conflict. Trends such as distributed operations and contested electromagnetic environments place a high premium on commanders exercising sound judgement across all levels. Developing the Army mind, through defence mastery, hones their capacity to achieve this. Defence mastery further creates trust between commanders through the relationships formed in the shared intellectual development of the Army mind. In this way, Army is better able to apply the principles of mission command to exploit an intellectual edge.
Another enduring benefit of enhancing defence mastery among JOs is that it improves their capacity to cope with surprise. Although new technologies are making the battlespace increasingly transparent and are enhancing command and control, there is still room for surprise on the modern battlefield.[55] In this environment, officers must be able to both cope with and exploit surprise in its various forms.[56] Defence mastery improves the capacity of JOs to recognise and understand surprise beyond the immediate ‘actions on’ that training provides. It also helps prevent the mental shock that often accompanies surprise, as well as assisting officers to identify opportunities to exploit surprise. This is particularly important, as surprise has become a requirement for successful tactical action on the modern battlefield.[57]
Change, through adaptation and innovation, is a hallmark of military affairs across the spectrum of conflict. Change exists through every function and layer of the organisation, from tactics to strategy and from platoon level to the army organisation as a whole. Militaries seek to gain advantage over an adversary through change. While training and ethos are important in creating individuals able to navigate change, so too is education. General Guilio Douhet, an Italian air power theorist, wrote in 1921 that ‘[victory] smiles upon those who anticipate the change in the character of war, not upon those who wait to adapt themselves after the changes occur’.[58] However, adaptation does not stop after the commencement of hostilities. Militaries must be able to survive day one and then continue adapting—as the Russia-Ukraine War demonstrates.[59] Accordingly, Army needs to anticipate and prepare for a future war while being adaptive enough to adjust throughout. Enhanced defence mastery provides the intellectual foundations to achieve adaptation and innovation through the process of change.
Optimising Defence Mastery
To improve defence mastery, better direction and structure is required to connect the JPME continuum to the Army context. Defence mastery should complement technical mastery through joint operational understanding and strategic awareness. This means redefining defence mastery to more fully reflect the studies required to achieve professional expertise. It means being explicit not just about the importance of cognitive abilities and strategy but also about the distinct need to study land power and joint warfighting alongside foundational topics such as the relationship between military and society. CA Directive 11/24 takes the first step towards this aspiration by directing the creation of an Army PME plan.[60] To be effective, this plan will need to amount to more than the rank-based reading list currently published periodically by CA. Instead, Army members will need lenses through which to interpret what they read and watch. These lenses need to be relevant to the organisation’s priorities and challenges, while not being restrictive. The PME plan must therefore aid officers and soldiers alike to pursue defence mastery throughout their careers by providing accessible lenses to achieve it.
This article proposes that defence mastery should be divided into sub-elements, or topics, to better guide units and individuals to develop the Army mind. These topics connect the abstract notions of PME and defence mastery to practical learning guides. The first three studies—land power, joint warfighting, and professional foundation studies—are a devolution of the singular ‘the profession of arms’ topic, which is already incorporated as a sub-element within the JPME continuum. The remaining two studies, ‘national security policy and strategy’ and ‘cognitive abilities’ are not new topics but this article proposes a framework within which they can be studied more systematically.[61] By breaking down defence mastery in this way, these studies can bridge the divide between military training and academic education to ensure they are cohesively enhancing military effectiveness.[62] These topics address what Evans describes as ‘studies which draw on academic and military knowledge, but which are designed to promote the effectiveness and viability of military organisations’.[63] In other words, they affect military effectiveness and are concerned with understanding war. The five areas of study are further explored below—noting, however, that these topics are not mutually exclusive; they frequently overlap.
Land Power Studies. This topic is central to developing the Army mind. The purpose of land power studies is to develop the Army mind and contribute to an Army school of thought. To achieve this, land power studies entail domain-centric learning focused on the design, development, sustainment and application of land forces. Land power studies also include the study of interdisciplinary topics relevant to military effectiveness in the land domain. Exploring this topic must be more than a doctrine walkthrough—it should span the breadth of military history and cover war in its various dimensions.[64] It should include study on the principles of land power to enable officers to solve contemporary problems and to anticipate the future of land warfare.
Joint Warfighting Studies. Major General Smith, Deputy Chief of Army (DCA), noted the historical continuity of all-domain warfare when he wrote ‘It is not new; we’re just going to do it with new stuff’ .[65] In this context, joint warfighting studies builds understanding of the interrelationships between domains in all-domain warfare. It provides the intellectual link between domain mastery and joint warfighting, between the Army and the integrated force. The topic describes the nature of warfare domains (land, sea, air, space, and information) and how land power is affected by—and affects—the other domains. DCA underscored the relevance of such study when he described a vision of ‘all-domain warfare’, which he defined as ‘a battle fought in one domain for an effect in another’.[66]Army has a professional obligation to develop and sustain expertise in joint warfare in addition to land warfare. For example, Army members might study British naval theorist Sir Julian Corbett and American naval strategist Admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan to understand the dynamics of sea power—relevant given Army’s renewed focus on littoral operations and a long-range land and maritime strike capability.[67]
Professional Foundation Studies. These studies are relevant to the military as a profession and are often domain-agnostic. Professional foundation studies aim to develop an understanding of the military and the Army as a profession, not just an occupation. They are about the history and sociology of the profession of arms, and they are about war as a phenomenon.[68] They build breadth and depth of knowledge beyond more traditional studies in tactics, operational art, and strategy. When they do consider these conventional topics, professional foundational studies emphasise their philosophical aspects with the purpose of enabling students to gauge the organisational ‘health’ of the Army profession.
National Security Policy and Strategy. This topic already exists within the current JPME continuum. It focuses on generating understanding of strategy, the application of military power as an instrument of national power, and Australia’s place in the regional and global context.[69] This topic has some overlap with professional foundation studies as the focus is not dissimilar; however, where professional foundation studies emphasise the profession, national security policy and strategy focuses on practice. While the topic is generally regarded as of most benefit to officers after ACSC,[70] Hocking observes that it is also highly relevant to JOs:
[The] understanding of national and military strategic objectives at the tactical level is in many ways central to the ‘soldier/state compact’. It both guides and motivates tactical action and in doing so reduces the risk of moral injury that is associated with unclear purpose.[71]
Cognitive Abilities. Like national security policy and strategy, this topic is already included within the existing JPME continuum. It involves aspects of defence mastery as well as technical and social mastery. It exists as a standalone topic due to its importance—it requires explicit emphasis. This is because cognitive abilities are a prerequisite for enhancing defence mastery and developing an Army mind that has the attributes needed to succeed in warfare. Cognitive abilities entail more than the capacity to frame and solve problems, or the faculty to think critically and creatively. They also encompass the capacity to adapt and thrive in chaotic environments—to be what Peter Roberts describes as the ‘antifragile fighter’.[72] Guided education can provide an effective way to enhance cognitive abilities among military members, thus improving the organisation’s ability to adapt and innovate.
While adding the topics ‘land power’, ‘joint warfighting’ and ‘professional foundation studies’ to the study of defence mastery promises to enhance the professional abilities of officers, Army requires a more detailed PME pathway. To this end, Table A proposes specific themes that should be addressed within each topic (except for ‘cognitive abilities’ because it is composed of skills developed through practical engagement with the other topics, rather than through its own themes). In essence, these directed themes provide an element of strategic design to guide efforts to develop the Army mind, to foster discussion about topics from different perspectives and understandings, and to help connect informal PME and self-study with formal education. The themes do this by helping to provide direction about the Army’s intellectual priorities at an organisational level without curtailing the flexibility of informal PME. They provide an institutional framework for engaging in PME without dictating the means of engagement. They allow flexibility for individuals to explore their own interests, thus contributing to the intellectual diversity of the organisation. The themes reflect both the agreed problems at the heart of the Army’s school of thought and the core knowledge required within the Army profession. Importantly, they are resilient to changes in the world—unrestricted by a learning management program that may take months to change and be outdated again by the time it is released. Ultimately, the themes outlined in Table 1 support what Ryan calls ‘a nucleus around which we can build individually tailored intellectual developments’.[73]
| Professional Foundation Studies | Joint Warfighting Studies | Land Power Studies | National Security Policy and Strategy | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Themes |
|
|
|
|
* Indicates themes drawn from Vincible Ignorance[74]
** Indicates themes adapted from Studying Airpower[75]
Each of the themes outlined in Table 1 supports officers to enhance their knowledge of history, theory and doctrine and to reflect on relevant experiences that contribute to their achievement of defence mastery. Given the practical nature of the military profession, the topics and their supporting themes should be studied in the same manner in which Sir Michael Howard suggests practitioners study military history: in width, depth and context.[76] This means to study across the width of time to view change and continuity, in depth to avoid the artificial order imposed on events and systems by rationalists,[77] and in context to grasp that wars are fought by societies, not solely militaries.[78] To study defence mastery in this way requires commitment to continuously learn about the Army profession and the profession of arms more generally. To ensure that maximum benefit is achieved, there are some further relevant considerations outlined below.
Intellectual Rigour. This is an essential quality of military studies because achieving defence mastery requires deeply and seriously engaging with the themes and topics for a practical purpose—that of war. There is a danger of credentialism in this type of education—to acquire qualifications for their own sake rather than to enhance intellectual capacity. This has been a recurring theme in many reviews of Australian military education, to the point where Evans argues:
[The ADF] saw the development of an institutional mindset that fostered dependence over independence; credentialism over creativity; academic stricture over professional knowledge; and superficial understanding over serious study.[79]
The purpose of military studies is in their application to practical problems confronting the military and the nation. The knowledge and ideas explored through such studies are tools for achieving clear and critical thought based on evidence and sound logic.[80] It is far too easy to accept the views of others when the demands of work (and life) diminish one’s capacity to develop the mind and critically analyse others’ views—regardless of whether they come from senior officers, academics or other commentators. The cost of sloppy thinking in peacetime might only be felt in money or time, whereas during war it will manifest in the loss of blood and lives. No commander or leader wants to reflect and say they could have done more. The First World War is an example of this occurring in the most tragic way. The French Army’s entrenched belief in an ‘offensive spirit’ failed to survive the bullets and artillery of the Western Front, leading to the deaths of 300,000 French soldiers in first month of the war alone.[81] Every officer, as a member of the profession of arms, owes it to their soldiers and themselves to develop their professional expertise in a practical and realistic way. In the next war, particularly as a middle power, and even when operating in a coalition, the cost to Australia of poor thinking is likely to be defeat.
Instructional Cadre. To improve defence mastery, Army needs a cadre of officers, with demonstrated intellectual rigor and research skills who can teach professional studies.[82] The requirements of these educators differ to those of educators in training roles, meaning that existing military and recruit instructor cadres are unsuited for this purpose. Instead, the instructional cadre needs to be more akin to officers posted to the Australian War College as directing staff. These educators should possess the qualities of officer-teachers who are able to coach students through reflective practices and discussions and inspire their intellectual reflection and curiosity. They should possess research skills to enable them to engage in research activities outside of their teaching roles and to maintain the corpus of professional knowledge. They should play a key role in adapting Army’s educational approaches to the realities of modern warfare. Developing such a cadre will take time to fully embed into the career management process but, fortunately, suitable officers already exist across Army. The challenge is to harness the career management processes to develop those who show potential for this kind of instructional work and ensure they are placed in the right roles to teach professional studies. Further, it is important that these educators are recognised and rewarded for their efforts—if officers lose out on career opportunities due to this role, it will make this initiative short-lived.
Army already possesses institutions that can underpin land power education. The Australian Army Research Centre (AARC), for example, conducts research into some of the relevant topics and fields. However, AARC research—and output—is primarily oriented towards senior leaders and decision-makers, rather than towards providing products of an educative nature. Whether the AARC, the Army G7 (the staff section responsible for training and education), or some other entity is the responsible agency, there exists a need for an outreach function. This function should provide access to experts who can conduct PME activities where and when they are needed and develop learning courses that can delivered by units to supplement what is delivered by such experts.[83]
Reflective Practice and Mentoring. These conditions are both essential for developing the Army mind. This is particularly true in the absence of any instructional cadre or a systematic approach to the achievement of defence mastery. Reflection is the process by which experience becomes wisdom. It is perhaps the fundamental process of learning, by synthesising new experiences and knowledge with the old to increase understanding. As observed by Shane Parrish, a former Canadian intelligence officer, ‘Reflection is the grunt work of thinking … If we read and don’t reflect, we only have the illusion of knowledge’.[84] Reflective practice is often undertaken by an individual, so there is the need to support such efforts with mentorship and discussion. Writing for the US Navy, BJ Armstrong and John Freymann state that ‘it is the responsibility of every leader to develop the intellectual professionalism of the men and women who serve with them’.[85] In an Australian context, this requires superiors to make time to engage with their subordinates to mentor them across all three elements of the JPME continuum.
Discussion Forums. These forums are an enabler of the study of defence mastery. They include blogs, journals and even podcasts. Discussion forums allow members to share ideas across the organisation, at all levels, without the limitations of location. Army possesses a number of these forums, such as The Cove and the Australian Army Journal. It is important that these resources exist to provide members from different specialisations the opportunity to discuss and debate the problems and ideas relevant to their community. Existing forums tend to be general in nature, attempting to be one-size-fits-all. Where this is not the case, forums tend to focus on strategic issues rather than on ‘smaller’ problems of particular units and specialisations. Army needs the forums that exist, but it also needs ‘watering holes’ that can deal with ‘more specific topics of interest to only some subset of specialists’.[86] The establishment of specialist forums might also help overcome another limitation of existing platforms: that they are predominantly open source and thus inhibit discussion due to security requirements. Creating a separate forum within a system classified at the ‘protected’ level or higher could help contribute an intellectual edge within Army. In this regard, the Australian Defence Education Learning Environment (Protected) is one existing mechanism that could be used for this purpose. Messes are another place in which professional discussions can occur. Although mess culture has dwindled in recent years, messes are still recognised as an important space for PME.[87]
While this article has focused on optimising the achievement of defence mastery within the existing Army education system, it can be further enhanced by creating a more systematic approach to educating for war. To support the intellectual development of military professionals, such an approach to PME should commence in the first decade before officers attend ACSC. It should provide a way to continually engage in the long-term development of individuals to achieve an intellectual edge. Making the time available to learn in the face of Army’s persistently high tempo of activities and ongoing changes is vital to any such long-term effort. Even if a systematic approach were introduced in the near term, it would need to be sustained in order to maximise results. This may be difficult to achieve because the results of the measures proposed here may not be evident for several years, perhaps decades, as officers move through Army and as the approach finds its mark. Therefore, long-term investment would need to be maintained across successive Chiefs of Army to ensure this systematic approach persists and is able to help intellectually prepare Army for long-term competition.
Achieving a systematic approach to the achievement of defence mastery within Army would require a transformative effort. One proposal is Evans’s recommendation to reorientate formal PME delivery from exclusively episodic residential courses (at 10-year intervals)—which he regards as more suited to industrial-age education—to a system of continuous career-long learning. This needs to include blended short courses that can deliver professional studies between residential milestones. Such efforts could be based on the Centre for Defence Research’s short course model.[88] Further, the elements of defence mastery could be better included within existing ACOTC courses to create additional deliberate touchpoints for intellectual development. Complementing these efforts, COVE+ could be reorganised to more clearly reflect the topics and themes proposed in Table 1 and could provide a suggested syllabus to support each topic, including core and elective modules. Measures like these would better introduce officers to an Army school of thought and an intellectual culture that would support developing the Army mind.[89]
Conclusion
The concept of defence mastery is an important missing element in efforts to develop the Army mind of JOs. Although is introduced during initial officer training , defence mastery is not consolidated or adequately updated until Staff College, which is typically 10 to 15 years into an officer’s career. Instead, the intervening period focuses primarily on the generation of tactical expertise. This situation limits the development of Army’s professional expertise and the intellectual edge needed to prepare Army to fight tonight and compete long term.
The Army mind needs to be developed during Army officers’ formative years in order to generate a solid understanding of the profession beyond an exclusively tactical or technical perspective. Earlier introduction to defence mastery benefits Army’s professional expertise and military effectiveness by developing an Army school of thought that can contribute to an intellectual edge in response to conflict and long-term competition. Such an approach would represent a departure from the current system, which is overly reliant on informal and often self-directed PME prior to officers’ attendance at ACSC. Better defining the elements of defence mastery, however, would better position JOs to develop an Army mind that would enhance their effectiveness in both command and staff roles. It would also inculcate JOs in an Army school of thought consistent with the sustainment of Army’s professional expertise and military effectiveness, including its contribution to joint warfare. Further, it would enable Army to better focus the learning opportunities provided by ACSC. In sum, the measures proposed in this article represent a fundamental shift in Army’s weight of effort for PME—from a system that largely ignores the concept of defence mastery during an officer’s formative years prior to ACSC, to one that favours continuous professional development with a focus on integration and consolidation of learning to achieve both Army and joint effects.
This article has provided several suggestions to help optimise Army’s existing approach to defence mastery—although it has not addressed the challenges of implementation. Instead, it recommends reframing the concept of defence mastery from its current focus on three topics to a focus on five topics. This new framework for JPME better articulates the areas of study necessary to achieve defence mastery and positions ACSC to focus on consolidation and integration of defence mastery, rather than the introduction of those broader professional ideas. This article has proposed that each of the learning topics related to defence mastery should be supported by themes that provide a more clearly defined structure for interpretation and study, while preserving a degree of flexibility to approach each topic and theme in a variety of ways. The article also suggests that Army more deeply consider the importance of intellectual rigour, instructional cadre, reflective practice and mentoring, and discussion forums to achieve maximum benefit from the framework proposed. Finally, the article has highlighted that Army could further improve its professional expertise by pursuing a systematic approach to defence mastery, and that these efforts must continue beyond the mid-career point of ACSC.
Although it is only one part of an entire system of professional military education, defence mastery contributes to a more professional Army whose officer corps can think beyond the tactical and the technical. It is not about turning junior officers into strategists—it is about the continuous development of officers so they can contribute more fully to military success regardless of specialisation. Defence mastery is a crucial component of ensuring Army is not only ready to fight tonight but also able to sustain its profession for long-term competition. Army should not be satisfied with ignoring the development of the Army mind in its junior officers for their first 10 years of service.
Endnotes
[1] Louis L’Amour, Education of a Wandering Man: A Memoir (Bantam Books, 1990), 88.
[2] Simon Stuart, ‘The Human Face of Battle and the State of the Army Profession’ (speech), 12 September 2024, at: https://www.army.gov.au/news-and-events/speeches-and-transcripts/2024-09-12/chief-army-symposium-keynote-speech-human-face-battle-and-state-army-profession.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Initial officer training for Army refers to the Officer Commissioning courses at Royal Military College—Duntroon (RMC-D). The Australian Defence Force Academy (ADFA) can be included as part of initial officer training; however, only a fraction of all Army officers attend ADFA, whereas all full-time officers commission via RMC-D. Further, while there is relevant discussion to be had of the respective approaches RMC-D and ADFA take to defence mastery, this article is focused on the period following graduation from these establishments up to attending ACSC. This means such discussion of ADFA or RMC-D is outside the scope of this article.
[6] Michael Evans, Vincible Ignorance: Reforming Australian Professional Military Education for the Demands of the Twenty-First Century, The Vanguard Occasional Paper Series, No. 3 (Department of Defence, 2023), p. 27, at: https://www.defence.gov.au/defence-activities/research-innovation/research-publications/vincible-ignorance-reforming-australian-professional-military-education-demands-twenty-first-century.
[7] Department of Defence, The Australian Joint Professional Military Education Continuum 2.0 (Department of Defence, 2022), p. 12.
[8] Ibid., p. 11.
[9] Mick Ryan, War Transformed: The Future of Twenty-First-Century Great Power Competition and Conflict (Annapolis MD: Naval Institute Press, 2022), p. 166.
[10] Ibid., p. 166.
[11] Department of Defence, The Australian Joint Professional Military Education Continuum 2.0 (Commonwealth of Australia), p. 9.
[12] Ryan, War Transformed, pp. 178, 180.
[13] Ibid., 178.
[14] John Connor, ‘Australian Military Education, 1901–48’, in Douglas E Delaney, Robert C Engen and Meghan Fitzpatrick (eds), Military Education and the British Empire, 1815–1949 (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2018), pp. 69–84.
[15] Iain Farquharson, ‘A Single Imperial Army? The Development of Australian Army Staff Training in an Imperial Context, 1919–1939’, War in History 30, no. 4 (2023): 408–426, at: https://doi.org/10.1177/09683445221143757.
[16] Australian Army, Educating for War: The Role of Informal Professional Military Education in Readying Army for War (Army, 2024), pp. 50, 57–58.
[17] Ibid., p. 59.
[18] ‘COVE+: Short Education Courses for the Military Professional’, Australian Army (website), at: https://cove.army.gov.au/article/cove-short-education-courses-military-professional.
[19] Author observation, ‘COVE+’ (accessed 8 May 2025).
[20] Australian Army, Educating for War, pp. 38–42.
[21] Evans, Vincible Ignorance, pp. 11–12.
[22] Ibid., p. 3.
[23] Department of Defence, The Australian Joint Professional Military Education Continuum 2.0, p. 22.
[24] Christopher Wooding, ‘The Intellectual Edge: A Collective Effect’, The Forge (website), 14 July 2020, at: https://theforge.defence.gov.au/article/intellectual-edge-collective-effect.
[25] James N Mattis, Call Sign Chaos: Learning to Lead (Random House, 2019), p. 256.
[26] Lawrence Freedman, ‘In Praise of Tactics’, The Comment Is Freed (website), n.d., at: https://samf.substack.com/p/in-praise-of-tactics.
[27] Andrew Gordon, The Rules of the Game: Jutland and British Naval Command (Penguin Press, 2015), chapter 9.
[28] Ryan, War Transformed, pp. 82–83, 171–172.
[29] Alessio Patalano and James A Russell, Maritime Strategy and Naval Innovation (US Naval Institute Press, 2021), pp. 209–211.
[30] ‘School of Thought’, Merriam-Webster (website), at: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/school%20of%20thought.
[31] ‘School of Thought’, Cambridge Dictionary, at: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/school-of-thought.
[32] Department of Defence, ‘Doctrine’, in Australian Defence Force Glossary, n.d. (accessed April 3, 2025).
[33] Department of Defence, ‘Concept’, in Australian Defence Force Glossary, n.d. (accessed April 3, 2025).
[34] Watling, The Arms of the Future, pp. 4–7.
[35] Ibid., p. 7.
[36] Operational artists are defined here as members skilled in ‘planning, preparing, conducting, and sustaining tactics aimed at accomplished strategic effect’. This definition is based on BA Friedman’s definition of operational art (quoted). B.A Friedman, On Operations: Operational Art and Military Disciplines (Annapolis MD: Naval Institute Press, 2021), p. 56.
[37] Ibid., pp. 52–55.
[38] Freedman, ‘In Praise of Tactics’.
[39] Ibid.
[40] Andrew Hocking, Preparing for the Future: Key Organisational Lessons from the Afghanistan Campaign, The Vanguard Occasional Paper Series, No. 2 (Department of Defence, 2022), p. 22, at: https://www.defence.gov.au/sites/default/files/research-publication/2022/Vanguard_no_2_web.pdf.
[41] Justin Kelly and Michael Brennan, Alien: How Operational Art Devoured Strategy (US Army War College Press, 2009), pp. 95-98, at: https://press.armywarcollege.edu/monographs/620; Friedman, On Operations, pp. 54–55, 140.
[42] This provides an obvious aim point for PME for junior officers, particularly if ACSC were to introduce entrance exams or similar intellectual requirements—similar to practices at British staff colleges during the interwar period.
[43] Ryan, War Transformed, p. 180.
[44] Ibid., p. 181.
[45] Jack Watling, The Arms of the Future: Technology and Close Combat in the Twenty-First Century (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2023), p. 8, at: https://doi.org/10.5040/9781350352995.
[46] Ryan, War Transformed, p. 194.
[47] Ibid., p. 195.
[48] Briefly regarding implementation, this might not take a significant investment. Instead, it would refocus ACSC problem sets towards ones based on real-world challenges developed in partnership with Joint Operations Command and Vice Chief of Defence Force Group.
[49] Randall Wakelam, ‘The Spirit of an Air Force: Learning about Air Power, 1919–49’, in Douglas E Delaney, Robert C Engen and Meghan Fitzpatrick (eds), Military Education and the British Empire, 1815–1949 (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2018), pp. 108–134.
[50] Farquharson, ‘A Single Imperial Army?’.
[51] Trent Hone, Learning War: The Evolution of Fighting Doctrine in the U.S. Navy, 1898–1945 (La Vergne: Naval Institute Press, 2018), pp. 300–305.
[52] Evans, Vincible Ignorance, pp. 3, 11–12.
[53] Mick Ryan, Thinking About Strategic Thinking: Developing a More Effective Strategic Thinking Culture in Defence, The Vanguard Occasional Paper Series, No. 1 (Department of Defence, 2021), p. 9, at: https://www.defence.gov.au/sites/default/files/research-publication/2021/The_Vanguard_no_1_web.pdf.
[54] BA Friedman, ‘The Difference’, Fire for Effect (website), 6 January 2024, at: https://substack.com/@bafriedman/p-140226583.
[55] Mick Ryan and Clint Hinote, The Character of Future War to 2030 (Special Competitive Studies Project, n.d.), pp. 19–21.
[56] Mark F Cancian, Coping with Surprise in Great Power Conflicts (Centre for Strategic and International Studies, 2018), p. 16.
[57] Watling, The Arms of the Future, pp. 22–25.
[58] Guilio Douhet, The Command of the Air (Air University Press, 2019), p. 27.
[59] Mick Ryan, ‘How Ukraine Is Winning in the Adaptation Battle against Russia’, Engelsberg Ideas (website), 24 August 2022, at: https://engelsbergideas.com/essays/how-ukraine-is-winning-in-the-adaptation-battle-against-russia/; Mick Ryan, ‘The New Adaptation War’, Doctrina Futura (website), 16 April 2025, at: https://mickryan.substack.com/p/the-new-adaptation-war.
[60] Simon Stuart and Australian Army, Army’s Professional Military Education (PME) Plan 2024–2030, Chief of Army Direction 11/24 (Australian Army, 2024).
[61] Department of Defence, The Australian Joint Professional Military Education Continuum 2.0, p. 13.
[62] Evans, Vincible Ignorance, pp. 28–29.
[63] Ibid., p. 28.
[64] Heather Venable, ‘Studying Airpower: Eight Essential Themes for Practitioners’, Aether Journal of Air and Space Studies 1, no. 3 (2022): 49–64, 49.
[65] Christopher Smith, ‘Introduction’, Australian Army Journal 20, no. 1 (2024): vii.
[66] Ibid., p. vii.
[67] Australian Army, The Australian Army Contribution to the National Defence Strategy (Department of Defence, 2024), p. 18, at: https://www.army.gov.au/our-work/strategy/australian-army-contribution-national-defence-strategy-2024.
[68] Evans, Vincible Ignorance, pp. 32, 36.
[69] Department of Defence, The Australian Joint Professional Military Education Continuum 2.0, p. 13.
[70] Ibid., p. 13.
[71] Hocking, Preparing for the Future, p. 17.
[72] Russell, ‘Human Capital in Future Naval War’, pp. 211–213.
[73] Ryan, War Transformed, p. 198.
[74] Evans, Vincible Ignorance, p. 33.
[75] Venable, ‘Studying Airpower’, pp. 49–64.
[76] Michael Howard, ‘The Use and Abuse of Military History’, Parameters 11, no. 1 (1981): 14, at: https://doi.org/10.55540/0031-1723.1251.
[77] Gordon, The Rules of the Game, chapter 25; Watling, The Arms of the Future, pp. 1–4.
[78] Howard, ‘The Use and Abuse of Military History’, p. 14.
[79] Evans, Vincible Ignorance, p. 14.
[80] Bruce McLennan, ‘The Historical Lessons and Intellectual Rigour of Admiral Sir Herbert William Richmond’, Australian Defence Force Journal 168 (2005): 19–29.
[81] Charles W Sanders Jr, No Other Law: The French Army and the Doctrine of the Offensive (RAND Corporation, 1987), at: https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/papers/2005/P7331.pdf.
[82] Evans, Vincible Ignorance, pp. 34–37.
[83] Implementing this instructional cadre requires money, of course, to pay for people, travel, publishing, facilities etc. The education system is also a parallel effort to the training system—they are complementary, not opposing, lines of effort.
[84] ‘A Meditation on Reading’, Farnam Street (website).
[85] Benjamin Armstrong and John Freymann, Developing the Naval Mind (Annapolis MD: Naval Institute Press, 2021), p. 4.
[86] JP Clark, ‘John Wayne at His Writing Desk: The Lessons from the Origins of the Army’s Professional Journals’, Modern War Institute (website), 26 February 2024, at: https://mwi.westpoint.edu/john-wayne-at-his-writing-desk-lessons-from-the-origins-of-the-armys-professional-journals.
[87] Australian Army, Educating for War, pp. 24, 60.
[88] Evans, Vincible Ignorance, pp. 30–31.
[89] One challenge militaries face with PME is balancing uniformity and individuality. These are two parallel efforts that recognise on the one hand that military professionals have shared bodies of knowledge and on the other hand that individuals have distinct interests and talents that must be fostered beyond that shared knowledge. A related part to this is that successful PME is not a ‘one-size-fits-all’—instead, there must be a variety of ways and means available to military professionals in parallel to more convergent education approaches that focus on shared professional knowledge. This is a challenge that requires further study and discussion to improve the ADF’s approach to PME and its intellectual edge.