Abstract
This article takes a critical look at the intellectual culture of the Australian Army, especially the lack of a culture of writing. The author observes that it is not that Army officers do not reflect and discuss what they experience, they just tend not to write about them. He argues that leaders at every level in the Army must contribute to reversing this trend.
Less than two years after the end of the First World War, the new German Army under General Hans Von Seeckt underwent a deep-set and far-reaching analysis of its battlefield performance in that conflict. Lucid, candid, and thoughtful, it is all the more impressive when it is remembered that this army was to number just 100 000 at its peak, with an officer corps not much bigger than our own. Similarly impressive was the process of rigorous post-combat analysis in the US Army after Vietnam under the guidance of officers such as William DePuy, which led to the emergence of creative and innovative ideas based on the re-examination in the West of manoeuvre and the operational art. Corresponding initiatives on the part of the United States Marine Corps (USMC) leadership elite in that period reflected a similar determination to embed a more intellectual and creative mindset. All of these initiatives bear testimony to the important process of intellectual renewal imposed by courageous and visionary leaders who were faced with what they believed to be sub-optimal combat performance.
The Australian Army has been fortunate—it has not been beset by such travails. Evidence of sub-optimal performance has not been as apparent here and, as such, there has been no compelling impetus for internal conjecture. Operations such as East Timor in 1999 were decidedly one-sided affairs. The issues in the prevailing post-operational literature seem to relate in the main to the logistical realm: to supply and transportation problems, to issues like stock visibility, and an inability to land adequate amounts of diesel fuel on a beach. I can’t help believing that this is just as well, not only because the sustaining of pointless casualties or the suffering of tactical defeat are of necessity a bad thing—of course they are—but because I don’t think we are all that good at looking at ourselves with a dispassionate eye and encapsulating needed improvements in written form. As a result, we have become too narrowly focused, unwilling to challenge prevailing orthodoxies, and increasingly content to let an ever-present media-spun triumphalism speak for us.
This is not to say that our army as an institution is a stupid one—far from it. Our special-to-corps and all-corps training courses are among the best in the world; our soldiers are well trained as individuals, and make cohesive and well-drilled teams. Our tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) appear pragmatic and based on salient experience. But something is missing somewhere above TTPs and below media-spun triumphalism and doctrine. It is the presence of written debate on how to prosecute operations. The life-blood of any institution that wants to improve and not simply recline in self-adulation, this debate is predominantly an officer skill and responsibility.
This is not to say that there isn’t debate on all manner of issues amongst the officer community. In weekend get-togethers around Townsville and Darwin, Service spouses collectively roll their eyes as intense and intelligent discussions rage around the BBQ about ‘where we are going’ and ‘what needs doing’ in our Army. These are reflected as much as possible in a number of on-line discussion forums hosted by professional and hardworking institutions at places like the Centre for Army Lessons. But, in the main, these important and decisive debates are not being extended by their proponents to a more formal collective level, where they can be included in broader organisational conjecture. This is because these debates are not reflected in written discourse. Without this information feed, no matter how good a leadership group may be, it is working in a near-vacuum, in an atmosphere uninformed by the views of the broader officer community. It is only within this process of self-examination and analysis based on experience, however, that the Australian Army can add the texture, colour and example needed to leaven the debate on what direction and orientation this army of ours should take. This short piece is an attempt to spur or inflame debate on this issue—thus its needlessly provocative title.
Why Don't Officers Write, Read and Engage in their Profession at an Intellectual Level in the Australian Army?
Cultural Factors
As I have already intimated, the answer appears to be that Australian Army officers do engage on a range of professional issues, some even read but hardly anyone writes. As such, at our worst the ‘blind lead the blind’ conceptually and we tend to inhabit a creative cul de sac. Part of this inactivity is no doubt cultural in origin: we see ourselves as ‘doers’, not ‘pontificaters’. We have a clear disdain for doctrine and ‘high-minded’ debate. To tweak George Bernard Shaw: we believe that those who can do; and those who can’t write. The process of encapsulating one’s thoughts and feelings on a professional matter, of committing those beliefs and convictions to paper and publishing them to be read and critiqued by others, is simply not ‘our way of doing things’. Any creative urge would best be manifested in other ways, perhaps via an MBA.
Systemic Factors
Most Army officers anticipate little reward for the energy expended in writing, as such efforts are neither rewarded nor recognised by the organisation as having any intrinsic worth. A demonstrated ability to show evidence of wide reading and conjecture is not really reflected anywhere in an officer’s performance assessment record, other than in the section on professional reading in which most receive the customary inflated assessment.
So What is the Status Quo?
To hark back to an earlier observation, there are strong and important debates occurring currently at the corps, unit and formation level. These debates are manifested in many intelligent and astute records at Corps conferences and discussion forums on courses and organisational retreats. The problem lies in extricating such debates from these fora and at these levels and moving them into the mainstream military community where they can stimulate and excite further discussion, and so necessitate an organisational response. The only way to achieve this is through writing, through having those insights published, and encouraging others to read these discursive pieces and feel motivated and duty-bound to respond in kind. Clearly, this is also a requirement at the joint, coalition and inter-agency level. As the majority of officers are primarily oriented towards their own Service, however, it would be sensible to start at this point. Currently, there are two means through which written debate can be published in the Army: through the lessons learned system, and through submissions and publications that are internally sponsored and distributed. I intend to address each of these in turn.
The Australian Defence Force (ADF) Lessons Learned System
Lessons captured from current ADF exercises and deployments appear to me to reside primarily in a number of purpose-designed databases. The key problem is that the majority of sensible officers hate spreadsheets and databases with a passion and rightly so. As a result, important material lies largely dormant, maintained by a hapless captain or major so tasked. Given that many of these lessons-learnt databases reside on the Defence Secret Network (and are therefore unavailable to about half of the Army), the list of already reluctant would-be readers shrinks still further. Opinions and experiences should not reside purely in a mechanical box—an administrative tool that most resent spending valuable time contemplating. Opinions and experiences are dynamic—they should live and breathe—their expression involves clenched fists, spilt alcohol and a level of intrigue, pride, emotion and even fun.
On their return from Somalia in 1993, many from the 1 RAR Battalion Group of all ranks were interviewed on video about what they had learned from the deployment. This footage was shown and discussed in some subsequent specific-to-corps and all-corps courses. Interviewees were encouraged to be candid: criticisms of the decisions of those above and around them were not toned down, noses were picked and profanities occasionally coloured the debate. For all its politically incorrect tone, these videos struck many involved as a great means of bringing the experiences of a group of individuals into the intellectual realm of the Army in its totality and in an immediate and intimate manner. This was not a dull ‘vanilla’ post-operational report that was duly stamped and filed on one’s G drive with the preparedness directives and the annual OH&S lecture, nor was it another entry in a stale database. Rather, with one ninety-minute tape (Beta, no doubt) the observer and syndicate participant felt the emotion of the human being at the other end of the camera—an equally blemished but well-meaning individual with motivations, skills and foibles. I have yet to see this process replicated. How then am I to learn about the operational realities experienced by the units and sub-units deployed to Afghanistan or Iraq under the current system? Must I subscribe to Defender?
Internally Published and Sponsored Works
It is in the realm of internally published and sponsored works that the decisive operational, tactical and cross-corps discussions should take place, and where debate of this kind should be captured on the written page for the ADF’s leaders to ponder and gain insight. Many strategic journals still strike me as way too ‘highbrow’ for their own good. Invariably highly polished quasi-academic pieces pondered over by learned types, they can tend to be too intimidating to attract the contributions of many within the Army’s ranks. This is exactly the opposite of what should be happening. If we want to foster the mass of debate needed to move us forward, any half-literate sergeant, captain or major who bothers to put pen to paper should see his or her words in print. The value is in the ideas behind the words, not in their expression and the adequacy of their grammar. It is vital also for Captain X’s colleagues in the unit to read his or her piece and feel motivated to respond in kind (either because they disagree with what was said or feel ‘if Captain X can submit something, anyone can!’). It is only in this manner that a ‘critical mass’ of submissions can provide the ferment of ideas and debate needed to drive this organisation forward. These thoughts should not be interpreted as a criticism of any one person or organisation, indeed far from it. Nevertheless, it is vitally important that the Army has an opportunity to read the views of its members on the way forward.
So What is Required? One View
Stephen R. Covey is well known for his division of a business unit’s planning and response regime into quadrants. These are planning and responding for: the important and urgent, the important but not urgent, the not important but urgent, and the not important and not urgent. Leaving aside the obvious question of ‘who defines urgent’, the business manager’s challenge is clearly not only to classify the task at hand but to move the priority of response from the urgent sector to the important (well, at least some of the time). It seems to me that the Army needs to decide on the level of importance it attaches to the art of conceptualisation and debate amongst its officer corps, and then apportion resources accordingly. I do not believe that we have done this yet in a consolidated way. It is no good simply wringing one’s hands and lamenting that ‘officers just aren’t writing like they used to’, or continuing to insist that writing not be done during work hours (and by implication banishing the release of creative written energies to when the kids are in bed and even watching re-runs of The Simpsons is a challenge). If debate is important, then it merits a reallocation of resources. Here are some ideas on how this can be achieved.
People
First, if we want written contributions to journals and debate, enthusiasm for writing needs to be ignited through role models and a peer network. While rank does not dictate value or influence, it seems to me that a major would be interested in what is observed and written by a peer, a lieutenant by a lieutenant, a logistician by a logistician and so on. Thus a plethora of articles, no matter how astute, by a bevy of grey-haired and overweight colonels will not arouse a single subaltern to turn on that dreaded technology tool after hours. Similarly, a litany of penetrating analyses by a phalanx of pimply infantry lieutenants on fire and movement is unlikely to arouse the 3 BASB Senior Non-Commissioned Officers’ Mess one iota. It will take peer networks to broaden the number of inputs—it’s that simple. This may mean having a representative from every rank from corporal to colonel resident at the Land Warfare Studies Centre, each with the task of getting their peers writing and submitting. To reiterate, this is all dependent on priorities. People are scarce and billets continually remain unfilled. However it may be useful in this context to conduct a straw poll of where a young captain would want to do: to think and write on the future direction of the Army or to be SO3 Nebulous at beige-world HQ?
Second, in the realm of personnel policy, we need to recognise and reward those who take the time and the risk (personally and professionally) to express their opinions in writing. Essay competitions at every course and joint activity could be mandatory. Some would advocate their inclusion as a promotion prerequisite. In most cases, essay topics need not be overly defined, allowing an officer to write on what interests him or her. Where essays are set, however, perhaps on a specific-to-corps course, they should most definitely not demand the millionth unique and penetrating analysis by a military officer on the leadership style of Patton, or on the unique energising aspects of the diarchy, but rather centre on real issues, addressing an aspect of the way this Army should prosecute operations in the future.
Third, we have conceded too much ground staff-wise at our Staff College and at the Defence Academy. The present structure of both institutions manifests the resounding belief that we are incapable of educating our own officers. Acknowledging that it is entirely ‘un-PC’ to forward this opinion, and conceding that the realm of military strategy should not be considered separately from national strategy for long, it does appear that if an officer wants to read, write and teach on military issues, they must resign it order to do so. I do not wish to discount in any way the excellent work of many officers at places such as Staff College and ADFA, but somewhere in the multitude of lecturers on military thought, military history, or strategy a cadet listens to in three years, at least a handful should be in uniform.
On a related issue, John Boyd felt that the orient stage in his OODA loop was the most difficult. It is clear that the demands of the Three Block War are going to make education (as opposed to training) more and more important in orienting the individual soldier and his or her leaders prior to deployment. Again, often the best person to encourage a young officer to think laterally and deeply about his profession is another officer, albeit an older and more experienced one. Currently however, the Army tends to consider this tutelage purely in the tactical realm—how to site a machine gun or plan the ambush. But if education as much as training is becoming important in winning the war with Islamic fundamentalism in failed and fragile states, then the conceptualisation of combat as a process and a typology of conflict and societal discord can also be supplied by that older officer. It makes sense to broaden the scope and range of input of this critical individual, as opposed to denying his or her ability to teach it, and sub-contracting it out as we do within the prevailing system.
Time
To recall Covey, it is important for a learning organisation to address more of the ‘important and not urgent’ quadrant at some point in its business cycle. In the same way that the need to be deployable was manifested in the material resources required to run and recognise AIRN standards a decade ago (PTIs to run BFAs, people to run range practices, the creation of additional entries in the dreaded PMKeyS, requirements for clerks to enter them etc.), so too a mechanism or format to receive and value intellectual contributions to the Army’s development must be created. Pay Thursdays could be when syndicate discussions occur in units and training organisations—an intellectual equivalent to ‘sporties’. Reviled at first, I’m sure, doubtless considered unnecessary and insulting (as the AIRN test was when it was first introduced), these could become part of Army culture if our hierarchy were willing to take the hits initially.
Money
As capability developers recognise in abundance, the military is benefiting enormously from technologies and intellectual innovations emerging from the predominantly civilian sphere. Why not pay to leverage discussion forums, assessment and structure in the various universities and think tanks that operate here and overseas for teaching Army’s people? A certain ‘swallowing of pride’ is important here; the mistaken belief that no mere civilian can tell us how to do our job will need to be dispelled. This is not the same as the almost complete sub-contracting of our core business as discussed earlier. Rather, it is the broadening of our capacity outside of formal courses to teach our people, in so doing perhaps eventually developing some uniformed academic expertise.
Final Thoughts
It is important that Army officers read and write about the way forward and the Army needs to do more to spur this. It is only in so doing that we will add the crucial layer of continuous debate, consideration and conceptualisation that are the hall-marks of first-rate armies. Some armies have done this in response to total defeat or sub-optimal operational and/ or tactical performance. Von Seeckt and DePuy’s work are cases in point. But it is important to foster and encourage this spirit of inquiry now to develop a capacity for collective analysis for the bad times. Worthwhile debate is occurring within our Army and splendid work has been undertaken to capture it by many hard-working individuals in and out of uniform. These laudable efforts must be placed, however, in a broader framework and encouraged to reach critical mass in order to become self-sustaining. I do not see signs that this is occurring. One day, in some theatre near or far, young soldiers and their leaders are going to get ‘done over’—tactically and in a limited way—but nevertheless beaten, and the inefficiencies of their parent organisation(s) exposed in the process. It is, arguably, the primary function of an army’s officer corps to guard against this eventuality but, at the same time, to prepare for it. It is only through a carefully sponsored culture of dispassionate and networked self-examination and conceptualisation that this function can be met.
