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Jun 04 2009

How Well Do Senior Professional Military Schools Produce Strategists?

  Washington, DC – Today Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Chairman Vic Snyder(D-AR) and Ranking Member Rob Wittman (R-VA) held a subcommittee hearing on how successful senior professional military schools are at producing military strategists.

 “The war colleges are designed to build the next generation of military strategists,” Subcommittee Chairman Vic Snyder (D-AR) said.  “Good strategy is hard.  Educating our best and brightest for tomorrow’s challenges requires the recruitment and selection of world class military and civilian faculty.  Military education must balance the old with the new—traditional thinkers with innovative skills, teaching the enduring themes of war and peace with the need to stay current and relevant. Today’s hearing was helpful and provided more insight.  I look forward to working with today’s witnesses in the future as we aim to improve the quality of military education. Later this month we’ll be holding a hearing on the professional military education of our middle-grade officers who must master the ability to plan complex joint campaigns such as we see being carried out in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

 "Professional Military Education has been near and dear to my heart for many years, and I thank Chairman Snyder, Ranking Member Wittman, and the members of the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee for holding this series of important hearings,” said Chairman Ike Skelton (D-MO).  “ I’m mainly concerned about two things.  First, are our PME schools creating strategic thinkers?  Second, are the services identifying strategic thinkers and guiding them into the right career positions? We can’t afford to squander the talents of our strategic thinkers and must make sure they are not discouraged in their military careers, whether serving in joint positions or in the services.

 Subcommittee Ranking Member Rob Wittman (R-VA) said “Today’s hearing provided the Committee with the opportunity to learn from those who face the day to day reality of managing our professional military education system. Their informed opinions and insight are invaluable in ensuring that we continue to educate strategic thinkers throughout the military’s leadership.”

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