We can't replace 'em all with robots

That good chronicler of all things military, Thomas Ricks, has moved his online digs to The Long March. Antiwar activist that I am, I've found him a necessary read for years.

In recognition that Erudite Partner returns to the academic salt mines tomorrow after a long break, here's Rick's current commentary on military education:

I fear that many officer students at the war colleges and the staff colleges can’t write, don’t read, and resent attempts to make them think.

Based on what E.P. and other college teachers of my acquaintance report about too many of their students, I think I know what the military is up against. Their students are products of U.S. high schools and even colleges that don't teach writing or thinking. The complaint is well-nigh universal.

In some ways, the problem is not new. Only half of drafted GIs in the U.S. Army in World War II had high school diplomas; by the 1960s Vietnam war, 60 percent had completed 12 years of education. Currently the War (Defense) Department expects all recruits to have high school diplomas, but makes many exceptions. Educational expectations for soldiers keep rising, just as they do in civilian life. An in-house critique of military education, suggests that there ought to be as many contemporary enlisted soldiers with college degrees as in the general population.

According to government data, only six percent of our enlisted force has completed a bachelor’s degree. By fiscal year 2025 the Army should strive to have a rate much closer to the national average of thirty four percent.

E.P. not infrequently has taught students who were following up on their service by getting a degree. Some were mature, thoughtful contributors to an ethics class. Others seemed to have lost their moorings in ways that might be beyond the resources of an undergraduate program to heal. That is, these ex-soldiers were people.