Officers and Scholars
By Dr. Eric A. Sibul PhD
It is perhaps no great secret that professional military education (PME) institutions in the Baltic countries have a shortage of qualified instructors. This includes the Baltic Defence College, where filling directing staff billets in recent years has proven quite difficult. Initially the Baltic Defence College operated with instructors who were officers in larger supporting nations’ armed forces. They came from France, Germany, United Kingdom, Sweden, USA, etc. and their tenure at the college was financed by the sending nations. However, this was meant to be a temporary solution to the manning situation, while in the long term qualified Baltic officers would take over the instructional posts. However, this has proved difficult for a number of reasons, foremost, the Baltic armed forces are small and highly qualified officers are needed for defence staffs and operational commands. Furthermore, it must be remembered that the Baltic armed forces are essentially “adolescents” as they were reestablished after 1991 and lack a well developed senior officer corps. Senior leadership has ranged from ethnic brethren who had served in western armed forces to rigid thinking old Soviet trained officers. To alleviate the shortage of instructors, the Baltic Defence College has hired retired officers from various western countries and number of purely civilian academics. This has proved an expensive and difficult process for the Baltic Defence College. The problem with civilian academics is the most have advanced degrees in theoretical social science topics and have had no experience with the military or are even familiar with the functions of a general staff college. The learning curve for these civilian academics is often a long and painful one. Too often the result has been time wasted in curriculum discussing topics irrelevant or only marginally relevant to PME. The retired officers from western countries are expensive to hire as their salaries must be internationally competitive with positions in Western Europe and North America. There is also the danger of receiving persons having previous experience in other PME institutions in NATO or partnership for peace countries, but were dismissed because of poor teaching performance or human relations problems. The problems are largely the same at the national military academies and defence colleges in all the Baltic countries. The employment pool is even more limited as instruction is generally in the national language, rather than English as it is at the Baltic Defence College. In actuality, PME in the larger NATO partners, like the United States, have suffered similar problems. Until recently for many officers in the US armed forces have viewed assignments as instructors as “career killers.” Those keen for promotion had avoided these assignments.[1] As a result by 2009, nearly four out of five members of the US Army Command and General Staff College's instructional faculty at Fort Leavenworth Kansas consisted of retired military officers hired on contract. Many of these instructors retired before the current conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan and cannot reinforce the classroom lessons with current operational experience or shape curricula to meet present demands. Some consider themselves stalwart guardians of a conventional mindset, resisting change to address low-intensity threats and maintaining an unimaginative “hey diddle, diddle, diddle, straight up the middle” approach to teaching military planning.[2] However, this has started to change with the rise of General David Petraeus as a key leader in the US led counterinsurgency efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan. General Petraeus obtained advanced degrees from civilian universities and embraced teaching assignments. Geneal Petraeus been has joined by a remarkably successful cadre of leaders, with nearly identical backgrounds, who have demonstrated exceptional talent in the chaotic environments of Iraq and Afghanistan. These officers have shared a lifelong obsession with reading history and studying the art of war and at some time in their careers they ignored the caution of personnel officers about spending too much time studying or teaching.[3] What has developed from this is the "Petraeus Model of strategic preparation for higher command.”[4] The "Petraeus Model" includes attendance at a top-tier civilian graduate school to study history or social and behavioral science followed by a teaching assignment at a service academy or staff college. In the “Petraeus Model,” once young officers have proved their ability to command at the tactical level, they are offered a "soldier's sabbatical," a fully funded hiatus to study at a top-rank civilian graduate school. Officers are encouraged to study all the way through to a doctoral degree, waving some purely military PME requirements along the way.[5] It is perhaps high time that the each of the Baltic Countries adopts a version of the “Petraeus Model,” sending to talented officers to masters and doctorate programs at expense of the of the armed forces. This is perhaps the only practical and long term solution to the shortage of qualified instructors in Baltic PME institutions.
[1] Neil Smith, “Educating the Army in its Own COIN,” United States Naval Institute Proceedings (February 2010), 42
[2] Ibid.
[3] Robert H. Scales, “Too Busy to Learn,” United States Naval Institute Proceedings (February 2010), 30
[4] Ibid.
[5] Ibid.
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