in:
http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/04/the-magic-of-west-point/?emc=edit_tnt_20131204&tntemail0=y&_r=0
The story of Westpoint and a little more and the lost war in Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Pakistan, Yemen, Libya, Egypt etc. and more, but also losing power against the Chinese Dragon even the Tiger of India : "
Here the posting in: "
"
The Magic of West Point
" By TERRY BABCOCK-LUMISHMy students jest that I earned my degree from Hogwarts. I dare not correct the record.
The childhoods of undergraduates today were steeped in Harry Potter. To be told that one is in any way associated with J.K. Rowling’s school of witchcraft and wizardry is a novel compliment. The association offers a caldron full of vivid examples to bring microeconomic models to life, particularly important when teaching a required course to the sleep-deprived.
An economics professor at the United States Military Academy, I regularly invoke Latin incantation when speaking of all else being equal — ceteris paribus! — and tell occasional tales involving flowing robes or formal dinners. Though neither Oxford nor West Point offers hovering candelabras, one need not reach to find similarities between the schools’ hallowed halls.
In 1993, the Defense Department released its “Blend of Excellence” report, calling for service academies to integrate civilian academics. Twenty years on, approximately one quarter of West Point’s faculty are civilians collaborating with uniformed colleagues “to educate, train, and inspire the Corps of Cadets.”
Upon arrival at West Point, I discovered cadets sorted into companies not unlike Hogwarts’ houses. Cadets wield sabers in lieu of wands, but students are students. Despite the cynicism no self-respecting 20-something would be caught without, most cadets are earnest learners proud to join the fabled Long Gray Line.
My very first day teaching in historic Washington Hall I realized how out of place I was. Upon reaching for what I presumed was a dusty eraser to disappear my calculations, I found an M16 rifle magazine on the dusty chalkboard ledge. Though my instinct was to recoil in horror, I feared my cadets viewing me as anything but a collected professional. To this day, I am unsure whether that magazine qualified as misplaced school supply or an initiation rite.
As a global nomad who has lived and worked in environments in which I have never entirely fit in, I have come to take solace in the familiarity of daily ritual. When I worked overseas, those rituals included everything from calls to prayer in Jordan to roosters crowing in rural Ghana. In Oxford, I grew accustomed to whirring bicycles and traders hawking fresh fruit and vegetables. At West Point, my sights and sounds are drum cadences and daily greetings rendered with salutes.
Just as I was enthusiastic about what I promised from my syllabuses, in the classroom I met cadets excited to teach me of their world: “survival swimming” terror, inspection anxiety, class ring excitement and more. Outdoors I discovered a college campus like few others. Rather than grooving to private iPhone music or admiring the chalk messages scrawled on most university walkways, cadets make eye contact and offer a polite “good morning, ma’am.”
Required to render sharp salutes with these greetings, cadets must remain vigilant of officers in their midst. Fifteen minutes between classes is not a great deal of time when one considers all of the required acknowledgment en route, and the need to constantly scanning the landscape to detect, identify and respond to targets.
What I didn’t know upon taking my own oath at the Academy is that I would acquire a sort of invisibility cloak. While walking with officers, I quickly discovered my ability to vanish in the midst of salutations destined for the uniformed. Curious, I did research to better understand. I read of knights raising visors to reveal their faces, of soldiers displaying right hands to assure one another neither carried a weapon. I was confused. Is being deemed low-threat a compliment, or should I feel left out?
I enlisted uniformed colleagues to run unscientific experiments, trying the radius of my invisibility cloak. We tested moving together, plus my walking at distances in front and behind. Cadets generally greet me so long as there are no officers within approximately twenty yards. As soon as a high-threat target appears, I become invisible approximately 95 percent of the time. As an economist interested in how people respond to incentives, I respect this.
Living and working in a world in which the majority wear their biographies on their chests makes for a fascinating social experiment. Being one of the few whose rank or accomplishments are not on display can be informative. Does one default to respect or non-detection?
Quick identification via tribal markings, such as rank, awards or units, can be efficient – at least until oversimplification becomes dangerous. I regularly witness cadets and officers alike lulled into a false sense of confidence that they “know” who people – military or civilian – are and therefore how to engage accordingly via external signals alone.
When I was studying overseas in the midst of conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, dinner party discussions inevitably turned to United States foreign policy. So often civilians, American and non-, posed questions to military guests. Rare was the occasion when service members queried civilians, as if by having once been a civilian, all was immediately understood.
Simultaneously an insider and an outsider, I readily admit I have a great deal to learn about the military. This includes that which is apparent from the external or the truer realities never revealed by a medal, tab, or patch. Military or civilian, we can all stand to better understand those for whom all is not immediately seen.
Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, recently wrote of the importance of rethinking civil-military relations. Much as we civilians do not fully understand the rites and experiences of military communities, service members can hold simple or incorrect views of civilians.
It should not require magic to help Americans learn from one another. And yet we hold a failing grade in demystifying the “other.” The benefits of learning from one another far outweigh the costs. Let the real conversation begin: accio collocutio."
This is a report to motivate a country in a declining path.
The childhoods of undergraduates today were steeped in Harry Potter. To be told that one is in any way associated with J.K. Rowling’s school of witchcraft and wizardry is a novel compliment. The association offers a caldron full of vivid examples to bring microeconomic models to life, particularly important when teaching a required course to the sleep-deprived.
An economics professor at the United States Military Academy, I regularly invoke Latin incantation when speaking of all else being equal — ceteris paribus! — and tell occasional tales involving flowing robes or formal dinners. Though neither Oxford nor West Point offers hovering candelabras, one need not reach to find similarities between the schools’ hallowed halls.
In 1993, the Defense Department released its “Blend of Excellence” report, calling for service academies to integrate civilian academics. Twenty years on, approximately one quarter of West Point’s faculty are civilians collaborating with uniformed colleagues “to educate, train, and inspire the Corps of Cadets.”
Upon arrival at West Point, I discovered cadets sorted into companies not unlike Hogwarts’ houses. Cadets wield sabers in lieu of wands, but students are students. Despite the cynicism no self-respecting 20-something would be caught without, most cadets are earnest learners proud to join the fabled Long Gray Line.
My very first day teaching in historic Washington Hall I realized how out of place I was. Upon reaching for what I presumed was a dusty eraser to disappear my calculations, I found an M16 rifle magazine on the dusty chalkboard ledge. Though my instinct was to recoil in horror, I feared my cadets viewing me as anything but a collected professional. To this day, I am unsure whether that magazine qualified as misplaced school supply or an initiation rite.
As a global nomad who has lived and worked in environments in which I have never entirely fit in, I have come to take solace in the familiarity of daily ritual. When I worked overseas, those rituals included everything from calls to prayer in Jordan to roosters crowing in rural Ghana. In Oxford, I grew accustomed to whirring bicycles and traders hawking fresh fruit and vegetables. At West Point, my sights and sounds are drum cadences and daily greetings rendered with salutes.
Just as I was enthusiastic about what I promised from my syllabuses, in the classroom I met cadets excited to teach me of their world: “survival swimming” terror, inspection anxiety, class ring excitement and more. Outdoors I discovered a college campus like few others. Rather than grooving to private iPhone music or admiring the chalk messages scrawled on most university walkways, cadets make eye contact and offer a polite “good morning, ma’am.”
Required to render sharp salutes with these greetings, cadets must remain vigilant of officers in their midst. Fifteen minutes between classes is not a great deal of time when one considers all of the required acknowledgment en route, and the need to constantly scanning the landscape to detect, identify and respond to targets.
What I didn’t know upon taking my own oath at the Academy is that I would acquire a sort of invisibility cloak. While walking with officers, I quickly discovered my ability to vanish in the midst of salutations destined for the uniformed. Curious, I did research to better understand. I read of knights raising visors to reveal their faces, of soldiers displaying right hands to assure one another neither carried a weapon. I was confused. Is being deemed low-threat a compliment, or should I feel left out?
I enlisted uniformed colleagues to run unscientific experiments, trying the radius of my invisibility cloak. We tested moving together, plus my walking at distances in front and behind. Cadets generally greet me so long as there are no officers within approximately twenty yards. As soon as a high-threat target appears, I become invisible approximately 95 percent of the time. As an economist interested in how people respond to incentives, I respect this.
Living and working in a world in which the majority wear their biographies on their chests makes for a fascinating social experiment. Being one of the few whose rank or accomplishments are not on display can be informative. Does one default to respect or non-detection?
Quick identification via tribal markings, such as rank, awards or units, can be efficient – at least until oversimplification becomes dangerous. I regularly witness cadets and officers alike lulled into a false sense of confidence that they “know” who people – military or civilian – are and therefore how to engage accordingly via external signals alone.
When I was studying overseas in the midst of conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, dinner party discussions inevitably turned to United States foreign policy. So often civilians, American and non-, posed questions to military guests. Rare was the occasion when service members queried civilians, as if by having once been a civilian, all was immediately understood.
Simultaneously an insider and an outsider, I readily admit I have a great deal to learn about the military. This includes that which is apparent from the external or the truer realities never revealed by a medal, tab, or patch. Military or civilian, we can all stand to better understand those for whom all is not immediately seen.
Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, recently wrote of the importance of rethinking civil-military relations. Much as we civilians do not fully understand the rites and experiences of military communities, service members can hold simple or incorrect views of civilians.
It should not require magic to help Americans learn from one another. And yet we hold a failing grade in demystifying the “other.” The benefits of learning from one another far outweigh the costs. Let the real conversation begin: accio collocutio."
This is a report to motivate a country in a declining path.
