Discussion on Whether to Educate Or Train Leaders Army

Life long discussion and debate throughout the time of the military, do we focus on training or educating our leaders. We have always adapted to the enemy and situation at hand when it comes to this topic. The technological advances we have made over the last 30 years use to be a dream, the type of wars we fought over the last 30 years have evolved so its only right that our methods advance from training focus to educating. Everything from the type and environment of education soldiers experience to the leadership skills there taught have to continue advancing, we have stepped away from fighting on the ground and boots on the ground so much to technological warfare. Through empowering and educating soldiers, we can build brighter more resourceful advanced leaders.

The transition in the military is a plan to affect the outcome of wars 10, 15 even 30 years down the road so we are not playing catch up. There were only two ways we educated soldiers 32 years ago, brick and mortar schoolhouses and distance learning through lessons and test sent and received through mail. Now we have so many different ways of educating soldiers and soldiers to educate themselves on free time so we can expect soldiers and leaders that are more intelligent. We have made the transition from analog to digital education so we can only expect it to continue evolving over the next 20 or 30 years. We need to as a nation continue to advance our education and leadership abilities as we are not favored in the current demographic to stay on top over countries such as China and Russia. The country is being significantly challenged by these major powers in all aspects of war, land, air, sea, and cyber dominance that we have relied on since World War II.

Military must continue to strengthen Professional Military Education (PME) in order to keep testing our soldier and evolve them as leaders.