The Vistas of American Military History 1800-1898 by Dr Brian Holden-Reid Joseph G Dawson III

The Vistas of American Military History 1800-1898 by Dr Brian Holden-Reid Joseph G Dawson III

Author:Dr Brian Holden-Reid, Joseph G Dawson III [Dr Brian Holden-Reid, Joseph G Dawson III]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Nonfiction, History
ISBN: 9781317983651
Publisher: Taylor and Francis
Published: 2019-01-02T05:00:00+00:00


The Military Academy and Accountability: Institutional Reform and Officer Socialization

The essence of post-War of 1812 military reform, and the roots of American military professionalism, lay in imbuing cadets at the Military Academy with the principles later embodied in the motto ‘Duty, Honor, Country,’ Probing beyond the slogan, analysis suggests that these words articulated essential prerequisites for the creation of a capable military leadership accountable to national civilian authority. ‘Duty’ meant subordination and accepting tasks assigned by constitutionally authorized and delegated command; ‘honor’ meant performing one’s duties with selfless integrity in the defense of law, rather than the belligerent defense of personal reputation regardless of right or wrong; and ‘country’ provided the focus of service to the nation – rather than self, class, or section – for graduates’ efforts to perform their duties. After four years of consciously practicing these principles, working together toward a common goal under the mentorship of officers who had experienced the same process as cadets themselves, graduates had imbibed a strong sense of their duty to serve the nation responsibly and accountably – the moral and emotional basis for professional commitment.

This process began with the Academy’s reform under the superintendency of Captain Sylvanus Thayer between 1817 and 1833. Before 1817 the Military Academy graduated few officers, and most of them left the army just as quickly as men commissioned directly from civilian life. Each of the first three superintendents – Colonel Jonathan Williams, Colonel Joseph G. Swift, and Captain Alden Partridge, who like Swift was a graduate from the Williams era – resigned for selfish personal reasons in disputes over command, setting examples of impatience and insubordination rather than dutiful, disinterested commitment to national service. Arriving at West Point after 15 years of inattention, confusion, and recurrent disorder there, Thayer believed that the purpose of American higher education was primarily the inculcation of mental discipline, an instrumental rationality particularly essential for what Swift labeled ‘a corps of instructed administrative officers to serve as a nucleus upon which may be predicated any necessary force’ – the expansible army established in the reduction in force of 1821.29

As superintendent Thayer buckled down to establishing, standardizing, and inculcating discipline and order, fostering an unprecedented uniformity and predictability in the Academy’s operations and graduates. He immediately ‘commenced a system of reformation,’ ‘to regulate and harmonize the whole machine of instruction’ by enforcing admissions standards already on the books, vowing that he ‘would persevere untilI produce that state of Military Discipline which is as indispensable in an institution of this sort as in a regular Army.’ (It should be noted that neither Williams nor Partridge had seen active service in the Regular Army during the War of 1812; Thayer had served in a variety of capacities in the field throughout the war.) Thayer quickly divided the corps of cadets into four year groups based on their academic progress, and he defined and enforced both the academic year, refusing to accept cadets who arrived at West Point after the beginning of classes, and the daily schedule, demanding the promptitude required ever since.



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