W.J. Astore The passionate discussion generated by our last article, America’s Military Academies Are Seriously Flawed, was heartening. Our military academies will not be improved if we merely accept the status quo, with allowance for minor, mainly cosmetic, reforms. But truly radical reforms are difficult to achieve since the academies are so deeply rooted in…
W.J. Astore U.S. military academies are neither Spartan in being dedicated to war, nor are they Athenian in recognizing humanism (even the humanism of war). They are Archimedean. They focus on engineering and the machinery of war. But two millennia ago even Archimedes with his clever war machinery could not save Syracuse from defeat at…
W.J. Astore Bruce Fleming, an English professor at Annapolis, has a great letter at the New York Times about the government shutdown. Unlike West Point and the Air Force Academy, most instructors at Annapolis are civilians rather than serving military officers. They have been furloughed because of the government shutdown, so Navy midshipmen are no…
The Contrary Perspective 