Letters

Army, Feb 2005

Truth Will Win Out

* I read with some incredulity and dismay "The Role of Propaganda in Fighting Terrorism" by former deputy chief of Public Affairs Charles A. Krohn (December). His advocacy for the use of propaganda in today's world by the U.S. military has all the ring of desperation to it.

I have never been much of a fan of psychological operations crossing over into the realm of public affairs. I can recall a number of times in my public affairs career hearing the PSYOPS officer brief the commander on how they would plant a cover story in the media. I always objected, and the commander always said "no" to that particular PSYOPS ploy. Loudspeakers, pamphlet drops and such, OK, but lying to the media and, by implication to the American public in today's information world, is anathema to everything the founding fathers believed.

The military already has difficulty getting the simple truth out. Witness the Pat Tillman debacle and the onset of the attack on Fallujah. How the military could be more successful at perpetrating a lie is beyond me. The truth stands by itself, whether an audience wants to believe it or not. Propaganda only works if you have an ignorant audience or one that is willing to believe untruth.

Propaganda and untruth do work in the Arab world, but it is all one-sided and it has been for quite some time-against the West and particularly the United States. All we have to offer to counter the Islamic media is the truth, which, as the old saying goes, will eventually win out.

We do not need propaganda to win the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. We need an understanding of Islam and the culture that will enable us at every level to broadcast the truth to this part of the world by contact, deed and action. We need linguists, and not just those of Arab descent who happen to live in the United States. We need military officers who have studied and dedicated a portion of their careers to understanding the culture of Islam and who have developed personal contacts in the Arab world.

The current status quo consists of a profound ignorance of each other's cultures by both sides in this conflict. Both sides spewing propaganda at each other is not likely to resolve anything.

COL. RICHARD M. BRIDGES, USA RET.

Clifton, Va.

NCO Education

* Far-sighted Maj. Gen. Emory Upton, who recommended progressive education for U.S. Army noncommissioned officers in 1878, would have lauded the Sergeants Major Academy that SMA Bainbridge and Col. Morton describe so eloquently in the January issue. Upton's vision unfortunately took nearly 100 years to reach fruition, because the luckiest noncoms before the 1970s logged no more than a few weeks of formal instruction during careers that spanned three decades or more.

The U.S. Constabulary that guarded post-World War II Germany established the first NCO academy in 1947, but 10 more years elapsed before Army Regulation 350-90, dated June 25, 1957, officially authorized major installations and divisions to activate counterparts. Myopic policymakers in the Pentagon nevertheless provided no resources, prescribed no selection procedures for faculty or students, mandated few subjects and set no standards for graduation. Resources came out of each command's hide. Seasoned bird colonels and second lieutenants who knew less than the students they tutored variously served as superintendents. Facilities ranged from lavish to measly (abandoned mess halls often filled the bill). Brig. Gen. Bruce Clarke's Seventh Army Academy, the best of the lot, originally restricted admittance to sergeants, but fixed quotas and pressures to bolster flagging attendance soon caused standards to slip. Attendees included privates first class by April 1959; nearly 80 percent were tech service specialists in 1966. Washout rates even so were woefully low.

Leadership classes tended to be inspirational rather than informative. Students generally changed starched fatigues several times each day, learned how to block tee shirts for footlocker displays and polished belt buckle backs for Saturday morning inspections. Superior NCOs consequently shunned schools that were cost-ineffective in terms of time and energy expended. Sample surveys in Vietnam revealed that the percentage of academy graduates was unsatisfactory.

Neither rocket scientists nor neurosurgeons were needed to confirm that progressive education programs for Army NCOs amounted to an oxymoron at that juncture. Crusaders at the Infantry School solicited recommendations from noncoms seasoned in the crucible of combat and received common sense replies that called for elementary, intermediate and advanced courses of instruction. Tier one academies, according to respondents, should enable junior noncoms to function effectively in any combat, combat support or combat service support organization. Tier two academies for mid-level NCOs should slant instruction toward particular branches of service, each of which present distinctive leadership problems that demand dissimilar solutions. Tier three academies should prepare outstanding first sergeants and sergeants major to rule enlisted roosts at any echelon from company/ battery/troop to field army.