Combatant socialization and norms of restraint: Examining officer training at the US Military Academy and Army ROTC

2021 ◽  
pp. 002234332110108
Author(s):  
Andrew Bell
Keyword(s):  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
Officer Training ◽  
Military Academy ◽  
Army Reserve ◽  
Civilian Protection ◽  
Us Military ◽  
The Us ◽  
Reserve Officer Training Corps ◽  
Army Rotc

Can armed groups socialize combatants to norms of restraint – in essence, train soldiers to adopt norms of international humanitarian law on the battlefield? How can social scientists accurately measure such socialization? Despite being the central focus of organizational and ideational theories of conflict, studies to date have not engaged in systematic, survey-based examination of this central socialization mechanism theorized to influence military conduct. This study advances scholarly understanding by providing the first comparative, survey-based examination of combatant socialization to norms of restraint, using surveys and interviews with US Army cadets at the US Military Academy (USMA), Army Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC), and active duty Army combatants. Additionally, to better understand ‘restraint’ from combatants’ perspective, this study introduces the concept of the ‘combatant’s trilemma’ under which combatants conceptualize civilian protection as part of a costly trade-off with the values of military advantage and force protection. Survey results hold both positive and negative implications for socialization to law of war norms: military socialization can shift combatants’ preferences for battlefield conduct. However, intensive norm socialization may be required to shift combatants’ preferences from force protection to civilian protection norms. Study findings hold significant implications for understanding violence against civilians in conflict and for policies to disseminate civilian protection norms in armed groups worldwide.

Brothers in arms: Visual commonalities between US and IS recruitment strategies

2019 ◽  
pp. 175063521988777
Author(s):  
Lawrie Phillips ◽  
Maha Ghalwash
Keyword(s):  
Visual Image ◽  
Military Power ◽  
Recruitment Strategies ◽  
Islamic State ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
Multimodal Discourse Analysis ◽  
Multimodal Discourse ◽  
Us Military ◽  
The Sublime ◽  
The Us

This article claims that the visual image contributes to, reflects and supports the dominant discourse of two powerful armed groups that have operated in Iraq and Syria: the US military and the Islamic State (IS). This research uses multimodal discourse analysis to explore two crucial insights into the ideological power of the visual image: the power of the image as spectatorship or spectacle and the sublime or transcendental nature of the visual image. The authors conclude that US and IS recruitment and propaganda videos share these two crucial ideological elements: pride in the spectacle of their military power, discipline and technologies, and sublime commitment to the act of killing and dying for the cause. In this sense, the US military and IS are brothers in arms.

“Different than an infantry unit down in Georgia”: Narratives of queer liberation in the post-DADT military

Sexualities ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 21 (5-6) ◽  
pp. 776-792 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine Connell
Keyword(s):  
Officer Training ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Us Military ◽  
Don't Ask Don't Tell ◽  
The Us ◽  
Rotc Cadets ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Military ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Unanimous Approval

More than five years out from its implementation, we still know relatively little about how members of the US military and its ancillary institutions are responding to the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. Contrary to what one might expect given the long history of LGBTQ antipathy in the military, I found in interviews with Boston area Reserve Officer Training Core (ROTC) cadets unanimous approval for the repeal of DADT. When pressed to explain why there was so much homogeneity of favorable opinion regarding the repeal, interviewees repeatedly offered the same explanation: that Boston, in particular, is such a progressive place that even more conservative institutions like the ROTC are spared anti-gay sentiment. They imagined the Southern and/or rural soldier they will soon encounter when they enter the US military, one who represents the traditionally homophobic attitudes of the old military in contrast to their more enlightened selves. This “metronormative” narrative has been critiqued elsewhere as inadequate for understanding the relationship between sexuality and place; this article contributes to that critique by taking a new approach. Rather than deconstruct narratives of queer rurality, as the majority of metronormativity scholarship has done, I deconstruct these narratives of urban queer liberation. I find that such narratives mask the murkier realities of LGBTQ attitudes in urban contexts and allow residents like the ROTC cadets in this study to displace blame about anti-gay prejudice to a distant Other, outside of their own ranks.

scholarly journals Inconsistency in the US Foreign Policy towards Syrian Kurdistan

Twejer ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 459-502
Author(s):  
NNawzad Abduallah Shukri ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Us Foreign Policy ◽  
Federal System ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
Autonomous Region ◽  
Us Military ◽  
The Us ◽  
Military Support ◽  
Military Relations ◽  
Trump Administration

This study attempts to explain the US policy towards Syrian Kurds and highlight the key reasons behind establishing of military relations between Kurds and US. Further, it endeavors to explore the fact that why the US policy towards Syria Kurds is unstable and why Trump administration allowed Turkey to attack Kurdish autonomous region in Syria. In reality, the emergence of relations between Kurds and US backed to 2014, especially when ISIS controlled vast majority of Syria and Iraq territory and posed serious threat to the US security interests in Iraq and region. In this regards, the US saw the Kurdish forces as a trusted partner to confront ISIS in Syria. In particular, the Syrian armed groups did not want to fight ISIS and even some of them had relations with ISIS. However, despite the US military support to the Kurds, but politically US has a contradiction and unstable policy toward Kurds in Syria and it does not have any intention or agenda to support autonomous region or federal system for Kurds. This has been the key reasons behind Trump attempts to withdrawal its troops from Syria without taking into consideration the future of the Kurds there and allowed Turkey to attack Kurds. In fact, Turkey pressures, US willingness to withdrawal its troops form Middle East and defeating ISIS might push US to completely withdrawal all forces and abandon the Kurds in Syria.

scholarly journals Influenza Before the 1890 and 1918 Pandemics in the US Army and at the US Military Academy

2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (7) ◽  
Author(s):  
G Dennis Shanks ◽  
Melissa Eslinger
Keyword(s):  
Seasonal Influenza ◽  
West Point ◽  
Military Academy ◽  
Us Army ◽  
Us Military ◽  
The Us

Abstract Influenza rates for the US Army and West Point cadets showed that seasonal influenza was not necessarily an annual event, and there was little influenzal illness in the decade before 1918 except for 1911 and 1916. Annual records from 1862–1918 also indicated a similar paucity of influenzal illness before 1890.

West Point

2019 ◽  
pp. 5-36
Author(s):  
Ingo Trauschweizer
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
West Point ◽  
Military Academy ◽  
Atomic Weapons ◽  
Limited War ◽  
Us Military ◽  
Mobilization Potential ◽  
Army Officers ◽  
The Us

In the opening chapter I introduce Maxwell Taylor as superintendent of the US Military Academy (1945-1949), where he placed greater emphasis on the humanities for a more balanced liberal education of army officers. This was to prepare them for leadership of a mass army made up of a mix of volunteers and draftees, which depended on one’s ability to communicate clearly and compellingly. At West Point, Taylor also began to formulate lessons of World War II, pondered the changing nature of strategy, which now had to encompass the full mobilization potential of the nation, and considered the effects of atomic weapons. Curiously, he concluded that limited war remained both possible and likely.

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