MAGAZINE
SPRING 2020
“ Seeing Ourselves through Our Allies : The Value of NATO in Adapting National Military Culture ”
Growing agile and adaptive leaders does not just happen in a vacuum . The expectations of and opportunities for soldiers within their army are central to its organizational culture . This culture , the context in which leaders develop , is widely recognized as important but is largely invisible to those immersed in it . In this article I argue that a unique advantage of NATO is that , through the close and continuous interaction between military professionals , each constituent army can become more aware of its own organizational culture . By seeing itself more clearly , each national military can then , in turn improve , how it selects and develops agile and adaptive leaders for deterrence and defence .
By Lieutenant Colonel Stephan PIKNER , U . S . Army , LANDCOM G5
Another widely cited advantage of democratic militaries is superior human capital . Citizens of democracies are broadly healthier and better educated than subjects in an autocracy , resulting in a deeper recruit base . By participating actively in the political process they are more likely to internalize the state ’ s mission as their own3 . Most critically , however , soldiers
Democracies : Militarily Advantaged Despite hand wringing about the assumed military advantages of authoritarian states , democracies generally field more capable armed forces and win more wars than their autocratic counterparts . There are several commonly cited explanations for this empirical observation . First , democracies tend to have stronger economies , resulting in a larger resource base which can support a more capable military . Second , authoritarian regimes have to concern themselves with not only foreign threats to their survival but also internal ones . This can divert resources away from the military towards the internal security organizations autocratic regimes rely on to intimidate and repress its own population1 . Within the military itself , authoritarian leaders often take a series of coup-proofing steps that reduce military effectiveness but secure their position in power . Such steps include establishing parallel chains of command , maintaining duplicative forces , and promoting officers for personal fealty instead of competence2 .
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