The Art of Command: Military Leadership from George Washington to Colin Powell

Foreword

Foreword In March 1969, I, along with two dozen other young men, stumbled off a chartered bus in front of the white World War II–era barracks at Fort Lewis, Washington. Waiting for us and already barking orders was Drill Sergeant Mata. I had joined the United States Army. I was a volunteer, a private who planned to serve his three-year enlistment and return home to Oregon. (Two weeks after entering boot camp, I received an official induction notice in the mail.) Unbeknownst to me, boot camp was actually the start of a thirty-eight-year military career— a four-decade journey of public service and leadership development. The year 1969 was the midpoint of the cold war and the peak of the Vietnam War. Four years earlier, in Vietnam’s Ia Drang Valley , Lieutenant Colonel Harold “Hal” Moore had exercised masterful leadership that resulted in America’s first major battlefield victory in that long and bloody conflict. As a new recruit, I knew little of Vietnam or military leadership, but I quickly embraced the culture of duty and honor that is the core of America’s armed forces. Remarkably , twenty-five years after my enlistment, I would lead two of Hal Moore’s sons, Lieutenant Colonel Steve Moore and Colonel Dave Moore. For me, the Moore family embodies the selfless values taught, learned, and practiced by the best leaders in our country’s military. During the course of my career, I had the tremendous benefit of being stationed in various billets around the world. I served under and with numerous superb commanders, each of whom influenced my own leadership development. During my tour as a staff officer for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, for example, I came to appreciate fully the complex and innumerable challenges faced by high-level military leaders. During this time, the Joint Chiefs, chaired by General Colin Powell, oversaw Operation Just Cause in Panama, Operation Desert Storm in the Middle East, and the fall of communism in Eastern Europe. Furthermore, my cruise aboard the nuclear submarine USS Pennsylvania served as a clear and direct reminder of Admiral Hyman Rickover’s accomplishments and the importance of technology leadership in the military. Then-colonel Norman Schwarzkopf at Fort Lewis and Major General Henry “Gunfighter” Emerson in Korea taught me invaluable lessons about charismatic, visionary, adaptive, and willful leadership. The Art of Command: Military Leadership from George Washington to Colin Powell provides insightful and informed analyses of nine leadership qualities that have been central to effective American military leadership. Do these historic leadership qualities have relevance for military officers leading servicemen in the twenty-first century? In other words, can the traits and practices of leaders such as George Washington, Ulysses Grant, Henry “Hap” Arnold, and Lewis “Chesty ” Puller be effectively applied by military officers in places like Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea, and the Balkans? The answer is yes. The lessons offered in the following chapters are timeless and should be adopted by current and aspiring military leaders. In fact, a renewed focus on integrity, persistence, vision, adaptability, institutional development, and technological advancement is needed now more than ever. In a unipolar world of intense globalization driven by revolutionary technological change and the free flow of goods, services, and capital, U.S. military leaders will be challenged like never before. The prelude to 11 September 2001 and its immediate aftermath brought to the foreground the exceptional leadership skills of two very different people: Osama bin Laden and Rudy Giuliani. Bin Laden orchestrated the audacious attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Center; in response, Giuliani rallied the citizens of New York City and inspired the country as a whole. Neither of these leaders, however, was born great. They, and the commanders discussed in this book, spent decades learning and developing as leaders. As legendary football coach Vince Lombardi once remarked, “Leaders are made; they are not born. They are made by hard effort, which is the price all of us must pay to achieve any goal that is worthwhile.” x Foreword One of my many mentors, General Montgomery “Monty” Meigs, personified the leader who is a lifelong learner. In the late 1990s, I was responsible for exploring the application of Internet and other computer technologies to the army mission. Then–lieutenant general Meigs, commanding general of the U.S. Army Combined Arms Center at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, inquired where he could learn more about the application...