@ae_rollinson @spatelis : I’m not just trying to answer why an officer billet exists in different MTOEs or TDAs, but why we commission lieutenants straight out of college, often with no prior real world experience. Of the nations that have ever had officers, I’m sure not all of them created an officer corps exactly like ours. One of my Soldiers from my first deployment thought you should have to attain the rank of Sergeant Major before becoming a 2nd Lieutenant. From his perspective, the path to attaining the competencies enumerated in S.L.A. Marshall’s “Armed Forces Officer” would be best attained and verified by a full enlisted career first. In such a military, our four star generals might very well be 80 years old.

If we were to list all the reasons to have officers, exactly as we have them, an argument for the age of generals would probably not be the most prominent. Somewhere on that list would be “because it wins wars”. This is likely not categorically true, but I’m willing to bet we have at least tenuous examples of a flat organization failing (i.e. Al Qaeda maybe?), and tiered organizations succeeding (US, UK, France, etc). I want to open this program with this argument, since it will have a mixed audience, and this argument is less likely to draw the room into an argument. Everyone can get behind winning wars, and those with enough historical knowledge to argue the merits of officership in a historical context are also less likely to disrupt the flow of the program.

There are definitely better arguments to be made for why we have officers. One that I’m considering from my original post is one of systemic mentorship. It starts with a robust education, punctuated by meaningful interactions with experienced veterans. If a 15-20 year veteran can impart all that knowledge to an eager and capable young officer, we have positive knowledge flow, and the possibility of that 15-20 year veteran’s wishlist getting fleshed out in that officer’s career. I’m less eager to make this argument in front of a mixed audience from my brigade, as phrasing can be delicate. I don’t want to minimize an entire 15-20 year enlisted career to “just what you can impart on some lieutenant”, but improperly presented, it could easily come off that way.