What we are witnessing at MCU is the FD equivalent of "divest to invest" - - get rid of what works under the false flag of acquiring something better. How did this work for the MAGTF? It failed and so will the MCU experiment for similar reasons, chief among them being the lack of transparency and inclusion.
LtGen Van Riper is right, and the direction being taken at Marine Corps University is a mistake that history has already graded.
Commanders do not fail in their moments of decision because they lacked the latest briefing on emerging technology. They fail when they lack a deep, internalized understanding of the permanent nature of war: friction, fear, exhaustion, the limits of men under fire, and the moral weight of ordering others into lethal risk. That understanding is forged by serious study of men who have already faced those moments—Thucydides, Chamberlain on Little Round Top, the endless case studies of decisions made under incomplete information and mortal pressure. Technology changes. The human material of war does not.
The post-1945 experiment of sidelining military history in favor of management techniques, systems analysis, and the newest technical orthodoxy helped produce the intellectual failures of Vietnam. The services eventually had to climb back out of that hole. The Marine Corps, under General Gray and with Van Riper’s direct involvement, deliberately restored history and maneuver warfare as the core of professional education for a reason. It was a hard-won correction. Reversing it now, under the banner of preparing for “tomorrow’s battlefield,” repeats the same error with new vocabulary—AI, Joint All Domain Operations, war games—while mocking the very studies that once corrected the last version of the mistake.
Chamberlain did not need more information about the Spencer carbine or the telegraph when he ordered the bayonet charge. He needed judgment formed by an understanding of what men can still do when the defensive position is about to collapse. Future Marine commanders will face their own versions of that moment. If their education has trained them primarily as consumers of technical information rather than as students of the art of war, they will arrive at those moments under-equipped where it matters most.
This is not an argument against technology. It is an argument about hierarchy. Technology is a tool. The educated judgment of the commander who must decide under pressure is the irreplaceable core. When professional military education begins to treat the study of history and the human reality of battle as “stale,” it signals the same cultural preference we see elsewhere: the elevation of the new, the procedural, and the technical over the permanent and the hard. That preference does not survive contact with a serious enemy who still studies the older lessons.
Van Riper has seen this cycle before. The Corps would do well to listen before it has to relearn the cost the hard way.
Most individuals who attend formal schools will never become commanders. Just the school selection criteria insures that many will attend and the mix of MOSs insure they will never be commanders. Why would a Chaplain, Lawyer or Administrator need to get an education that might prepare them to command? They are usually not even well prepared for the course. They do however, gain an appreciation for their roles in support.
Gen Van Riper and General Gray and others understood that the study of history and the great captains was essential for understanding the friction of war and how the most unique human endeavor cannot be captured in formulas and algorithms. It is called “ A Genius for War” for a reason. There are flashes of brilliance in institutions where circumstances and talent meet opportunity. For the Marine Corps this occurred when Gen Gray and LtGen Van Riper rebuilt the formal schools. They were very good and suddenly into overdrive. Some people have it and get better through intense study and reading. Others will never have it under any circumstances.
A superior faculty can often spot the most gifted. A “not observed” fitness report while under formal instruction was severely misguided.
The Corps changed its fitness report system in 1992. That was a huge mistake. Command selection was a huge mistake and perverted the actual reason it was implemented. The school selection boards picked too many staff officer MOS’s and not ranking graduates was a mistake. Each mistake magnifies the severity of the last.
I will repeat that today’s Marine Corps needs a renaissance. A rebirth in education, training, culture, ethics, Esprit de Corps, accountability, elan, leadership and dedication. That will require a few good men of extraordinary vision, energy, charisma and a “ genius for war.”
What has the Marine Corps History Division at MCU done to document the history being made by Marines since 9/11? Not much. Recent work includes an update of "Semper Fidelis," the Marine Corps institutional history, for the 250th Anniversary, and a Vietnam commemorative, "Withdrawal: U.S. Marines and the American Exit From Southeast Asia, 1969-1979." The historian who wrote that was hired to write the history of Operation Iraqi Freedom almost a decade ago. Where is it? Another long time staff member has spent the past several years writing "Marines in the Frigate Navy," covering the Nineteenth Century up to the Civil War.
The History Division has had two full time and three acting directors since 2019. Both of the full time directors were/are retired lieutenant colonels with limited experience - both were brand new PhDs when they were hired. From 2019 to 2021, half the staff left due to toxic leadership. Complaints about the situation, which have gone to congressman, senators, and the DoD IG, are met with denial by the MCU and Marine Corps.
We hear much from former MCU President Paul Van Riper. Perhaps he can tell us about the Mundy Board (which Van Riper sat on when it met over two decades ago). The board identified the problems caused by the History Division's move from HQMC to MCU, and made recommendations to fix them. MCU President Don Gardner ignored the findings, perpetuating problems that have only gotten worse over the years.
The Director of the History and Museum Division reported directly to the Commandant of the Marine Corps until the organization was moved to Quantico and split into the National Museum of the Marine Corps and the History Division both under the Marine Corps University, which is a subordinate element of the Training and Education Command. Retired Brigadier General Simmons was the director when the organization reported directly to the Commandant. Today it is headed by a retired Marine Lieutenant Colonel and resides three layers below the Commandant. If I was the Commandant, I would reestablish the History and Museum Division with a general officer (perhaps retired) reporting directly to the Commandant beginning in November 2027. To illustrate the current Commandant’s disinterest in history, he turned down a donation of five million dollars to fund support of the History Division saying, “The History Division doesn’t need any money.”
I attended USMC Command & Staff in the ill fated 90-91 class where we watched Desert Shield from afar. The Marine Corps thought the benefits of the school attendance would outweigh the benefits of being "the man in the arena." It was entirely frustrating at the time, but both the year at Command & Staff College and the year at the Naval War College were mind altering from the opportunity to study history and decision making at all levels of war, guided by world class professors and marinaded by students from various areas of warfighting expertise. The decision to deemphasize history strikes me about as misguided as the decision to deemphasize combined arms, and both seem based on whims as opposed to rigorous thought. I believe we got to the "ready, fire, aim" phase of our Corps when we stopped listening to people with institutional knowledge, perhaps better called living history. Why this would be done without brining together former leaders of MCU and the colleges completely baffles me.
How about getting rid of the Sun Tzu nutjobs and find people with a complete and thorough working knowledge of Von Clausewitz? (Sun Tzu has not won any wars, or are you not paying attention?)
Once you find them, you'll see them push back on politicians to adopt better politics. The Greatest Generals knew war is to be avoided at all cost. Of course, that wouldn't make the Military Industrial Complex happy now, would it?
What we are witnessing at MCU is the FD equivalent of "divest to invest" - - get rid of what works under the false flag of acquiring something better. How did this work for the MAGTF? It failed and so will the MCU experiment for similar reasons, chief among them being the lack of transparency and inclusion.
LtGen Van Riper is right, and the direction being taken at Marine Corps University is a mistake that history has already graded.
Commanders do not fail in their moments of decision because they lacked the latest briefing on emerging technology. They fail when they lack a deep, internalized understanding of the permanent nature of war: friction, fear, exhaustion, the limits of men under fire, and the moral weight of ordering others into lethal risk. That understanding is forged by serious study of men who have already faced those moments—Thucydides, Chamberlain on Little Round Top, the endless case studies of decisions made under incomplete information and mortal pressure. Technology changes. The human material of war does not.
The post-1945 experiment of sidelining military history in favor of management techniques, systems analysis, and the newest technical orthodoxy helped produce the intellectual failures of Vietnam. The services eventually had to climb back out of that hole. The Marine Corps, under General Gray and with Van Riper’s direct involvement, deliberately restored history and maneuver warfare as the core of professional education for a reason. It was a hard-won correction. Reversing it now, under the banner of preparing for “tomorrow’s battlefield,” repeats the same error with new vocabulary—AI, Joint All Domain Operations, war games—while mocking the very studies that once corrected the last version of the mistake.
Chamberlain did not need more information about the Spencer carbine or the telegraph when he ordered the bayonet charge. He needed judgment formed by an understanding of what men can still do when the defensive position is about to collapse. Future Marine commanders will face their own versions of that moment. If their education has trained them primarily as consumers of technical information rather than as students of the art of war, they will arrive at those moments under-equipped where it matters most.
This is not an argument against technology. It is an argument about hierarchy. Technology is a tool. The educated judgment of the commander who must decide under pressure is the irreplaceable core. When professional military education begins to treat the study of history and the human reality of battle as “stale,” it signals the same cultural preference we see elsewhere: the elevation of the new, the procedural, and the technical over the permanent and the hard. That preference does not survive contact with a serious enemy who still studies the older lessons.
Van Riper has seen this cycle before. The Corps would do well to listen before it has to relearn the cost the hard way.
Semper Fi!!!
Most individuals who attend formal schools will never become commanders. Just the school selection criteria insures that many will attend and the mix of MOSs insure they will never be commanders. Why would a Chaplain, Lawyer or Administrator need to get an education that might prepare them to command? They are usually not even well prepared for the course. They do however, gain an appreciation for their roles in support.
Gen Van Riper and General Gray and others understood that the study of history and the great captains was essential for understanding the friction of war and how the most unique human endeavor cannot be captured in formulas and algorithms. It is called “ A Genius for War” for a reason. There are flashes of brilliance in institutions where circumstances and talent meet opportunity. For the Marine Corps this occurred when Gen Gray and LtGen Van Riper rebuilt the formal schools. They were very good and suddenly into overdrive. Some people have it and get better through intense study and reading. Others will never have it under any circumstances.
A superior faculty can often spot the most gifted. A “not observed” fitness report while under formal instruction was severely misguided.
The Corps changed its fitness report system in 1992. That was a huge mistake. Command selection was a huge mistake and perverted the actual reason it was implemented. The school selection boards picked too many staff officer MOS’s and not ranking graduates was a mistake. Each mistake magnifies the severity of the last.
I will repeat that today’s Marine Corps needs a renaissance. A rebirth in education, training, culture, ethics, Esprit de Corps, accountability, elan, leadership and dedication. That will require a few good men of extraordinary vision, energy, charisma and a “ genius for war.”
What has the Marine Corps History Division at MCU done to document the history being made by Marines since 9/11? Not much. Recent work includes an update of "Semper Fidelis," the Marine Corps institutional history, for the 250th Anniversary, and a Vietnam commemorative, "Withdrawal: U.S. Marines and the American Exit From Southeast Asia, 1969-1979." The historian who wrote that was hired to write the history of Operation Iraqi Freedom almost a decade ago. Where is it? Another long time staff member has spent the past several years writing "Marines in the Frigate Navy," covering the Nineteenth Century up to the Civil War.
The History Division has had two full time and three acting directors since 2019. Both of the full time directors were/are retired lieutenant colonels with limited experience - both were brand new PhDs when they were hired. From 2019 to 2021, half the staff left due to toxic leadership. Complaints about the situation, which have gone to congressman, senators, and the DoD IG, are met with denial by the MCU and Marine Corps.
We hear much from former MCU President Paul Van Riper. Perhaps he can tell us about the Mundy Board (which Van Riper sat on when it met over two decades ago). The board identified the problems caused by the History Division's move from HQMC to MCU, and made recommendations to fix them. MCU President Don Gardner ignored the findings, perpetuating problems that have only gotten worse over the years.
The Director of the History and Museum Division reported directly to the Commandant of the Marine Corps until the organization was moved to Quantico and split into the National Museum of the Marine Corps and the History Division both under the Marine Corps University, which is a subordinate element of the Training and Education Command. Retired Brigadier General Simmons was the director when the organization reported directly to the Commandant. Today it is headed by a retired Marine Lieutenant Colonel and resides three layers below the Commandant. If I was the Commandant, I would reestablish the History and Museum Division with a general officer (perhaps retired) reporting directly to the Commandant beginning in November 2027. To illustrate the current Commandant’s disinterest in history, he turned down a donation of five million dollars to fund support of the History Division saying, “The History Division doesn’t need any money.”
I attended USMC Command & Staff in the ill fated 90-91 class where we watched Desert Shield from afar. The Marine Corps thought the benefits of the school attendance would outweigh the benefits of being "the man in the arena." It was entirely frustrating at the time, but both the year at Command & Staff College and the year at the Naval War College were mind altering from the opportunity to study history and decision making at all levels of war, guided by world class professors and marinaded by students from various areas of warfighting expertise. The decision to deemphasize history strikes me about as misguided as the decision to deemphasize combined arms, and both seem based on whims as opposed to rigorous thought. I believe we got to the "ready, fire, aim" phase of our Corps when we stopped listening to people with institutional knowledge, perhaps better called living history. Why this would be done without brining together former leaders of MCU and the colleges completely baffles me.
How about getting rid of the Sun Tzu nutjobs and find people with a complete and thorough working knowledge of Von Clausewitz? (Sun Tzu has not won any wars, or are you not paying attention?)
Once you find them, you'll see them push back on politicians to adopt better politics. The Greatest Generals knew war is to be avoided at all cost. Of course, that wouldn't make the Military Industrial Complex happy now, would it?