I follow the development of crisis/emergency/disaster training at colleges and universities with a mixture of increasing curiosity and dismay. People who teach these courses have minimal (if any) experience in operational issues. Consequently, you end with a curiously pseudo-intellectual porridge of hardly any practical value, a BS or MS in “emergency management,” and subsequent employment in the field (often as the manager) with absolutely no predisposition to manage an emergency greater than a blown tire when it happens in front of a garage.

The civilian world seems to delight in disregarding what the military considered for ages the cornerstone of any complex operation – proper staff work. The civilian world does not train people in even the most elementary aspects of it, and when things happen (or even before they happen) chaos reigns supreme. Russ makes very broad hints to that deficiency, and ToL (Team of Leaders; PWH note – see previous RC posts) could, in many ways provide the bridge (assuming the civvies will see the sense in it!)

The solitary bright light here is the presence of PK Carlton at Texas A&M and his steering their homeland security program. With his illustrious past as the SGUSAF, intellect, and incisive vision he provides the example of a flag officer in the right place after retirement from active service – giving the amateurs some sense of what it all is about, how it should be managed, and run. But a solitary point of bright light is insufficient to dispel the gloom. Therefore, a great pity there are only a handful of admirals and generals who end in the world of higher education. Russ at Emory will be another one, providing they wring every molecule of his expertise out of him and imbue these into their students.

The field, in the context of disaster management and higher education, has been made artificially academic. Surely, you can make a lot of theoretical deliberation on how to fight a fighter squadron, but will that make good fighter pilots? Probably not – the manual needs to be written, and the mantra spread around, by a person who knows what he talks about – just like Boyd did with his classic. Hence, the need for the senior military officers presence in the academy (which will oppose that with the greatest of vigours and vehemence!) and not only at the military academies. It is really essential for the future – they possess the practical expertise, the wisdom, erudition, and breadth of vision that a typical narrowly specialized academic is simply incapable of having. There is also the spunk and leadership qualities that universities talk about but have absolutely no clue as to the nature of that beast.

If the next generation must learn, let them learn from the best, not from the confusing, confused, and badly enamoured in their “learned qualities” people at universities. They have their place, surely. However, myself bridging the two worlds, I see that too often they are sadly out of place, and not much is done about it, despite a solid cadre of people who really should be in charge of these departments and this type of education.

We have some of the best specialists in the world, both in the military and in other branches relevant to crisis/disaster management. After their retirement from service, you find them all over the place, but not where they ought to be – sharing their hard won expertise with the new generation of civies in whose, currently singularly inept hands, the fate of the nation is about to rest. And mind, this is the ONLY nation that provides a working glue to the rapidly fragmenting world. If the US fails in that role, if the mission of this country gets diluted to the extent it becomes inconsequential, I am the first to look for a “galaxy after the next” to be moderately safe from a massive amount of highly radioactive dust that will be known to extraterrestials as “Ex-terra nuclearis.”

Good idea, good job, and keep on distributing such thoughts to the world at large. I also think, the conference that you started organizing will be a major step in what Lagadec aptly calls “sense-making.”