Military and Societal Values :: Military Philosophy Society Essays

Military and Societal Values Colonel Malham M. Wakin, in his evening address, asks whether Plato's claim that "knowledge is virtue" is true. Much contemporary experience suggests otherwise. To some extent, such an observation could apply to the military as well. Col Wakin argues that we do have some basic knowledge about human conduct, but that we live in a highly pluralistic society in which some practices reject that basic knowledge. Nonetheless, even though we draw members of the military from that pluralistic society, the uniqueness of the military function will always keep its leading practitioners apart from the mainstream of civilian society. The military profession swears to defend the values, the lifestyle that incorporates the minimal conditions for human dignity. After examining the convergence of the values that are functionally necessary for the military and those that we know are fundamental to social existence, he concludes that a competent military profession can serve as a moral anchor for its p arent society. I Many years ago when I learned I was going to have the opportunity to study philosophy at the graduate level, I was tremendously excited. What a wonderful opportunity this would be, I thought, to sit at the feet of Socrates and be enlightened by those who studied the crucial problems of human existence. I expected that senior philosophy professors would be marvelous role models in their personal lives and I looked forward with great anticipation to associating with those who had solved the problems of the universe. Indeed, these senior professors seemed very wise. They were dazzling in their abilities to rattle off the names and theories of great thinkers from every era. They knew the views of those whose names I couldn't even pronounce and I said to myself: "I'll never be able to grasp all of these ideas nor remember them well enough to teach them to others." But as time went on, I was slightly devastated to observe that these senior professors were not, as a group, the congenial masters of everyday living I expected them to be. They were not all basically kind persons--not even to each other. In fact, some would occasionally cross the street to avoid meeting and speaking with a colleague. And some had difficulties in their most important personal relationships--divorce, legal squabbles, envy, character assassination, narcissism--hardly what I had hoped for in the most knowledgeable, most studious persons in our society.