In two profound U.S. Naval Academy Commencement speeches, sitting presidents Woodrow Wilson and John F. Kennedy articulated the necessity for military officers to immediately and continuously develop their understanding of international relations. Both stated military officers should not only master the technical aspects of their warfare areas, but also understand their role as critical players in and shapers of national security policy. This unique role elevates military officership from a trade to a profession and distinguishes the officer’s role from his or her limited duty, warrant, and enlisted counterparts.1 While the use of naval forces at the strategic level is coordinated by political and flag-level leadership, junior officers at the tactical level must identify the “primacy of the political object” that subordinates military strategy to calibrate immediate decisions to best align with the nation’s desired end states.2 To effectively lead, officers must heed President Kennedy’s charge to, “[out] of necessity, be prepared not only to handle a ship in a storm or a landing party on a beach, but to make great determinations which will affect the survival of [the United States].”3
Strength and Character
Both presidents spoke at a time of international turbulence. As President Wilson addressed the class of 1914, the incipient flames of World War began to kindle in Europe. Although it would be three years until the Great War’s flashover would engulf the United States, the newly commissioned officers President Wilson addressed in 1914 would be those who carried out the Commander-in-Chief’s grand strategic aims. Similarly, President Kennedy led the free world and its principal military service through a “long, twilight struggle” against the Soviet Bloc.4 Both leaders sought to defeat aggressors not only through overwhelming military strength, but also through the conduct of national character. “The idea of America,” spoke President Wilson to the class of 1914, “is to serve humanity, and every time you let the Stars and Stripes free to the wind you ought to realize that that is in itself a message that you are on an errand which other navies have sometimes forgotten; not an errand of conquest, but an errand of service.”5 A democratic nation’s naval force ensures the international commons that underwrite national prosperity remain free from aggressive interference. In executing this mission, the officers that navigate gray-hulled warships not only protect national security interests but also promote international economic and political interdependence.
Although both Commanders-in-Chief sought an idealistic vision of international relations, each understood that the arcs of history do not naturally bend toward justice.6 To maintain the peace, argued President Kennedy, the United States must proactively guard against “those who challenge us so severely in so many parts of the globe.”7 For every hour logged on the bridge or in the cockpit, naval officers are directly participating in one of the many special “activities [that are meant] to keep the world straight, and to keep the energy in its blood and in its muscle.”8 But the naval fleets that they lead can also serve, sometimes simultaneously, as international deterrent mechanisms, warfighting forces, and diplomatic attachés. As people “who are trained for a special thing,” preached Wilson, naval officers are a unique “part of the power of the Government of the United States.”9
It is crucial that officers—especially junior officers (JOs)—understand and appreciate this role. The seemingly trivial tasks associated with material management, administrative minutiae, and technical details often disparage the fundamental role of the naval officer as the principal manager of “[the] direction, operation, and control of a human organization whose primary function is the application of violence” upon the sea.10 If JOs wait until midcareer to study the theories of international politics and grand strategy, they will do themselves and their divisions or departments a grave disservice. As retired Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral John Richardson, wrote in the foreword to James R. Holmes’s A Brief Guide to Maritime Strategy, “all officers, from newly commissioned ensigns . . . to senior admirals . . . need to be familiar with the strategic cannon” to establish common points of departure to communicate with other officers and lead enlisted subordinates.11 President Wilson spoke to the newly graduated officers of their responsibility as teachers of the men and women they were getting ready to lead: “You are going to make them fitter to obey your orders and to serve the country. You are going to make them fitter to see what the orders mean in their outlook upon life and upon the service; and that is a great privilege, for out of you is going the energy and intelligence which are going to quicken the whole body of the United States Navy.”12
Principles and Security
To do so, officers must be attuned to the intricacies and necessities of their times while simultaneously guarding against the myopic tendencies to leave the hardest battles to the subsequent generation. According to Samuel P. Huntington, “Military skill requires a broad background of general culture for its mastery. The methods of organizing and applying violence at any stage in history are intimately related to the entire cultural pattern of society.”13 President Kennedy realized the political principles and security structures that defined international order when Wilson spoke at the same location nearly 50 years before had been dramatically and fundamentally altered. Because of this, Kennedy argued, the traditional lines between military service and political influence had become thinner. President Kennedy charged his audience to appreciate “that few of the important problems of our time have, in the final analysis, been finally solved by military power alone.”14 The uniformed services are but one component of the United States’ foreign policy apparatus. Accordingly, he instructed the graduates that “[they] must understand not only this country but other countries. [And also] know something about economics and politics and diplomacy and history.”15 When naval officers go to sea, they not only display American might but also send the political message that the United States is committed to participating in and ensuring the security of the international order that it established.
Moreover, an officer must remain ever cognizant of the political turmoil his or her maneuvering abroad could potentially generate. This is a point stressed by military historian Antulio J. Echevarria. Though war is often a Clausewitzian extension of politics by other means, there are times when war is the result of a break in or complete failure of policy. To prevent military inaction or blunder during these periods, the military professional must “possess enough political acumen to make on-the-spot decisions which, if not always right, are at least not too far wrong.”16
Looking Forward
Despite the many decades that have passed since Presidents Wilson and Kennedy spoke to the graduates of the U.S. Naval Academy, their charges remain critically important in the professional development of naval officers. Officership demands a continuous education in both the platform-specific mechanics of certain ships, aircraft, or submarines as well as a broader engagement with the liberal arts, international relations, and strategy. James R. Holmes argues that an organizational and generational failure to think strategically drastically weakened the United States’ ability to project power against formidable competitors.
All is not lost, however, and Holmes’s prescription is simple: “Studying strategy and history throughout a career in uniform—not just when assigned to the schoolhouse—will inoculate seafarers and the service as a whole against taking tough rivals lightly” and reinvigorate U.S. lethality upon the high seas.17 Presidents Woodrow Wilson and John F. would approve. The naval officer must always be on-guard to properly confront the unique challenges of his or her generation. President Wilson’s explicit order must be carried out by all who, as officers, are charged to obey: “Be ready and fit for anything that you have to do. And keep ready and fit. Do not grow slack. Do not suppose that your education is over because you have received your [commission].”18
1. Samuel P. Huntington, The Soldier and the State: The Theory and Politics of Civil-Military Relations (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1957), 7–18.
2. Kevin D. McCrane, Mahan, Corbett, and the Foundations of Naval Strategic Thought (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2021), 71.
3. John F. Kennedy, “U.S. Naval Academy Commencement” (1961), in Let the Word Go Forth: The Speeches, Statements, and Writings of John F. Kennedy, ed. Theodore C. Sorensen (New York, NY: Dell Publishing, 1988), 242–44.
4. Kennedy, “The Inaugural Address” (1961), in Let the Word Go Forth, 11–15.
5. Woodrow Wilson, “Annapolis Commencement Address” (1914), in Charge: History’s Greatest Military Speeches, ed. Steve Israel (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2007), 110–13.
6. Kennedy, “The Inaugural Address” (1961), in Let the Word Go Forth, 11–15.
7. Kennedy, “U.S. Naval Academy Commencement,” 242–44.
8. Wilson, “Annapolis Commencement Address,” 110–13.
9. Wilson, “Annapolis Commencement Address.”
10. Huntington, The Soldier and the State, 11.
11. ADM John Richardson (Ret.), USN, Foreword to A Brief Guide to Maritime Strategy, James R. Holmes (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2019).
12. Wilson, “Annapolis Commencement Address.”
13. Huntington, The Soldier and the State, 14.
14. Kennedy, “U.S. Naval Academy Commencement.”
15. Kennedy.
16. Anulio J. Echevarria II, War’s Logic: Strategic Thought and the American Way of War (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2021), 141.
17. Holmes, A Brief Guide to Maritime Strategy, 150.
18. Wilson, “Annapolis Commencement Address.”
