I attended a breakfast meeting on Friday with John P. Rose (Brigadier General U.S. Army, retired), who directs the School of Defense and Strategic Studies at Missouri State University. When I was growing up in St. Louis, there was no such thing as Missouri State University. It’s a result of a name change – the former Southeast Missouri State University in Springfield. And why would there be a School of Defense and Strategic Studies at a Missouri state school in, of all places, Springfield?

Well, first of all it turns out that the program is not carried on in Springfield, but in Fairfax, VA. The program was started by another individual in California, but whose home town was Springfield, and he decided to bring the program back home, which he did. After his leadership ended, the continuation of the program, at least as a successful program, probably mandated that it leave Springfield, and Washington turned out to be the best place, both because of its attraction to students and the availability of internships and other programs.

I must admit that I had never heard of the program, and my guess is that you hadn’t either. But it now has over 300 students, all graduate students, about 1/3 in PhD programs and the rest getting masters degrees. For those who attend live classes (I think, but am not sure, that this is the majority), the classes are all evening classes (6 to 9 p.m.) in Fairfax County. There are others who matriculate via Zoom and I think still others who do not do live Zooming, but who watch video recordings of classes.

The purpose of the program is to prepare students for 21st century dangers to the security of the country. A quick glance at some of the names of classes gives one a good idea of what is being taught: nuclear strategy, arms control, international law, international negotiating, conflict and accommodation, U.S. defense policy, science and technology in warfare and defense, regional security problems, NATO, Russian military strategy, weapons of mass destruction, space policy and security, international terrorism, intelligence and counterintelligence and covert action, understanding military action, causes of war, small wars, guerrilla warfare, emergency strategic challenges, Chinese military policy, chemical and biological warfare, cyber conflict, climate change, ethical issues, and so forth.

What you soon realize (if you have not realized it already), is that this is a very complicated world and it is getting more complicated, and more dangerous, by the day. I don’t know how many programs there are like that of Missouri State, I don’t know how strong the faculty is, or how talented the student body is. But I know these are all issues that need much more attention than they seem to get, and I am glad to hear that there are programs like this around.

The goal is to teach for the future. What was clear from the conversation Friday morning is that, even with all of his experience, knowledge and concentration on these subjects, General Rose really can’t predict the future much better than any of us can. That is why the students need to be prepared to respond to a variety of threats, each of which requires technical training to understand and to counter. A big topic of course is whether or not everything is becoming too complicated for the human race to control or, on a slightly lesser level, whether American democracy with all of its faults, its starts and stops, etc., is capable of responding to a world of one-man, or one-party, dictatorships and instant and omnipresent social media. At least, that is my big topic.

And I guess that one day we will find out.