The foundation for this study rests upon the military ideology of Revolutionary America, which had as its guiding principle, the conviction that standing armies in peacetime were a liability. To many Americans a standing army represented an ever present threat to their rights as citizens. As a consequence, responsibility for the security of the nation was placed upon the idealised notion of the citizen soldier. This was a citizen, who it was supposed, would, when the need arose, voluntarily renounce his own personal priorities for the sake of the nation. Reality, however, proved otherwise, for citizen soldiers rarely achieved what was expected of them. Yet as this study's examination of the Congressional debates of the 1790's makes clear, the notion of the citizen soldier proved to be extremely resilient. Despite a catalogue of failings, the country's reliance on the state militias for a significant proportion of its military capability persisted. This served to severely handicap the effectiveness of the American military establishment during the War of 1812. Primarily, the effect that the militias had upon the effectiveness of the military establishment is found within the various interactions of citizen soldiers with the regular army. Although these interactions are categorised and analysed within the context of this study, all of them revolve around the issue of consent. Militiamen demanded from the federal government that once they had consented to serve, it was beholden upon the federal government to ensure that they were properly equipped and supplied, as well as being directed towards some worthwhile objective. Yet despite the considerable importance these interactions had upon the military establishment, and their utility in understanding many of its failings, historians of the conflict have failed to adequately consider them. Instead, they have tended to either denigrate the militias' obvious failings, or eulogise their achievements, rather than examine why the militias were capable of performances at both extremes.

Lithuanian soldiers volunteers are well evaluated for their participation in international missions: in Serbia and Montenegro, the province of Kosovo, the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. Their professionalism is positively evaluated by the high officials of other foreign states thus physical health and healthy state of mind of every soldier volunteer as well as appropriate rehabilitation after the return from mission is very important. Hypothesis. When in mission soldiers volunteers experience various reactions caused by stress events (e.g. dizziness or faintness attack, sleeping disorders, muscular convulsion, difficulties in decision making, low self-confidence, alcohol addiction, etc.), thus they require psychological and medical rehabilitation that would result in quicker and more effective return of the soldiers volunteers back to their service, work, family and society. The object of the research is the social rehabilitation of the soldiers volunteers who returned from missions. The aim of the research is to analyze the peculiarities of social psychological rehabilitation of the soldiers volunteers who returned from missions. The following are the objectives of the research: 1) Discuss the concept of soldiers volunteers and the aspects of historical development in Lithuania. 2) Reveal the peculiarities of social psychological rehabilitation in the rehabilitation process of soldiers volunteers. 3) Analyze the social psychological... [to full text]

At war’s most basic form, it is a very bizarre concept: soldiers who have never interacted and may have even got along with each other under different circumstances are ordered to take the other’s life. If you were in a similar situation, would you be able to kill him? Would you see the enemy as a human or a lowly creature? Would you kill him because you wanted to (weather it be out of fear or patriotism) or because you felt there was social pressure on you to do so? Would you be able/willing to pull your trigger at all? Years ago, someone came up with the idea that armies fight in order to preserve peace. Frankly, that is inaccurate. Armies fight to win wars: intermittent political confrontations between countries that manifest as physical, deathly battles between citizens that do not know each other, and the price of which is billions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of lives. These are the reasons why training is so important, but even more than that, why putting soldiers through the best training available is so important. If a country is going to throw all this money and life at war with no guarantee of getting any of it back, they want to make sure the outcome is worth it. In order to do that, however, their side needs to win, and in order to win that side must be more prepared and better trained then the opposing force; and not only better trained on how to survive because that can be irrelevant, but better trained on how to defeat/kill the enemy. That is, how to tactically overpower them and either force them to retreat or surrender (Woods and Baltzly, 1915). Training soldiers for battle however, proved to be a more psychologically complex task than originally thought to be. In WWII, Brigadier General Marshall (1968) conducted “after action interviews” where he surveyed thousands of combat soldiers immediately after they participated in combat engagements where shots were fired and soldiers were killed, asking them whether or not they had participated in the actual killing of the enemy (the physical pointing and shooting of a weapon). Marshall reveals his findings, stating that he found about 75-80 percent of the soldiers either refused or could not convince themselves to participate in the actual killing of the enemy, even when their lives and/or the lives of their buddies were in danger. Marshall’s findings suggested that the training of the time did not translate to effective fire during battle. Training programs thought discipline, procedural knowledge and loss of individuality would lead to the shaping of soldiers who would follow orders and provide effective fire. They were wrong. Perhaps without realizing it, training programs were relying on two human tendencies in their attempt to create the best soldiers possible: When in a group, people often get pulled into a group mentality and allow their beliefs and perceptions to succumb to the crowd’s sentiment. (Asch, 1955; Myers, 2013; Zimbardo, 1970) When one is made to feel like a subordinate to someone, they are likely to follow that person’s direction even if it conflicts with their morals. (Milgram, 1963, 1974; Myers, 2013) They had not anticipated the existence nor the strength of a third human tendency: Most humans have a very strong drive to avoid killing their fellow man. (Grossman, 2009; Griffith, 1989; Keegan and Holmes, 1985; Lorenz, 1963) After witnessing the struggle that leaders faced with getting their men to fire during combat, Marshall declares in his book that all combat arms had been unsuccessful in coming up with a well-founded and authoritative intent. Without intent, training institutions and instructors had no endstate or goal to try to accomplish through training. Therefore, they could not generate productive training schedules or exercises. Marshall then goes on to stress the need for more effective fire and challenges training programs and instructors to come up with innovative and practical training methods that will actually be applicable to wartime activities and thus increase the amount of effective fire. In response, the Navy generated its Fighter Weapons School (Top Gun) in 1969 that included lectures followed by practical applications in which recruits would compete against Top Gun instructors in flight (Grossman, 2009). Upon seeing the success and benefits for the training, (Chatham & Braddock, 2001; Fletcher & Chatham, 2010) the Army integrated and diversified this style of training in the early 1980’s with the development and refinement of numerous tactical simulators: Squad and Platoon Tactical Exercise Lanes, DARWARS, EST, America’s Army, Cultural trainers, which have been used to train thousands of soldiers (Chatham, 2011).

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An attempt to bring together a set of conceptual and theoretical issues related to the programming of the Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration Process for child soldiers in Sierra Leone. By questioning if the programmes have considered cultural and contextual specificities, this is a qualitative case study based in the text analysis of secondary data from a number of different researchers and practitioners from the field. The latter will be done by correlating conceptual and theoretical dilemmas based in the definition of child soldiers and their navigational skills, and will be analyzed under four topics chosen to present the cultural and contextual specificities of this case. Conclusions and recommendations will leave in evidence the fact that in the case of Sierra Leone, the DDR programme for children did not prioritize a cross- cultural approach and deliberately ignored navigational skills from former child soldiers, it delegitimized local initiatives for reintegration, failed in promoting a gender-sensitive component in the programme, and demonstrates a lack of cooperation between humanitarian and development agencies, which have been insistently westernized. The case of Sierra Leone is an interesting experience from which much can be learned, but mostly because it highlights the fact that each case is different and the urgency of considering the improvement of aid in a more individualized perspective.

There is an ongoing debate as to the role of women in Israel's army and to the degree of integration of women into male-dominated military positions. Using qualitative methods (in-depth interviews and participant observation), this dissertation examines the participation of women in the Israeli Defence Forces with a focus on organizational belonging and military status. / Women soldiers find distinct ways of experiencing organizational belonging and gaining status in the army. Much of women's variation in organizational belonging is linked, not to positions held, but, rather, to the kind of base at which a woman served during her service. Those serving in closed bases (at which soldiers stay to sleep), report developing a greater sense of organizational belonging than those serving in open bases (at which soldiers return home to sleep). This distinction is linked to notions of combat. Those serving at closed bases are more likely to serve in close proximity to combat. As well, closed bases are associated with combat more than are open bases regardless of the nature of individual closed bases. Thus, women serving on closed bases benefit from the prestige associated with combat positions as well as from the organizationally bonding experience of staying to sleep on the base. This stands in contrast with women serving on open bases who are more likely to have their sense of organizational belonging affected by their actual army position and rank and tend to seek status through association with higher ranking soldiers such as their officers and commanders. / There has been a great deal of literary discourse concerning women's participation in the IDF concentrating on women's military positions and ranks. While my research relates to this discourse, it differs through its emphasis on base placement over army position/rank. My study concludes with a discussion of my contribution to organizational belonging literature and with reflections on the implications of my findings for both the IDF and Jewish women in Israel.

Thesis (D. Min.)--Bethel Theological Seminary, 1996. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 181-188).

Thesis (M.A.)--State University of New York at Binghamton, Department of English, General Literature and Rhetoric, 2007.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Ohio State University, 2008. / Title from first page of PDF file.

"Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Business Administration from the Naval Postgraduate School, December 2008." / Advisor(s): Eitelberg, Mark ; Hudgens, Bryan. "December 2008." "MBA professional report"--Cover. Description based on title screen as viewed on January 28, 2009. Includes bibliographical references (p. 251-255). Also available in print.