Books: February 5, 1997
Military Lessons for the Rest of Society
How civilian institutions can benefit from the Army's experience with race relations
All That We Can Be:
Black Leadership and Racial Integration the Army Way
by Charles C. Moskos '56 and John Sibley Butler.
Foreword by Richard C. Leone *68
Basic Books, $27.50
Recommended resolutions of the American racial dilemma abound. Some of them, tainted by emotionalism or political opportunism, do little but fan the flames of smoldering controversy. Other proposals, more reasoned and objective in purpose, wither on the vines of national apathy and cynicism.
Out of this disheartening background comes a small, insightful volume, offering fresh lessons for those who are committed to bridging our racial divide. All That We Can Be explains how the U.S. Army has complied with President Harry Truman's executive order of July 1948 directing the racial integration of the armed forces. The authors, Charles C. Moskos '56 and John Sibley Butler, contend that the lessons derived from the Army's experience with desegregation can be applied to the problems of race in civilian society.
The broad lesson the military offers, say the authors, is that "Race relations can best be transformed by an absolute commitment to nondiscrimination, coupled with uncompromising standards of performance." The action essential to providing meaningful integration is creating of avenues of opportunity for qualified black leaders.
Moskos, a sociology professor at Northwestern University, and Butler, chairman of the sociology department at the University of Texas, are respected academicians who study and write frequently about military manpower issues. But they bring more than academic credentials to their writings. As young college graduates they were drafted into the Army, where they witnessed early efforts to eliminate discrimination. Moskos served in Germany during the 1950s, and Butler is a Vietnam veteran. They conclude that the Army "is the only place in America where whites are routinely bossed around by blacks," and tell us how this uncommon situation evolved.
Historically, our military services have mirrored the racial tensions present in American society. Until 1948, blacks fought in each of our major wars, but, with the exception of the Revolutionary War, in all-black units. President Truman's desegregation order sanctioned a massive remodeling of the culture and organization of the armed forces. The Army's experience with racial integration encompassed two broad periods of change.
During the 1950s, formal discrimination in recruitment, training, and on-base living arrangements were eliminated. Black enlisted men fought with their white counterparts in integrated units during the Korean War. Commanders in Korea noted no difference between the fighting abilities of AfricanAmericans and whites.
A second phase of Army desegregation-the introduction of more blacks into leadership positions-began during the 1960s and coincided with the war in Vietnam. Social and political turbulance generated by that conflict disrupted the Army's ongoing efforts to achieve racial integration. Army leaders focused instead on coping with disciplinary breakdowns and acts of racial violence in the ranks.
The establishment of an all-volunteer force followed the end of the military draft and the withdrawal of American forces from Vietnam. The Army recruited large numbers of blacks and renewed its attempt to train black leaders.
African-American enlisted men received instruction in mathematics, reading, and writing giving them the basic skills they needed to meet the academic requirements for promotion to the noncommissioned-officer ranks. Other black soldiers won assignment to the Military Academy Preparatory School, where 10 months of academic training prepared them to qualify for admission to West Point; today, 40 percent of the incoming black cadets at the Academy are graduates of the school.
Another Army initiative involved the training of reserve officers at traditionally black colleges and universities. Undergraduates enrolled in ROTC programs at these institutions honed their written, verbal, and mathematical skills in programs organized for this purpose.
Black leadership programs in the Army remain in place. They demand an extensive commitment of time and the allocation of considerable resources, but their success is well documented. The proportion of black senior noncommissioned officers grew from 14 percent in 1970 to 35 percent in 1995. The number of commissioned blacks rose from 3 percent in 1970 to 11.4 percent in 1995. Overall, AfricanAmericans composed 27.2 percent of the Army's total strength in 1995.
Moskos and Butler assert that the Army has effectively improved race relations by increasing the number of blacks "who have access to the tools necessary to compete on a level playing field" and by "bringing blacks and whites together in a common cause."
They go on to make the case for establishing a national service program for black and white Americans, one that would model the military in being federally funded, highly visible, and would offer GI Bill-type benefits. This program would include resource conservation, helping the aged and institutionalized, and teaching English as a second language. Within such a program, a national sense of purpose would take precedence over a focus on ending racial discrimination.
The authors conclude by offering 12 "Army Lessons for American Society." Three are paramount:
1. Racial discrimination cannot be tolerated within the leadership of any organization. In the Army, racist behavior ends a soldier's career.
2. Changes in attitude cannot eliminate a racial problem. Emphasis must be placed on opening avenues for black participation and leadership.
3. Qualified black leaders must be placed in positions as soon as possible. The quickest way to dispel stereotypes of black incapacity is to bring white people into contact with highly qualified African-American leaders.
Moskos and Butler have produced a mass of evidence on a complex issue in clear, nontechnical terms. Their analyses and constructive solutions to the problems of race deserve close study and thoughtful response by the decision-makers in our civilian institutions, public and private.
-George D. Eggers, Jr. '47 *65
George Eggers is a former director of development at Princeton and a retired Army brigadier general.
INVEST IN YOURSELF AND YOUR PORTFOLIO
Get a Life: You Don't Need a
Million to Retire Well
Ralph Warner '63
Nolo Press, $18.95 paper
Throw away your retirement planning guides! Heave out those actuarial tables! Forget compound interest! Ralph Warner '63 has a surprising message for those of us concemed about our golden years: You don't need a million to retire well. That, in fact, is the subtitle of his book, Get a Life, which tells us we should be more worried about the quality of our sunset years than the quantity of bucks in our nest eggs.
The book is a wonderful antidote to all those grim tomes about the paucity of preparation among baby boomers for a financially secure retirement. It will start you thinking in very healthy ways about how you should spend the rest of your life. But it should be read in conjunction with one of those dour warnings mentioned above. The truth is we all need to think about both the quality and quantity of our own retirement.
For the kind of people who would be likely to read this sort of book, Warner's advice is counterintuitive. People who read books about retirement are planners. They're rational, forward looking, and organized. They care about tomorrow.
For the serious planners among us, then, Warner has very clear instructions. Take steps now to ensure that when you do retire you'll have something interesting to do. Moreover, that you'll know some interesting people. And finally, that you'll be in good enough health to enjoy those activities and friends. For Warner, this preparation, not financial planning, is the key to happiness in your 60s and beyond.
Warner tells us to stop smoking and develop an exercise regimen. What's the use of not working if you're too sick to enjoy it? Again and again throughout the book, Warner returns to the theme of taking responsibility for your own health. But that's just the first step.
Next, Warner gives us tips on how to have a satisfying family life. Watching beautiful sunsets with no one close enough to share the view is, in Warner's eyes, pathetic. Friends, too, Warner says, are essential to happiness and mental health, and he gives us a few tips on how to make and keep them. And embracing life, not just money, Warner hints, is the key to finding lasting happiness.
Warner alternates the advice with interviews profiling senior citizens who have remained vital and are doing interesting things. The theme that runs throughout these interviews is the importance of staying busy, having goals larger than yourself, and keeping involved in the world. The people that he interviews are certainly remarkable; one man in his 90s says that he has recently cut back on his jogging, but still manages to do 100 pushups each day.
Warner does end the book with several chapters that discuss how to assess your financial health, and what to do to keep it strong for the long run, but the advice is atypical in that it chiefly counsels the reader how to get along with less. For example, he gives tips on turning your home equity into cash, moving to a less expensive home, buying cars cheaply, and the like.
This self-help advice is consistent with the author's previous books, which include The Living Together Kit and Everybody's Guide to Small Claims Court, They too were published by Nolo Press, a company Warner cofounded 25 years ago.
Warner's point of view is consistently fresh and challenging. Get a Life is an excellent addition to your retirement planning library. But perhaps you should also amass some cold hard cash.
-Nicholas Morgan '75
Nicholas Morgan is a writer living in New Hope, Pennsylvania.
BOOKS RECEIVED
John Bogle ['51] and the Vanguard Experiment: One Man's Quest to Tranform the Mutual Fund Industry
Robert Slater
Irwin Professional Publishing/Times Mirror Higher Education Group, $24.95
Simplify, Simplify and other
Quotations from
Henry David Thoreau
Kevin P. Van Anglen '75, ed.
Columbia University Press, $23
Wired Style: Principles of English Usage in the Digital Age
Constance Hale '80, ed.
HardWired, 520 Third St., Fourth Floor, San Francisco, CA 94107-1815. $17.95
The Imaginative Claims of the Artist in Willa Cather's Fiction: "Possession Granted by a Different Lease"
Demaree C. Peck '81
Susquehanna University Press, $48.50
A Culture of Teaching: Early Modern Humanism in Theory and Practice
Rebecca W. Bushnell *83
Cornell University Press, $37.50 cloth, $15.95 paper
The Princeton Review Pre-Law Companion: What Law School Grads Wish They Knew Before
They Started
Ronald Coleman '85
Random House, $15
Summary of Low-Speed Airfoil Data, Volume 1
Michael S. Selig *88 et al.
SoarTech Publications, 1504 N. Horseshoe Circle, Virginia Beach, VA 23451. $25 paper
Democracy and Disagreement: Why Moral Conflict Cannot Be Avoided in Politics, and What Should Be Done About It
Amy Gutmann (politics professor) and Dennis Thompson
Belknap Press/Harvard University Press, $27.95