Contents

The Idea of the Academy and its Title .......................................................................................................... 2 International Cooperation ............................................................................................................................ 3 Organizational Model of the Academy ......................................................................................................... 3 Higher Education Qualification Framework.................................................................................................. 4 Academic component in military education ................................................................................................. 5 Military education programs ........................................................................................................................ 5 Management................................................................................................................................................. 6 Command ...................................................................................................................................................... 7 Personnel Problems and Policy ..................................................................................................................... 7 The Problem of Human Resources within the System of Military Education ............................................... 8 NCO Training ................................................................................................................................................. 8 Training Centers ............................................................................................................................................ 9 Our Cadets abroad ........................................................................................................................................ 9 Further Reform Priorities .............................................................................................................................. 9

Mr. Minister, You are probably informed that starting from November 29, 2010 I headed the Georgian National Defense Academy and on 9th of July, 2011 was appointed as a Deputy Minister of Defense. In this capacity, I was responsible for Training and Military Education System as a whole, Analytical Department and Personnel Policy. The latter did not include appointments and dismissals of the employees, but rather elaboration of policy documents and programs. At the same time, I continued to work as an acting rector of the National Defense Academy till July 2, 2012, when I was stripped away the possibility of continuing my work. During this period we had an opportunity to promote the work in all the three of the mentioned fields, but the progress should be kept and the work has still to be continued. In spite of the fact that I am still in charge of another important sphere at the Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University, I consider myself responsible to inform both the Georgian society and new Leadership of the Ministry of Defense of the important achievements of the last two years. I do believe that this process must be continued. Its very important for the society to have proper vision of those problems and their impact on current processes in the Armed Forces of Georgia. This is exactly why I decided to find time and address you with this letter. I consider the Analytical sphere a separate and special issue where lots of changes for the better have been achieved and of course they must be continued. However, problems of Professional-Military development represent the main aim of this letter. I hope that this letter will be of definite interest to you. At the same time, I fully realize that it is impossible to cover all the details by this small letter and therefore Im ready to give more detailed explanations if there is such interest on your side.

The Idea of the Academy and its Title

Probably within just one hour after my first arrival to the Academy, I decided to change the title of the organization. The Academy looked more like a training base at that time and had nothing to do with the real Academy. Its official title was National Academy of Defence while the renamed title still reads National Defense Academy. The motive of this change was simple - this is not the National Academy, but the Academy, where national defense is taught. That was my personal attitude towards this issue. Speaking generally, education has no borders. Educational institution, be it even military education system, cannot be an institution of indoctrination. Educational system has to provide knowledge and develop professionalism with no frames. National Defense is a unique topic and it cannot have national or any other connotations. It is a collection of skills that enables professionals to meet the requirements of national defense. That is why this organization is named National Defense Academy. The title itself reflects the essence of the organization. It should not be changed. On the other hand, this idea means that the Academy provides this kind of knowledge not only for Georgians but also for any interested attendee. It is another question who the government decides to

cooperate with, but the quality of obtained knowledge should be that of international standards. That is why international collaboration and experience sharing are of the utmost importance.

International Cooperation
During 19 months, we managed to totally set up the infrastructure of the academy. Besides, we made progress in opening the Military Education System to participants from other countries and vice versa. In this period, all types of relations with the USA Military Academy (West Point), USA National Defense University, North Georgia Military College (the largest US Institution for the military reserve training), Military Universities of Poland and Czech Republic, Baltic Defense College, Military Academy of the Republic of Estonia and etc. were officially launched. For the moment, negotiations with the Military Educational institutions of France, Britain, Romania, Moldova, Lithuania, Latvia and some other countries are underway. We had a great support from respective partner countries Defense Institutions, the NATO Defense Education Enhancement Program (DEEP), with which we developed the closest possible contacts for the last two years. Special attention should be paid to the NATO PfP Consortium, which performed its annual conference in Tbilisi as a merit of positive processes and achievements in the sphere of Defense Education and where, for the first time, Georgia was selected to sit at the Senior Advisory Council for two years.

Organizational Model of the Academy

In most countries Military Academy implies officers basic preparation. In other words, this is an institution where lieutenants ranks are conferred upon the cadets. Apart from this, there are captains preparation centers where officers undergo the second level tactical training; Mid-level officers training schools where the tactical training ends and bits of operational training is offered; and Higher Defense Schools where the operational level training ends and the strategy is being taught. All the developed countries have their own Defense Universities where generals and civilians are thoroughly trained on strategy and defense planning issues. Also, there are some other specific military service schools and universities. There is no unified military education model in the world, but the so called sandwich model is recognized far and wide. It means that militaries combine education with service. Georgian military education system was formed according the named principle. However, for the purpose of effective reform, all the officers schools were merged into one organization. This is a temporary phenomenon and it is desirable that the system is split back onto three different parts once the reform is over. Namely, the basic Officers preparation component should remain within the Academy, Captains preparation School should be set up as a separate organization, the Command and General Staff School (CGSS) and the School of Advanced Defence Studies (SADS) should merge and constitute a separate college (CGSC) where Majors and Lieutenant Colonels will be accepted each after 4-5 year service period. All credits must be summed up and after graduating from SADS, the Masters Degree should be granted.

On this stage of reform, BA component is finished but it needs constant attention in order to avoid failure due to certain whims of some Commanders. There are significant changes at the Captains Career School (CCS) as well. Now it is a unified School under a single management, whereas before there was just a set of many separate courses. As a result of these changes, the School management has got an opportunity to work out and introduce new annual training programs; to enhance the communication level among Course leaders and trainers; to optimize resources and to attract new, highly qualified staff. Thus, the education process has radically changed for the better. In spite of these developments, the improvements of School infrastructure and educational facilities were implemented only in July of 2012 and the process has to be continued. After this, a new stage of CCS development should start. This must include not only educational programs, but also new ethics and standards, including international advisers active participation in improving the process of implementation of new procedures, regulation of normative bases, increasing material and financial resources of the school according to new standards and so on. Very important component of the officers education system is CGSS. In this period, we managed to initially set up a 6 month-long pilot course, and then to establish a 9-month full program. The school became a part of Command and Staff College and needs further development. Despite of the progress, there is still a serious risk for the School failure when the visiting experts contracts expire. The main reason of this is an instability of local human resources which was once solved after long debates with the leadership of the Armed Forces, but the problem was immediately resumed as soon as competent oversight of the process disappeared and the risk of failure is still real now. The attendees of the school are late captains and early majors. After graduating from the school, they will serve as battalion commanders or brigade staff officers. This is the highest level of military education nowadays. The next is the School of Advanced Defence Studies (SADS) which is the higher echelon of the Command and Staff College (CGSC). This school is in its preparation phase and in case of goodwill, it will easily open within a few months. Most part of the educational programs and managerial solutions are ready, needed human recourses are reckoned and academic accreditation procedures are finalized. In a part of Operational Arts, close collaboration with the partner countries and educational institutions has been established. The SADS has to be the highest level of the Georgian military education system with all its components and Masters Degree should be granted to the graduates.

Higher Education Qualification Framework

Higher Education Qualification Framework is the document which regulates qualifications and specialties within higher education system. Since the last year, military specialties are included into this document, which means that the programs of the NDA should meet the standards of higher education requirements. The idea of separation of military education from the rest of higher education system was very popular among the high echelons of the Armed Forces, but after my firm opposition this was not realized. It is necessary to pay serious attention to academic programs so that they should really satisfy the standards of higher education. There is certain risk that the programs will go back to resemble those of two years ago and we will remain with nothing but renovated buildings of NDA.

Academic component in military education

One of the main oppositions that the reformer will face within the Armed Forces is a non-acceptance by the military leaders of the importance of academic component as part of military education programs. Big part of the officers supports the idea that an officer should be a professional shooter, physically best fitted, qualified in every skill across all branches of service, etc. It goes without saying that these are very inappropriate views. An officer must be a leader and an intellectual. This means that he/she must understand Laws of War, be equipped with the knowledge of military management, have necessary leadership skills, and manage the units appropriately. Initial stage of officers education must guarantee the potential of their further professional growth, i.e. their further ability to grow as captains, majors and colonels, which means their studies in CCS, CGSS and SADS. In its turn, this means that officers should have a sort of entry level education that enables them to later study operational arts and strategy, or even to work in the fields of defence industry, military theory, etc. These are all intertwined with the exact, natural, social and political sciences. The reformer should take all these into close consideration. There is one more important reason why higher military education must be compatible with general higher educational system. The problem is that officers career is risky one and includes possibility of injuries and disability. In such cases officers return to civilian life and realize that it is difficult for them to be socialized. They are not understood by others and they dont understand others. Moreover, they dont possess necessary skills to find employment and live normal lives. Good higher education can solve these problems. If we follow this way, future NDA professors/lecturers will be retired militaries. This will further support the process of socialization of military servicemen.

Military education programs

All the above-mentioned considered, the programs are devised to fully satisfy the requirements across the branches of service and give appropriate higher education to future officers. Future officers are studying academic sciences that meet the demands of respective branches. For example, artillery officers study math and mechanical engineering; military engineers building of bridges and tunnels, infantry officers study management; communication officers study radio, IT and related technologies. Certainly, this is only a part of what they study and, of course, much attention is paid to military theory and practical training, exercises, different combat arts, sports, etc. All in all, these are harmoniously developed programs, which must build up our Armed Forces of tomorrow. These programs were adopted in 2011 and the first cadets were accepted in September. This notwithstanding, the best officers of our Armed Forces and a large group of foreign advisors started to work on a new, improved, program in February, 2012. A hard work was done and by the end of June these programs were completed.

Unfortunately, September 2012 freshcomers failed to start education with these new programs because already in July the process of spontaneous and un-thought-through changes has started and the needs of NCO training were prioritized for future officers. It is necessary that someone immediately interferes into this process and thoughtful policy be introduced. Entry level education puts basis for the tomorrow of the Armed Forces and every lost year means the loss of a whole generation of officers. Therefore, control over the reforms should be restored as soon as possible. I spoke of the same priorities with your predecessor and I would like to repeat again that it is in no way acceptable that a successful reform of the defence education system be placed under threat.

Management
NDA management should ensure that the cadets receive needed military training and academic education. The current model is built exactly this way. Ideally, it does not matter whether the Rector is civilian or military person. It is important that he/she clearly understands the idea of the Academy and effectively represents the Academy in relations with the Armed Forces, Ministry of Defense, and domestic and foreign partners. At the same time, it is of principal importance that military and civilian deputies of the Rector could act in consent with the Rectors vision and that they possess proper skills to realize it. It is important to wisely delegate the functions and duties to the Staff and Civilian Administration, to allow no duplications of functions and that each acts independently within the defined framework. Academic Department and its structural units are very important components of NDA. They manage the entire educational process within the organization. Unfortunately, these units have almost lost their functions after July and the military HQ was given right to manage the process. This happened because the military leadership of the Armed Forces decided to manage NDA through the HQ. In the meanwhile, the HQ has not, and cannot have appropriate competences to manage educational process. Current situation is completely unacceptable and should be immediately improved. Lots of experienced people left the NDA because their skills and knowledge were ignored and they were expected to automatically obey the orders. These circumstances are also very regrettable and must be immediately corrected. At the same time, we must remember that the NDA instructors are military officers and their chain of command should not be disrupted only because they serve in the NDA. It is another issue that they must have some special conditions while serving in NDA but the officers should remain inseparable parts of the Armed Forces. The model of rotation of military instructors between defence educational institutions and combat units is something well tested in the developed countries and we should also follow this way. Yet, we have to take into consideration that we cannot make the rotation model into a strictly universal one due to the lack of human resources. We need to have careful approach to this process and some there must be some limits beyond which a compromise will be impossible. For instance, it is impossible that a mid-career officer spends 10 or more years within NDA. This would kill them as officers. A

desirable model would be a 3yr rotation. However, as it was mentioned above, we will have a number of limitations all the time.

Command
It is of great importance to carefully select the officers we are going to invite for the training proses. An officer may be a competent specialist within his/her field, but this criterion is not enough. It is desirable that an ideal environment is created within the NDA so that the future officers familiarize a civilized culture of military service. Hence, a huge utmost importance should be given to personnel selection based on their leadership and command skills. It should not be allowed that future officers are educated in an environment where mercilessness and heartlessness is a norm. Often, this is an established culture of the decades and any political leadership can be of little avail in changing it. The main reason behind this reality is a lack of education among the military personnel, and one of the main aims of Military Education System is to solve this problem. A commander must lead by example and not only by strict administrative tools. A commander has to be competent, fair, and respected and trusted by the subordinates. Unfortunately, the civilized military management is not yet rooted in our country and much care should be applied to help it arrive.

Personnel Problems and Policy

As a modest reverence to our Armed Forces, I must say that after 2002, when I left military service, so many changes were made that nowadays it is almost impossible to recognize that these are the same Forces as 10 years ago. The great progress is obvious and it cannot be disregarded. However, there are lots of problems, which need immediate solution but due to the lack of consensus, solutions protract for years. One of the goals of the reform is to achieve consensus over the goals of policy and it is a mission of political leadership to promote shared goals and common values within the Armed Forces. Georgia lacks qualified personnel in almost every sphere and it is most sensible within the defence system. Military professionals cannot be attracted from street through open competition. They should grow within the system. Hence, this process is particularly slow and every wasted year means the loss of entire officers generation, indeed. It is especially important that the officers professional education is regarded in parallel with the personnel management system. Until today, specific commanders play crucial role in the personnelrelated decisions, while the Joint Staff fails to fulfill the required functions. Besides the faulty vision of the Leadership, the technical reason of this situation is that the HQ fails to properly manage the personnel-related information. During the years, there were numerous attempts to regulate this process, but these attempts were made as a reaction to recommendations of our partners, while the system has never really been mobilized to solve this particular problem of personnel-related information management. These factors notwithstanding, we have started last year and have now finalized creation of reference model and terms of reference for the system of military personnel management, which can be now

enacted within one year. A long-term model and plan of personnel readiness improvement has also been prepared. Now a political will and a consensus with the military leadership is necessary which is often something most difficult to achieve. This program will enable us to plan and manage individual careers of military personnel. It will be the consecutive model of service and education and training, which will consider all kinds of skills which the servicemen have obtained both within and outside the system. In other words, the system is based on so called military occupational specialties and creates an automated system, which, instead of 5 traditional components, will consider 11 components instead. Due to the specificity of the subject, I will not mention the details in this letter, but would like to say that this system is really very complex and needs firm political will and very qualified people in order to finally solve the problem. And in conclusion I would say that such a system will greatly strengthen the Joint Staff, since the information processing and decision making will be provided by centralized method; it will set up a promotional, motivational and fair process, will raise military personnels motivation, ensure advance planning of individual carriers, and also avail us to develop longstanding plans throughout entire Armed Forces. Whatever firm the determination to improve the quality of personnel management system, significant changes will be impossible to carry out without implementation of this program. As was mentioned, technical part of this program is over and it needs to see implementation.

The Problem of Human Resources within the System of Military Education

It is somewhat natural that commanders resist sending his/her best officers to educational and training units. Skillful officers are always needed within combat units and this is why that goodwill of political and military leadership is crucial for attracting good people for the needs of an educational system. In the past period the problem was more or less addressed, but the system is unstable and starts to lose people as soon as oversight is slacken. Hence, any political leadership must clearly realize that, however desperately needed in combat units, educated officers should be sent to education system while keeping certain balance. First of all, this concerns the officers who acquired good knowledge in the best foreign Educational Institutions and returned to continue service in Georgia. These officers should become the knowledge disseminators and serve a year or more in the Education system and then return to the units. This is the only way to solve the acute personnel problem we so often come across with.

NCO Training
Unfortunately, the least I did in military education and training system was perhaps in NCO training. However, there was enough time for me to develop solid understanding of the existing problems and to have few significant recommendations. NCOs, who are considered squad leaders and combat commanders of the privates and specialists, constitute the most significant segment of the Armed Forces. They conduct trainings, supervise everyday regime of the servicemen, ensures proper implementation of the assignments and distribute

functions and duties among the soldiers. A platoon commander (no mention of company commanders and upper level commanding officers) does not interfere into this business. But this happens in an ideal world, while in Georgia NCOs are often platoon leaders and officers try to stick to NCO functions. This happens only because of deficient vision by the high military leadership of the Armed Forces of the competencies of NCOs and officers. In real world, we come up with duplication of functions and inefficiency in management. This situation needs to be changed. Thanks to very significant support from our partners, there are now many qualified professionals working at the NCO School and this support of our friends may well increase in the future. But there are lots of other specific problems to be solved, that I wont expand upon now. Identification of these problems is easy let just political will pushes the process ahead.

Training Centers
Beside the fact that the training centers were not fully involved into the reformation processes, their role is enormous for the development of the Armed Forces. The current situation is not bad. However, there are many aspects that need improvement. Due to the lack of resources, the centers capabilities must be used not only for the training purposes but also for the needs of the Career Schools.

Our Cadets abroad

Finally, I need to say a few words of our cadets in the foreign military educational institutions. These young people are trained along with their foreign comrades in countries of great military traditions. Unfortunately, there were facts that cadets got training abroad but failed to continue service within Georgian Armed Forces. The number of returning cadets will grow over these years and we need great care to ensure that the Armed Forces do not lose this fantastic resource for development.

Further Reform Priorities

In order to avoid the failure of the reforms, to preserve the already achieved and to successfully finalize them, a few steps have to be taken by the system leadership in the near future: Restoration of the control over the Bachelor level of the Academy and use the existing resources at the most effective way. Provide corresponding premises and facilities for the Captains Career School, elaborating and upgrading training programs, attracting and developing the best of the staff. Guarantee stability of the CGCC. Finalize project, equip with new facilities Finalize the process of establishment of SADS Equip the NCO School with relevant facilities, broadening the partnership with relevant education institutions Establish the Department of Military Education and Training by reorganizing the Command of Military Training and Education.

Facilities improvement of the Military Training Centers. Set up separate schools with independent and efficient management. That kind of approach will give them the opportunity to develop further and establish their own traditions in this field. Centralize Military Career system; increase the role of Military Personnel Department of the Joint Staff of the Armed Forces. Work out the rotational system among military institutions and the Armed Forces Formalize and refine the norms of military ethics, improve commanding practices

Apart from the above mentioned, there are a number of various details that are omitted here due to the open character of this letter, there are numerous important structures which were established under my direct supervision and which I dont mention now, but I hope enough is said to provide certain vision of the processes and current situation. I do sincerely wish success to the new leadership of the Ministry in any decision that fosters development of our Armed Forces. Of course, I wish success and development of our Armed Forces! And finally, would mention that I am going to closely monitor the processes within the defence system and, now as outside observer, support by healthy criticism and advice the achievement of the goal of professional and decent Armed Forces. Andro Barnovi Director of the Center for Defence and Security Studies Member of NATO/PfP Consortiums Senior Advisory Council Dean of the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences of the Tbilisi State University Former Deputy Defence Minister of Georgia Former Rector of National Defence Academy of Georgia November 7, 2012