This dissertation examines the question: To what extent does the international news media influence the outcome of interstate wars? It considers the longstanding charge that media reports of public debates about foreign policy provide aid and comfort to the enemy. New theory is proposed that addresses this policy problem facing democracies, and also addresses gaps in the theoretical literature on the causes of war. The theory advanced in this dissertation is that the presence of the international news media influences the outcome of wars by providing an additional channel through which information about leaders cost sensitivity is revealed and by reciprocally influencing the beliefs and behavior of leaders and their foreign adversaries in the conduct of wars. Novel variables representing major phases in the emergence of the international news media are defined. Original research is conducted using primary and secondary sources to characterize the media by year in individual states. The novel media variables are combined with variables from other studies to create a dataset spanning 90 interstate wars involving 51 different states from 1823 through 1990. Hypotheses based on the theory are tested using a multinomial logistic regression model. The results of this study partially support the theory in that the type of media in a war initiator state is strongly and significantly associated with a higher probability of winning. Unexpected findings regarding the influence of media speed on the probability of winning, and a failure to find a relationship between media and the probability of losing require further investigation. Overall, however, the presence of the international news media appears to influence the outcome of interstate wars. The results have important implications for future theoretical research as well as for policy choices regarding the proper role of domestic debates and media reporting thereof. Additional research is required to confirm the findings, examine the unexpected findings, and to examine the relevance of the findings in other eras and other phases of war. Deeply rooted assumptions within society that media reporting on wars conflicts with national security interests must be revisited as part of an examination of policy implications of the findings.

Viewsheds are an important asset in military analysis for geographers in the war in Afghanistan due to the significantly diverse and rugged terrain of the battlefield. At the simplest level, viewsheds answer the question: “What areas can be seen from this location?” But the same is also true if we flip the question to, “What areas can see this location?” It is then logical to extend this question to improvised explosive devices IEDs), the number one killer of soldiers and civilians in Afghanistan, as it is well documented that insurgents routinely observe the attack as controllers, witnesses, or videographers. The purpose of this study is to account for uncertainty in viewshed analysis in Afghanistan. Viewsheds are a derivative of digital elevation models DEMs), an imperfect representation of physical relief. Currently, the highest resolution open-source DEM available for Afghanistan is the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer Global Digital Elevation Model ASTER GDEM). This research demonstrates a methodology to extrapolate known error models between ASTER and National Elevation Dataset DEMs to locations in Afghanistan where ASTER is the highest resolution DEM available and error is unknown. This extrapolation then makes it possible to develop more informative probable viewsheds for IED explosion sites via Monte-Carlo simulated elevation models through the visualization of uncertainty in the viewshed. Lastly, this research contributes to the discussion of the dynamic nature of viewsheds and their spatial dependence.

Since 2007, the Air Force has experienced two major nuclear weapons-related incidents. Post-incident studies and investigations identified a serious decline in munitions leaders’ nuclear expertise, and a lack of expertise may have contributed to both incidents. Therefore, the problem addressed in this study was that Air Force senior leaders assumed generalist leadership skill was the most important criterion in leader selection, and that functional competence was unimportant, without inquiring into the views of officers managing munitions-nuclear organizations In this study, a quantitative non-experimental research design was utilized with a survey methodology to investigate munitions and missile maintenance officers’ perceptions regarding the importance of generalist leadership skills and functional competence in achieving successful organizational performance. From the 120 officers invited to participate, 92 completed the online survey, for a response rate of 76% Analysis of data provided three key findings: (1) officers perceived both generalist leadership skills and functional competence to be important in achieving successful organizational performance (H1 & H2)； (2) officers perceived functional competence to be more important than generalist leadership skills in achieving successful organizational performance； and (3) there were no differences between the perceptions of senior officers and company-grade officers in terms of rating the importance of these two leader qualities (H3 & H4). The Wilcoxon signed-ranks test indicated officers perceived functional competence to be more important than generalist leadership skills in achieving successful organizational performance, z ＝ -4.20, p &lt； .001. The Mann-Whitney U analysis revealed no differences between the perceptions of senior officers (M rank ＝ 43.26) and company-grade officers (M rank ＝ 35.45) in terms of the importance of generalist leadership skills or functional competence in achieving successful organizational performance. These findings have immediate practical and long-term implications. Competence in the organization’s mission functions is a critical criterion for selecting officers to lead technical, complex, high-risk organizations such as nuclear weapons logistics and maintenance organizations, where system failure could have catastrophic consequences. Generalist leadership skills are important but not sufficient to achieve successful organizational outcomes. It is recommended that future researchers investigate whether these findings can be generalized to officers and noncommissioned officers working in the areas of aircraft maintenance and logistics.

Policymakers in the Department of Defense and Congress have expressed a normative goal that all levels of the armed forces ought to represent society, coupled with alarm over whether recruiting and promotion policy can keep up with societys rapidly changing demographics. This dissertation informs manpower policymakers seeking to achieve this goal of social representation by presenting three essays on obstacles to improving demographic representation in the armed forces. The first essay focuses on the effect of eligibility requirements on the demographic distribution of the population that is able to serve in the Air Force. This essay estimates the race/ethnicity and gender distribution of several populations: 1) the population that is eligible to enlist in the Air Force, 2) the population that meets requirements similar to those met by officers who commission through Reserve Officer Training Corps and Officer Training School, and 3) the population that meets requirements similar to those met by officers commissioning through the US Air Force Academy. Furthermore, this essay incorporates “propensity to serve” as a measure of baseline demographic differences in preferences for military service. In each case, the eligibility benchmark contains a smaller percentage of minority youths than the general US population. This result is primarily driven by education and aptitude requirements, and for officer benchmarks, citizenship requirements. The eligible population tends to contain a high percentage of white females, which in some cases approaches a majority. Preferences for military service tend to work in favor of minority representation and against female representation. The second essay focuses on Air Force Specialty Code AFSC, i.e. occupation) assignment at the United States Air Force Academy USAFA). Historically, Air Force personnel policies have demonstrated a preference for rated i.e. flying) AFSCs by giving officers assigned to these AFSCs better promotion prospects. If these policies continue, the demographics of future senior leaders will tend to reflect the demographics of cadets who enter into these particular AFSCs. This essay summarizes demographic differences in AFSC assignments for the USAFA classes of 2004–2009 and models the assignments with probit regression and a two-sided logit methodology. The Air Force Academy ranks cadets according to performance and classifies cadets into AFSCs such that higher-performing cadets are more likely to receive their most-preferred AFSCs. The two-sided logit methodology analyzes preferences for AFSCs in multinomial logit fashion, while allowing the available choices to vary according to a cadets performance ranking. Findings indicate that female cadets, and to a lesser degree minority cadets, are less likely than male and non-minority cadets to enter rated AFSCs. While differences in performance, medical qualification, human capital, family considerations, and background can account for some of this tendency, even female and minority cadets with characteristics that are similar to the male and white cadets are less likely to enter the rated sector and more likely to enter the various non-rated sectors of the Air Force. The third essay performs a parallel analysis on the 2007 Army ROTC branch occupation) assignments. Because Army ROTC assigns branches to cadets in a way similar to the Air Force Academys AFSC classification process, this essay also employs the two-sided logit methodology. This analysis finds that female cadets, and to a lesser degree minority cadets, are more likely to be assigned to combat support and combat service support branches, while male and white cadets are more likely to enter the combat arms sector—the sector which promotes more prolifically to the senior levels. Results from the two-sided logit estimation revealed that some of the tendency for female and minority cadets to submit preferences for combat service support branches may have been attributable to the classification process, as lower performing cadets have fewer opportunities to obtain combat arms assignments. The analysis estimated a two-sided logit specification that included several human capital variables. Although these additional variables, themselves, were significantly associated with branch preferences, they explained very little of the correlation between demographics and branch preferences.

A historical survey of cases of Continental powers—Imperial Germany, Soviet Russia, and the People’s Republic of China—pursuing maritime transformation, seeking to understand the motivations and the reasons these ambitious building programs are undertaken. The presence of an existing hegemonic maritime power influences perception of seapower as being indispensable to a transition from regional or Continental land power to global status, and the rising state attempts to emulate this kind of ability through the development of surface fleets with sea control or capital ship capabilities in order to secure demonstrable global power and further global interests and influence. The apparent refusal of rising powers to consider sea denial strategies as adequate to security needs further suggests the primary motive on the part of the political leadership for authorizing surface fleet construction may be political, rather than concern with wartime naval strategy. Implications of these cases and the political motivations, including arms races, opportunity costs, and other possible consequences, as well as policy implications for the United States in the face of the Chinese naval program, are also considered.

This study explores how U. S. military service changes veterans’ civic values and behaviors. America faces a loss of civic consciousness, which may be defined as an individual sense of duty to society. Public participation has declined in civic activities ranging from voting to volunteering. A better understanding of veterans, who are approximately 7% of the general population, may provide insights to assist educators, government and community planners, and social scientists in strengthening civic values and participation in greater society. Service providers may apply insights from this study in programs designed to meet veterans’ needs for wellness and lifelong human development. The study was conducted in the context of Mezirow’s theory of transformative learning. The main research question addressed how U. S. military training and experience changed veterans’ civic mindedness and related behaviors. The study used a qualitative grounded theory approach with 22 theoretically-sampled veterans. During in-depth interviews, they discussed how their military experiences affected their values and behaviors. Data was acquired and interpreted through repeated cycles of theoretical sampling, constant comparative analysis, and increasingly refined, integrated coding and memoing. The study presented a theory that serving in the U.S. All-Volunteer Force tends to develop and strengthen positive social values in veterans who experience challenging leadership, learning, and values-immersion experiences. Lessons developed in this study may help promote positive social change by suggesting policies, strategies, learning programs, and further research for increasing civic consciousness in society generally.

This dissertation examines the Veterans History Project VHP), an official U.S. government project created under a bill signed into law by President William J. Clinton on October 27, 2000 to document the experiences of American veterans and their supporters in time of war. It explores the intersections between, cultural, social, public, and military history and addresses the following questions: Who created the VHP, what were the motivations, and what resources did Congress allocate the Library of Congress, the federal agency selected to fulfill the mandate? Who was charged with implementing the VHP, why, and what resources did they employ? In terms of the collection, what are the results? Primary sources used to reconstruct this history include oral history interviews, congressional reports, and veteran testimonies housed in its on-line archival and digital collection. This study asserts that the VHP model was adopted based on the Library of Congress/American Folklife Center antecedents previous oral history projects) that began with the Works Progress Administrations Federal Writers Project FWP) a lasted when the democratization of U.S. history and a shift in professional research practices, ethics, and goals led to “radical trust,” a decline in expert and curatorial authority towards a more egalitarian approach, where everyone regardless of professional status shares authority. This participatory approach adopted for the VHP differs from an earlier LOC approach utilized in the WPA and 1970s projects. It is now witnessed in how the VHP grants untrained, amateur historians the authority to contribute on equal basis with trained scholars. It has largely kept with the “spirit of legislation,” inspiring numerous national partner groups, historians, educators, students, and veterans to participate. However, the VHP is politically charged and represents more of a celebratory endeavor than a serious professional scholarly effort to document veterans experiences. It suggests that Congress is not concerned about creating an accurate/complete historical record of wartime experiences. Therefore, the concept of “radical trust” is limited and the VHP will continue to collect materials in vast numbers and remain wildly uneven in quality of interview and coverage of diverse veteran groups across gender, race, and ethnic lines.

Innovation’s effect on war outcomes has been under-examined. Kenneth Waltz has noted that successful methods of warfare are soon widely imitated on the international stage, while William McNeill has demonstrated that innovation leads quickly evaporate. Scholars such as Barry Posen and Richard Overy have analyzed the degree to which innovation has contributed to winning and losing wars, but their focus was not on the relationship between innovation and war outcomes. This project uses select case studies to analyze the success of wartime innovation through the ability of military organizations to adapt to those innovations. This ability manifests itself in the “organizational capacity to adapt,” which consists of sufficient resources and well-positioned organization. Adequate resources are necessary, but the sufficient condition for timely adaptation is effective, and often flexible, organization. The chances of an innovator’s success increase as the adapter’s organizational capacity decreases.

This thesis explores the impact of strategic culture on the United States Navy’s reaction to the dreadnought and battlecruiser ship types introduced by the British Navy under Admiral Fisher. This essay concludes that the strategic culture of the U.S. Navy, shaped in large part by Alfred Thayer Mahan, was unable to adapt to the new environment suggested by Fisher’s ships. While the U.S. Navy adopted dreadnoughts, its leaders and thinkers were unable to grasp the battlecruiser concept, and decided against building them.

The geographic size and overall complexity of the U.S. Army supply chain leads to frequent problems that disrupt the flow of goods to essential operations. This study investigates inventory stock outs which can ripple through the chain and affect military readiness. This study focuses on two aspects of stock outs； first, I statistically investigate the primary causes of stock outs, and second, I develop a technique to predict their occurrence. The ability to predict stock outs allows the Army to develop a preventative measure which may ultimately reduce the Army’s cost of supplying its troops.