The first proactive effort by the US Army to redefine itself in a rapidly changing world occurred over a forty-year period at the end of the 19th century, bookended by the Civil War and the War with Spain. From 1784 until the end of the 19th century, the regular US Army focused almost solely on supporting the westward-moving frontier and the Native Americans who lived in it. The end of this frontier period occurred simultaneously with the growth of economic power and national ambition in the United States. Thus, change was not precipitated by a single significant event comparable to the end of the Cold War, but rather, it resulted from the confluence of several imperatives demanding action by military and political leaders.
By the early 1880s, the Army recognised that the era of territorial expansion was ending, and with it the Army’s only clear reason for existence. Two-thirds of the small army had been deployed across the western frontier in small detachments, providing security for settlers and miners against Indian tribes and serving as “the visible representatives of the national government.” Structured like a conventional European army, the US Army was unable to operate like one, and without a purpose in place of the frontier mission, little justification for the army existed. This inaugurated a dialogue regarding the Army’s peacetime purpose and roles in the post-frontier future.
Meanwhile, the American Civil War identified the need for administrative and training reforms within the Army. Leaders called upon to form the bulk of the field army often lacked necessary military leadership qualities, resulting in combat leadership failures accompanied by high casualty rates. This experience left an indelible mark on post-Civil War Army leaders, who repeatedly “referred to their experiences as they attempted to justify their reform proposals in the later 1800’s.” Army reformers sought to improve the post-graduate military education for officers and non-commissioned officers, and to improve administrative methods of selection for promotion and retirement. This need was magnified by the experiences of officers stagnating for decades on the frontier with little hope for promotion, barring death in combat or illness of a more senior officer within their regiments.
Towards the end of this period, the brief, but hectic, war with Spain, in 1898, provided impetus for further reforms by exposing severe weaknesses in war planning and logistics. As noted by Weigley, “The unplanned, helter-skelter mobilisation of 1898 was consistent with the whole unplanned, helter-skelter nature of American life in the late nineteenth-century heyday of governmental laissez-faire.”
The war also inaugurated US entry into the ranks of imperialist nations by adding Puerto Rico and the Philippines to US territories. Under the direction of Elihu Root, who became Secretary of War in 1899, “the principal task of the War Department would now be the administrative and legal one of governing the insular territories acquired from Spain.” Root used this mission to push existing reform measures, and introduce new ones, including: the creation of a general staff to develop plans for future wars; creation of an Army Reserve trained and equipped to provide more reliable reinforcement to the Army than the National Guard could provide; and creation of the Army War College to facilitate strategic training of senior officers.
Other positive changes were also taking hold. By 1895, there was consensus among Army and civilian leaders that the primary mission of the peacetime army should be training and preparing for conventional war. The frontier experience had ended, providing the opportunity to consolidate army units on a smaller number of bases. Large training exercises began to take place during the summer months, involving state national guard and regular Army units, providing officers with important experiences in operational planning.
A system of post-graduate military education had emerged, based largely on the Prussian model but retaining uniquely American characteristics. This training began to produce a small cadre of officers trained in the command of large military formations, while also providing advanced schooling in military operations and strategy. Reforms to the officer promotion system removed obstacles that had kept some officers from deserving promotions for decades. New rules regulated military retirements, and a generation of aging Civil War officers was cleansed from the ranks, clearing the way to promote younger officers. Finally, the officer corps had begun to develop the characteristics similar to emerging middle-class professions like doctors, lawyers, and pharmacists.
While it remained small and ill-prepared for a modern war compared to its European counterparts, the intellectual and structural changes necessary to enable rapid expansion were in place and maturing. A cadre of experienced and increasingly well-educated leaders continued to gain critical leadership and technical experience in the Philippines and along the nation’s southern border as the sound of the guns from Europe grew louder.
This piece is part of a series of blogs produced by scholars from the School of Security Studies Military and Political History research theme