What Is The Difference Between The Us Army Command And General Staff Course

Introduction

1. The U.S Army Command and General Staff Course (CGSC) educates and trains intermediate level officers of U.S Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine, Interagency Leaders and International Students from different countries. The course participants are U.S Military Officers with the military rank of Majors, civilian leaders from U.S interagency and international students’ officers with the military rank of Lieutenant Colonels and Majors. The course participants of 2008-02 were 296 officers of which 41 were international students’ officers from 39 countries. Before I began the Command and General Staff Course, I attended a Specialized English Training for eight weeks at Defence Language Institute (DLI) at Lackland, San Antonia. The English

The CGSC takes 49 weeks for the international students and 46 weeks for the U.S officers, and consists of three parts: two preparatory courses and the main core course. First, the international preparatory course is a three-week in length for only international students’ officers. It familiarizes the international students with classroom environment, use of College resources and systems such as computers, internet systems and library, as well as introducing political, social, economical and military factors to the international students. Second, two weeks preparatory course, which involves international students and the U.S students from Air Force, Navy, Marines, Interagency Civilians and officers from the U.S Army with special tasks such as Chaplains, Medical Service Officers, Judges and others. It introduces to the participants with U.S army doctrine, organisation, logistics, military decision making process (MDMP) and military symbols. Lastly, the main core course takes 44 weeks and consists of three sub courses programme. These

The second sub-course, known as Advanced Operations and War-fighting Course (AOWC). It is three and a half months training and emphasizes on command, staff planning and operations execution. It covers combined and joint /corps operations (W100), division operations (W200) and brigade operations (W300).

c. The third sub-course, known as Advanced Application Program (AAP). It takes three months and every student is required to complete eight courses called electives ‘A’. The students select eight electives among the many according to individual interest.

4. Furthermore, the conduct of instruction, the international students are integrated along with U.S students officers in a small staff group of fifteen or sixteen officers representing thirteen or fourteen from U.S Services and Combined Arms and two international students’ officers in each staff group. The small staff group instruction is students centered. The students are responsible for their own learning and professional development while instructors facilitates and guides their learning. In addition students are assigned many readings to read before next day class session. Secondly, the classrooms are well equipped with advanced instructional materials such as computers, internet network, and video conference materials. Finally, the evaluation is largely based on class discussion, examinations in essay paper writings, individual and group research papers and presentations. Again, the college conducts several field studies