Word: sandhurst
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...Sandhurst's program of officer training, compulsory for all British army officers, is a distillation of centuries of accrued knowledge combined with a rigorous practical regime. It attracts applicants from all over the world including China and the U.S., and has stiffened the sinews of the heads of state of eight countries plus a clutch of royals, including the British princes William and Harry. "When I was in Sierra Leone meeting a Kenyan battalion, it was exactly like being back at Sandhurst," says Major General Andy Salmon, former commandant general of the Royal Marines, the last British commander...
...return for such wisdom, the sparsely equipped Brits called on the richer U.S. forces for material assistance. Major General Patrick Marriott, who since last September has been commandant of Sandhurst, led British troops alongside U.S. Marines during the 2003 Iraq campaign. "The Americans called us 'the borrowers,'" he says. "When we ran out of field kitchens, which we did because we were underresourced, the Americans delivered in a split second and it was magnificent. We've been underresourced in our history on numerous occasions. But within the psyche, we cope. Americans fix and we cope...
...Until that happens, Sandhurst is overseeing a production line of officers who must expect to be plunged quickly into the complexities of modern missions. Captain Matt Woodward left Sandhurst in April 2002, and deployed to Iraq the following year. "On my first tour my squadron leader was 50 miles away from me," he says. "I was running a town of 40,000 on my own with a troop of 16 people. I went to Iraq with some armored vehicles and they said, 'Right, here's your town. There's a police force here that's largely ineffective, there...
...academic study of military history and strategy. "Where we are fundamentally different from our peer academies at West Point, Saint-Cyr and Dresden is that we are a military academy that has a significant intellectual, academic component. They are military universities that do military training," says Colonel Tim Checketts, Sandhurst's chief of staff. The academy is uniquely placed "to develop character, intellect and professional competence." He adds: "At their age [the cadets] are all wonderfully optimistic. We do give them some intensive lessons in the realities of war." (Read: "A Window on a Lost World...
...cadets look around, they may spot amid the splendors of Sandhurst's 1812 Old College and its New College, completed a century later, another sobering lesson in the realities of the career they have chosen. Sandhurst's iconic buildings, like the armed forces, are showing signs of wear and tear. Britain's soldiers remain a focus for national pride, and the fresh-minted officers being turned out by Sandhurst embody a grand tradition. But unless Britain's politicians find a way of reconciling the U.K.'s reflexive desire to take a leading role on the world stage with the nation...