by David W. Lovell and Deane-Peter Baker
For the ordinary soldier, the non-commissioned officer and the junior officer – the large proportion of the lower strata in military organisations – the expectations of levels of responsibility and decision-making are rapidly increasing. In 1999, US Marine Corps General Charles C. Krulak addressed this in his essay `The Strategic Corporal: Leadership in the Three-Block War’, which described the range of challenges likely to be faced by marines on the modern battlefield and where a range of operations (fighting, peace works and humanitarian assistance) might occur simultaneously within a very limited precinct (three blocks). The chapters in this book use the metaphor of the ‘strategic corporal’ to focus on the demands facing junior leaders in contemporary military operations, and what might be done to enhance their ability to respond to them.
