The United States Military Academy (USMA) is a United States service academy in West Point, New York. It was originally established as a fort during the American Revolutionary War, as it sits on strategic high ground overlooking the Hudson River 50 miles (80 km) north of New York City. It is the oldest of the five American service academies and educates cadets for commissioning into the United States Army.
Alexander Archer Vandegrift was a United States Marine Corps four-star general. During World War II, he commanded the 1st Marine Division to victory in its first ground offensive of the war, the Battle of Guadalcanal. For his actions from August 7 to December 9, 1942, during the Solomon Islands campaign, he received the Medal of Honor. Vandegrift later served as the 18th Commandant of the Marine Corps. He was the first four-star general on active duty in the Marine Corps.
The United States Army War College (USAWC) is a U.S. Army educational institution in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, on the 500-acre (2 km2) campus of the historic Carlisle Barracks. It provides graduate-level instruction to senior military officers and civilians to prepare them for senior leadership assignments and responsibilities. Each year, a number of Army colonels and lieutenant colonels are considered by a board for admission. Approximately 800 students attend at any one time, half in a two-year-long distance learning program, and the other half in an on-campus, full-time resident program lasting ten months. Upon completion, the college grants its graduates a master's degree in Strategic Studies.
Ben Hebard Fuller was a major general in the United States Marine Corps and served as the 15th Commandant of the Marine Corps between 1930 and 1934.
John Archer Lejeune was a United States Marine Corps lieutenant general and the 13th Commandant of the Marine Corps. Lejeune served for nearly 40 years in the military, and commanded the U.S. Army's 2nd Division during World War I. After his retirement from the Marine Corps he became superintendent of the Virginia Military Institute.
Commandant is a title often given to the officer in charge of a military training establishment or academy. This usage is common in English-speaking nations. In some countries it may be a military or police rank. It is also often used to refer to the commander of a military prison or prison camp.
Earl Edward Anderson was a U.S. Marine four-star general. He was the youngest active duty Marine ever promoted to the rank of general and the first active duty Marine Naval Aviator to be promoted to a 4-star rank. He became Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps on April 1, 1972. He was promoted to general on March 31, 1972. General Keith B. McCutcheon had been promoted to four-star rank the day of his retirement for medical reasons on July 1, 1971. During his 35-year Marine career, he served in combat actions in World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War.
Carlisle Barracks is a United States Army facility located in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. The site of the U.S. Army War College, it is the nation's second-oldest active military base. The first structures were built in 1757, during the French and Indian War between Great Britain and France in the colonies.
John Henry Russell Jr. was a major general and 16th Commandant of the Marine Corps.
Staunton Military Academy was a private all-male military school located in Staunton, Virginia. Founded in 1884, the academy closed in 1976. The school was highly regarded for its academic and military programs, and many notable American political and military leaders are graduates, including Sen. Barry Goldwater, the 1964 Republican presidential candidate, and his son, Rep. Barry Goldwater Jr., 1960's folk singer Phil Ochs, and John Dean, a White House Counsel who was a central figure in the Watergate scandal of the early 1970s.
The Strategic Studies Institute (SSI) is the U.S. Army's institute for strategic and national security research and analysis. It is part of the U.S. Army War College. SSI conducts strategic research and analysis to support the U.S. Army War College curricula, provides direct analysis for Army and Department of Defense leadership, and serves as a bridge to the wider strategic community. It is located at Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania.
Henry Wolfe Butner was a United States Army general in World War I and onetime commanding officer of Fort Bragg (1928–29). A native of North Carolina, Butner graduated in the top half of the United States Military Academy Class of 1898. He became an artillery officer and was sent to France with the American Expeditionary Force during World War I. In the last month of the war Butner commanded an artillery brigade after promotion to brigadier general. After attending the United States Army War College, he led the United States Army Field Artillery School, the 24th Field Artillery Regiment, Fort Bragg, and Fort Eustis. Promoted to major general in early 1936, Butner took command of the Panama Canal Department. He suffered a stroke while golfing in late 1936, and died at Walter Reed Army Hospital in March 1937.
Barksdale Hamlett Jr. was a United States Army four-star general who served as commandant of the American sector of Berlin during the 1958 Berlin crisis and as Vice Chief of Staff of the United States Army from 1962 to 1964. He later served as President of Norwich University in Vermont.
Thomas Henry Barry was a major general of the United States Army who served in many conflicts throughout his military career but is perhaps best known as being superintendent of the United States Military Academy from 1910 to 1912.
Joint unconventional warfare is the inter-agency, or international implementation of an unconventional warfare strategy, comprising elements of asymmetric warfare, irregular warfare, urban warfare and various forms of psychological operations deployed by non-traditional means.
Frank Leith Jones Jr. is an American academic, public servant and military historian. He published his first book in 2013, Blowtorch: Robert Komer, Vietnam, and American Cold War Strategy, a biography of Robert Komer who served as "national security policy and strategy adviser" to three Presidents. In 2020, he published Sam Nunn: Statesman of the Nuclear Age, a study of the impact Senator Nunn had on US national security and policy during the Cold War and its immediate aftermath.
James Edward Thompson Jr. was a United States Army officer. He attained the rank of lieutenant general and was a commander of the 101st Airborne Division and First United States Army.
The US AWC International Fellows Hall of Fame honors USAWC international graduates "who have attained, through military merit, the highest positions in their nation's armed forces, or who have held an equivalent position by rank or responsibility in a multinational organization."
Stephen J. Maranian is a retired major general who served in the United States Army from 1988 to 2023. Commissioned as a Field Artillery officer, Maranian served continuously on active duty, commanding from the platoon to the two-star level. In his final assignment he served as commanding general of the 56th Artillery Command in Mainz-Kastel, Germany from 2021 to 2023. Maranian served in combat deployments in Afghanistan and Iraq and more than half of his career was spent overseas. Maranian holds two master's degrees and is a graduate of both the United States Army Command and General Staff College and the United States Army War College; he has also graduated from the NATO Defense College and the Defense Language Institute.
John Samuel Kem is a retired United States Army major general who last served as the 51st Commandant of the United States Army War College at Carlisle Barracks from July 28, 2017 to July 30, 2020. He previously served as the 1st provost of the Army University while dual-hatted as the deputy commanding general for education of the United States Army Combined Arms Center and deputy commandant of the United States Army Command and General Staff College. He was promoted to major general on October 3, 2016.
