"Persuasion Beyond Logic: The Importance of Rhetorical Training for Military Officers"

About the Author

Megan McIntyre is a PhD student at the University of South Florida where she works as Mentoring Coordinator for the University's First Year Composition program. Her research interests include writing pedagogy and practice as well as the intersections of rhetoric, writing, ethics, and politics.

Contents

Introduction

Donald Rumsfeld and Operation Iraqi Freedom

Winning Hearts & Minds: The Way Forward in Afghanistan

Rhetorical Training & Effective Intercultural Communication

An Overview of Rhetorical Training

Conclusion

Works Cited

Conclusion

It is hard to deny the growing importance of strategic communication, of persuasion, of winning hearts and minds, in modern warfare. As we know from General Smith’s discussion of the changing paradigm of warfare, we will likely never again see two regular armies, uniformed and visible, meet on battlefield with clear boundaries. Rather, irregular warfare, and COIN in particular, represent the most likely engagement scenarios moving forward. In such scenarios, “seeing all the available means of persuasion,” which is Aristotle’s definition of rhetoric in Book 1, Chapter 2 of his Rhetoric, will be an invaluable skill for any soldier. The American government has begun to recognize this very fact: retired Colonel Maxie McFarland suggests, in his 2005 Military Review article on the importance of cultural training, that the Army must “educate soldiers and leaders on foundational cultural norms and values and teach them skills used to understand and bridge cultural differences” (69). The best bridge between cultural differences is intercultural communication, and, as Linda Flowers notes, successful intercultural communication depends on attention to rhetorical convention, both in terms of persuasion and in terms of responsibility for and to others.