why is it important to study history in the United States Army ? What is actionable history and how does that affect current decision making at all levels of command and leadership answers to these questions and more army history insights . Welcome to the U . S . Army history and Heritage podcast , the official podcast of the United States Army Center of Military History . The Center of Military History writes and publishes the army's official history , manages the US Army Museum enterprise and provides historical support throughout the U . S . Army . Hello everyone and welcome to the United States Army history and Heritage podcast . I'm lee Reynolds , the strategic communications officer for the Center of Military History . I want to welcome you to the premiere episode of the United States Army history and Heritage podcast from the United States Army Center of Military History . You know I think it's appropriate that for our first episode we talk about why history is important to the army and how army history program is used and that we talk a little bit about who we are as the center of military history and I can think of no better person to discuss these topics with than the executive director of the Center of Military History . Mr Charles our bowery Jr welcome Mr . Bowery to what is essentially your podcast . Thanks lee it's really a pleasure to be here and pretty cool to be sitting in this space . All right , thank you . Yeah we've created for those . You're listening . We've created a little studio here at the center of Military history and it's full of our publications which I think we'll talk about in a few minutes , a little background on mr bowery . He is a retired army colonel who spent his 23 year career as an army aviator flying Apache helicopters . Uh I think that's pretty awesome . Uh He deployed twice to Iraq and commanded an Apache regiment in Afghanistan but of course he is no stranger to history . He received his bachelor's degree and master's degree in history , taught history at West Point and has published three historical books focused on the civil war . He's currently working on his PhD in history and uh I didn't say what schools ? I don't know if you want to talk about the schools that you went to or ? Yeah . My bachelor's is from William and mary in Williamsburg Virginia Go tribe . My master's is from north Carolina State University in Raleigh north Carolina go wolfpack . And I'm working on my PhD at the George Washington University in Washington dc raise high , wow , Alright , well I got all the mottoes . Yeah and that's important . Um So what am I missing about your background ? What what do you want to bring up that I haven't touched on ? Well what I tell people is that I've been a historian in some form as far back as I can remember . And I got that a lot from my environment . I grew up in tidewater Virginia and the story I'd like to tell is that my bus ride to school in elementary school every day went through a battlefield and it was the seven days battles outside of Richmond Virginia . And so every day I would see those historical markers as we drove those roads . And it sparked my interest in history , particularly in the civil war and I began to read from a young age and really never stopped . Um and uh , well I'm so glad that you're here to help us kick off our very first podcast today . But I think what would be really helpful , you know , we're here at the center of Military history and just for our audience , people who don't know who we are , what we do . Could you explain what CMH is all about the mission and role of CMH in the army ? Sure , the short answer is that we fill a couple of different roles for the army . Uh First and foremost , we are the command historical office for headquarters , department of the Army , which means that we provide staff historical support to the army's leadership . But in addition to that sort of defined role , we are responsible for the army's historical programs are at large , meaning that we , that we synergize and we advocate for historians across the army and the army employees . Around about 5-600 historians in various capacities and some of these are history teachers and professors and instructors who teach history in professional military education and training courses uh in the , in the senior service college and the staff college , things like that . And while those history instructors are not a part of CMH were responsible for being an advocate for them at the army level , which means fighting for their visibility and their programs and reminding our leaders of the importance of history and historical mindedness throughout the lifecycle of a soldier or civilian . Yeah . And we're gonna touch on in a few minutes why it is important that we study history in the army or that leaders use history . But besides the center of Military history and there's the combined Arms center , there's the Army Heritage and Education Center up at Carlisle . So what is the difference , you know , who's , who's really in charge of history or how do we share history ? Yeah , I mean , so that sort of question of who's who in the zoo is sort of interesting for the army because the army does have of all of the services has the biggest and most wide reaching historical program and it's really the one of all the services that is sort of the most unified in its approach in that we all collaborate and though we all work for different commands and have different missions . We , we approach those missions in a very unified sort of way . And , and so there are a lot of different entities that have historians and you mentioned a couple of them and these go all the way from , for example at West Point . The Department of History at West Point is responsible for uh , for teaching history to undergraduates who are cadets at West Point . And so we consider those folks who are , are a mix of military and civilian faculty , a part of the army historical program , even though they work at West Point . And the same goes for the historians who teach at CGs , C and SaM's at Fort Leavenworth Kansas . They're members of the army historical program . Uh Each one of the trade talks centers and schools has history instructors who teach history and those training courses in those branch training courses for all ranks that train to join the army . And so we teach history at every level of education and training all the way up to at the army War College . Their their professors who teach history at the sort of the strategic level of war to the students at the army war College . And so we have an impact on , on every soldier and civilian in the army in conveying that importance of historical mind is Alright , great . And and the Army Heritage and Education Center at Carlisle . Um they collect history also . But what's what's the difference between them and CMH . Yeah , it's uh it bears talking about because the the unique mission of a heck the Army Heritage Education Center is to serve as a point of reference in education for really for the nation , for the american public and understanding the heritage of individual soldiers service through collecting documents uh and making making archives available to researchers uh and individuals and private individuals to understand the Army's past but then also uh to maintain a museum collection which highlights uh the individual's service and how that relates to the Army's long heritage . And under the center of Military history there is the Army Museum Enterprise . Um and we can talk about that briefly um because there'll be later podcast where we go more in depth on uh the A . M . E . But um is the museum at a heck part of the Army Museum Enterprise . It is . And so uh the army maintains 30 different museums uh that are located around the army around the world in uh in the in the U . S . Uh in uh in Alaska I'm sorry in Hawaii . Uh And then in to overseas countries , Germany and Korea . Uh And in addition to those uh unit museums , uh The army has a couple of historical collections . Uh One of those is at a heck that services and supports the Heritage education center . Museum there in Carlisle barracks . The Corps of Engineers in Fort Belvoir Virginia maintains a research collection of artifacts based on civil engineering . Uh The the Army Special Operations Command maintains a small museum at fort Bragg north Carolina as part of the Special Warfare Center . Uh And then we also maintain here as a part of the Army's Museum Enterprise , the National Museum of the United States Army at Fort Belvoir and and so all of these museums fit together in terms of telling a very comprehensive story of the army . Both from the individual soldier's perspective at places like no musa and at a hack but then also from the unit perspective at those unit museums that are around the arm . Great yeah . And you know , just as a former soldier myself , you know everywhere I've been stationed , they've had museums and uh it's been just great to visit those and learn more about the unit and just soldier stories and soldier history . So it's been really important . But then CMH um um really has a mission to support H . Q . D . A . And I know we do a lot of publications . We've got over 600 publications . I don't know if you want to just touch on that briefly um what the publications are for . So they're really the CMH s calling card over time . And so when you when you ask people uh about if you did a word association with CMH or the center of Military history with your average person who's a history buff or knows anything about history or is even a professional historian . They would probably reference one particular publication that we produce . And it's called The Green Books . And these are the very famous history of the US Army in World War Two , the multi volume series that was begun immediately at the conclusion of World War Two . Uh and that continued all the way into the 19 eighties in terms of work on the series , but that's our most famous publication , but it's only one of hundreds of of individual publications and series that we publish . And the intent behind our publications program is to document the army's history very systematically both in breadth in terms of covering different campaigns , wars , conflicts uh and other other special topics . So in breadth but also in depth . And so we have publications of varying lengths and focuses for different audiences all the way from . For example , you know , the green books which are incredibly detailed with orders of battle with charts , photographs , maps that really serve as a research tool . Uh Much more than a book that you would pick up and read all the way down to are are shorter monographs , Which we've tended to call pamphlets at some point . But these are shorter publications . 50 , 60 pages that are that are quick uh general summations of battles and campaigns that are more aimed at a non academic audience or a popular audience or even a military audience to use in training or education . And so the intent behind having this range of publications is to get historical content out to the army and the public in different formats and links in ways that people can approach them based on their own needs for history . And we've got some . I mean we have publications coming out all the time . In fact , you know , um Modern war in an ancient land about american forces or the U . S . Army in Afghanistan through 2014 . We have a new one that just came out about the ISIS are conflict with ISIS and about um um Covid 19 , correct . So those are I mean it's a it's a testament to the great work that CMH does and turning these around and informing well the army as well as the public about these and and getting those lessons . Which is a which is a great transition to the next topic . Which is so why is history important ? Why do we do all this ? You know , we've got a better understanding what CMH does . But that's the next question . Why why is history important to the army ? History is important to the army . I believe in two general sorts of senses . So in the first sense ah what I call historical mindedness and I and I'm going to refer to that term because I think it's the theme of what we do . I think it's our calling card . It's our elevator speech is that historical mindedness matters to soldiers and civilians of all ranks and all duties . Because an awareness of the army's past builds resiliency in terms of people understanding that that the challenges that they may face or the missions that they may have are generally not new . There is some occurrence or some reference or some echo of the present always in the past . And there's always something that can be learned from understanding how previous generations uh have grappled with those problems . And so , uh but that understanding , as I said , creates this resiliency , This idea that you can deal with the conditions of being in the army by understanding that other people like you have approached and surmounted those issues . Uh in some cases , the army has been challenged or struggled uh in particular arenas . And so , learning from the warts and all of our history is very important in that terms of , of building people's resiliency . Historical mindedness also builds , I believe , as free decor . Uh someone's ability to understand when they serve in a particular unit , for example that units passed that breeds in a spree decor that encourages someone to be proud of and to want to live up to that past . And so resiliency and esprit decor . Uh and we tend to refer , I prefer to refer two programs that build resiliency and esprit decor is focusing on army , on army heritage . And so we use history and heritage in the title of the podcast because I think these programs are more focused on what I would call heritage awareness , which again , builds esprit decor , builds cohesion and it builds resiliency . So that's one sense in which I think historical mining , this is important . The other is in the sense of historical mindedness being a tool , a tool to learn from the past in the pursuit of making better decisions uh and having better outcomes now and in the future , and that's where history becomes again a resource . But this implies that one can uh can have the ability to to read to understand the past , but also to have access to records of the past . And that's where CMH feels such a key role for the army is in maintaining a physical record of the past , in terms of documents , in terms of digitally maintained archives and in terms of publications that give people the tools . So , for example , in in a headquarter setting or in a policy setting , we've got this challenge or this new mission that's coming up , we've got to decide on how the army will approach that mission and accomplish it . Well , uh it would be easy just to throw up your hands and and and say that uh well , this is a new challenge . This is an unprecedented challenge . And you hear these terms all the time now that we've never faced , a challenge like this before , and that's really not true . So , a benefit of historical mindedness is that you will default to the idea that there is something in the past , something in the army's past that you can use uh not to create sort of a checklist for what to do , but to gain a perspective from the past that would enable you to think about similar situations , what was done in similar situations , and not that that will tell you what to do . But it may it may shape your planning and your decision in the future . And so I think that's the those are the two dimensions of historical mindedness that that I think are valuable . one is using history in a decision making and planning role and the other is that heritage awareness . Yeah and and historical mindedness as as you're putting it I think is that the same as actionable history ? Because I've heard that term used a lot as well . Yeah we tend to use those terms sort of interchangeably . I think of actionable history as , yes it's both of those things and it becomes actionable because it is something that that that units that commanders that soldiers that civilians can use for these various purposes . And I I know that we get queries from H . Q . D . A . Or other commands um for exactly what you're talking about . Hey we have a certain type of mission coming up . Um Can you give me some perspective on that And um a very interesting story I thought was that for um to fight I think the insurgency in Iraq um or or ISIS I I can't remember which one it was but that a staff ride was used um for some senior leaders that addressed the Seminole wars in florida but they were able to take lessons learned from that and apply it to how how to fight ISIS or or the insurgency in Iraq . That's right . That was an army general who was at the time , was stationed at the U . S . Central Command in Tampa and he worked with the center of military history to develop a staff ride that for actions that took place during the Seminole war in northern florida . And this was the date campaign which spoiler alert had a very bad outcome for for that particular unit and for decades decades formation . But that's also an example of the point that I often raises that that that that that our work as a historical office is not purely sort of celebratory . We're not we're not ignoring the bad parts of the army's past and just celebrating the good parts . We are learning from all aspects of the army's history and who should be learning , is it just is it just senior leaders in the army that should be using CMH and reading this history or it should be expanded to more soldiers . Well , our mission or our our current emphasis and focus Is to broaden this appeal of of using an understanding history to all ranks of the army and that's where I think there is such power in our recent sort of reorganization and realignment underneath the Army's training and doctrine command . And so uh so until 2019 , CMH was a subordinate element of of the army secretary . So we worked directly for the army headquarters Which gave us a lot of impact and visibility at senior levels . But it very much limited our ability to influence the wider army . Uh and so in a round of headquarters and army reforms in 2018 and 2019 we made the decision thatcmh was a good fit for the training and doctrine command because the training and doctrine command as their name says , is focused on on inducting and training the force in terms of its people , but then also writing its doctrine , writing its procedures and maintaining that that architecture over time to ensure that the army is ready for any mission . And so we see that we belong now to headquarters that gets us , as I say , is that we fit very neatly within the trade off mission and what we offer the products and services that CMH offers . The army can provide real value in a lot of different ways to the entire army as a member of trade off and how um how does CMhc connect history , army history to the units ? I know we have the army historical program and there's ways that units can actually participate . Can you talk about that a little bit Sure , This is , this starts at the very basic level of , of maintaining a system by which units can get what we call campaign participation credit for their units , historical participation in battles , wars , campaigns over time . Uh And so CMH is responsible within the army's infrastructure to maintain those records of lineage and honors for units . So battle honors which translates to the the awards , the soldiers wearing their uniforms , the streamers that they carry on their colors . Uh They're maintaining their physical lineage in the past . But this also extends to our advice to the army on applying unit lineages two units when they activate or change or change their organizations . So we advise on all of those things as well . And now with our again our realignment in the trades were beginning to think about how we use the digital space . So this is one of the ways in which we're doing it right now in this podcast but how we can use tools like social media tools like e books , audiobooks , different formats of our publications to appeal to wider audiences and how we can begin to impact the army's newest and most junior soldiers in the basic training base to begin to inculcate in them a sense of the long heritage of service that they're joining right ? And um at units right now you have unit history officers I believe and we're trying to expand that . I don't think it's available to every unit but I want to make sure that units out there know that they can be a part of this . They can and what we're doing is a program called , as you said the unit historical officer program . And this acknowledges that not every unit in the army has the ability to hire and maintain a historian and so what we're doing is developing a unit historical officer or you H . O . Program whereby a unit can assign an officer or an N . C . O . To an additional duty as a unit historical officer and their job is to maintain the units historical file of documents that describe what the unit has done over time and to do that we give them a couple of tools . So CMH is developing a distance learning training course for you H . O . S . That teaches them how to do their job . And we have also developed a digital toolset that allows them based in a web based format to have a guide and a checklist to what they maintain as AUh . Oh there what a unit historical file consists of . Uh and then it gives them digital tools to assemble an annual historical report or summary for their unit . So in a way you could say that history is truly the future of the army , We are absolutely trying to bring it into the 21st century in that regard , acknowledging that that the ways in which people consume information is changing . The ways in which they maintain information is changing and the ways in which they understand the past are changing ? Right ? And um great . You know we're we're getting short on time here . But um is there anything else that you think is important for folks to know about CMH or the role of history in the army ? Well I just think we need to continue to advertise the various ways that people can connect with the center and with our , with our activities ? Uh the really the best ways through our website history dot army dot mil , which is a treasure trove of materials . So virtually every one of our hundreds and hundreds of publications are available for free download in pdf format on our website history dot army dot mil . Uh And that also is the place where these unit historical officers and interested commanders can go to to get guidance on how to set up and maintain a historical program . And so there are so many resources available at history dot army dot mil . But by following us on our social media platforms , you can sort of plug in and get quick hits of history or of army history throughout your time . Uh and then also I'll highlight the National Army Museum's website , which is the name musa dot org org , nm usa the nm usa dot org , which is the National museums website , which gives you a portal into the many , many free virtual programs that they offer for folks who are not here in the Washington dc area . Right ? Yeah . And a lot of virtual programs there and it's it's really fascinating so to , to close um closing segment in this , I call you a trivia . So I just want to close each episode with a piece of army trivia is something that will wow the audience kind of who was . So is there something that you can think of ? I've got a couple . So I'll start with one of the most popular sort of slogans that we always use and that that is actually based in fact in historical fact . Uh we tell people all the time that the army actually has more ships than the navy . Uh and we have more aircraft than the air force and so it speaks to the breadth of the army's missions in all of the domains around the world . Uh and as an army aviator , I can say that that applies to me in particular . Uh My other little bit of trivia today is that the first army museum was at West point new york , the U . S . Military Academy . Uh and it was formed in the mid 19th century immediately after the mexican american war to begin to house war trophies from that conflict . And so the army's museum enterprise goes deep into the 19th century . Well , thank you Mr Barry for your insights today about the importance of army history at all levels of command and leadership and why the army history program is a central part of the commander's toolkit . And I look forward to having you back on again in the future to talk about other areas of army history and if anyone wants to learn more about army history , I encourage you to explore our website as mr Bauer has pointed out at history dot army dot mil . And if you want to experience army history every day , then visit our social media sites on facebook twitter and instagram and make sure you like and share them so that we can get more people excited about army history . So please join us every week on this podcast for more in depth discussions about army history as we cover topics from all eras of U . S . Army history , examining battles , soldier experiences , equipment , weapons tactics and lots of trivia . So if you love army history , you don't want to miss an episode . Thanks for joining us today on the United States Army history and heritage podcast for the Center of Military history . I'm lee Reynolds and until next time the views expressed in this podcast reflect those of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect the views policies or opinions of the U . S . Army or Department of Defense . For more information about the army's proud history and heritage , go to history dot army dot mil . Mhm