The CCW Programme is connected to an extensive network of international partners, and has developed various links over ten years through exchanges, joint research, conferences and publications. Oxford University has strong links to leading institutions throughout the world & sends its academics outwards to engage with colleagues and institutions globally, but it also welcomes hundreds of international scholars every year. The University has three international offices, in the New York, Hong Kong, and Tokyo which facilitate our extensive networks of scholarship, publications and our alumni relations.

Axel and Margaret Ax:son Johnson Foundation for the Public Benefit, Sweden

The Axel and Margaret Ax:son Johnson Foundation for the Public Benefit Foundation has become a strong link for CCW, not just through a funding relationship but also in our shared interests in the changed security situation in Eastern and northern Europe. Axel and Margaret Ax:son Johnson Foundation for the Public Benefit now generously funds the CCW programme’s research work. 

Denmark

The University of South Denmark is looking to build collaborative working with CCW on the theme of Nordic and Baltic Defence and Security.

Australia: The Australian Army

Since the Chichele Professor of the History of War was formerly held by R.J. O’Neill, links with Australia have remained alive. The Australian Army has sent Visiting Research Fellows and supported generously the CCW conference on Post-Heroic Warfare (2011).

United States: Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), The Johns Hopkins University

We have firm links with SAIS via a Memorandum of Understanding which covers staff and student exchanges, joint research activity, joint funding efforts and shared teaching.

The Philip Merrill Center for Strategic Studies operates as a foundation for strategic thought, teacher development, and education at SAIS. It explores the relationship between politics and the many kinds of military power—from the use of terror by small, non-state groups to the threatened use of nuclear weapons—aiming to promote dialogue and innovative research on pressing national security issues. Since its founding in July 2004, following a generous gift from The Merrill Family Foundation, The Philip Merrill Center for Strategic Studies has been a primary resource to improve the quality of teaching in strategic studies and promote dialogue on major issues of the United States national security agenda.

Through its ‘Strategic Dialogue’ programme, like CCW, the Merrill Center sponsors conferences, seminars, and other gatherings on contemporary security issues. It works both independently and with other local, national and international organizations to bring together scholars, policymakers and practitioners in small seminars or in large open forums in which the SAIS community and the public at large can participate.

SAIS also runs the Hertog Summer Study programme. The result of a generous gift from New York philanthropist Roger Hertog, the summer study explores an important dimension of one of the broad challenges that we face today and will face in the future. This year’s summer study focused on the Asian Security Environment and China as a strategic actor from 10 – 20 August 2014.

Professor Eliot Cohen, the Director of the Merrill Center, has assisted in CCW becoming a permanent partner at the heart of Washington DC. Following Dr Johnson’s participation in the SAIS Basin Harbor class for those teaching strategic studies in the United States and Canada, plans have been discussed to run a joint summer school, establish more studentships, and exchange more staff. There have so far been exchanges where Dr Andrea Baumann, and doctoral students Jacob Stoil and Todd Greentree, from CCW to SAIS.

Through SAIS, the CCW programme has links with the SAIS offices in Washington DC, Bologna, and Nanjing. The Merrill Center also organizes three lecture series for the SAIS Community: The Alvin H. Bernstein Annual Lecture; the You Were There lecture series, and the Merrill Center lecture series. Additionally, the Merrill Center organizes staff rides for military officers or civilian groups. In common with all staff rides, they focus on the nature of command, the impact of changing technologies, and the adaptation of military organizations to new environments. An active form of learning, they rely on role play and participation.

The US Navy

Every year, the US Navy sends a senior officer to St Antony’s College, Oxford to work alongside the Royal Navy’s Hudson Fellow. The officers are also Research Fellows of the CCW Programme, and contribute with papers, team seminars and discussions. CCW members also have strong links with the US Navy through the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey and the Naval Academy at Annapolis, through research and as lecturers.

The Naval Postgraduate School is a fully accredited research university operated by the United States Navy. It grants master’s degrees, engineer’s degrees and doctoral degrees. The school also offers research fellowship opportunities at the postdoctoral level through the National Research Council research associateship programme.

Among its many research centres, several have direct relevant and linkage to CCW including the centres for Asymmetric Warfare, Defense Management Reform, Contemporary Conflict, Terrorism and Irregular Warfare, Information Operations for Research, Undersea Warfare and Littoral Operations.

American Universities

Oxford University and the CCW Programme in particular have good links with leading American universities, particularly through colleagues at Harvard (Steve Rosen at Harvard’s Weatherhead Center), Yale (Paul Kennedy at International Security Studies) and Stanford (Hoover Institute, Paul Berkowitz and Gary Roughead). These institutions regularly send students and a number of them are supervised by CCW members during the course of their studies. The Ohio State University’s Mershon Center for International Security Studies is similar in inter-disciplinary format to CCW and Pete Mansoor (former executive officer to Petraeus) is the military history professor in the Mershon Center with whom we have contact. The MIT Security Studies Program will also be developing links in 2015. Tom Marks at the National Defense University is another partner, with strong links to the US defence and security sector, along with Susan Stipanovich (US War College and NDU), Richard Hooker, Thomas X. Hammes, and Frank G. Hoffman.

China: The Academy of Military Science, Beijing and National Defense University, Beijing

Through Chevening Scholarships organised by the British Council and the Foreign Office, it has been possible to have between two and four officer-academics of the PLA visit CCW as VRFs. These exchanges resulted in an invitation for CCW to address the AMS during its conference on Sun Tzu (2014) and Chinese academics attended a conference on the China-Japan War in Oxford in April 2015. Further joint working is expected.

France: Paris I, Maison Francais and Institut de Guerre

The ‘Globalising and Localising the Great War’ research project, partly funded by CCW, staged an international conference in January 2014. Since thenm we have hosted French VRFs in the past, including Professor Raphaëlle Branche from Paris I. The Institut de Guerre at Paris I now has a Memorandum of Understanding with CCW through Pembroke. We will continue to run joint events in 2017-18.

The USAF War College and USMC University

These already enjoy some links with individual members of CCW, but exchanges and joint working are being developed further.

Turkey: Turkish Army Staff College/National Defence University

Following the visits of a number of VRFs rom the Turkish Army since 2004, a Memorandum of Understanding has been established between CCW and TAF. This MOU enables officers and academics in the Turkish defence establishment to take part in exchanges with CCW and a delegation of Turkish officers visited CCW in May 2015.

Norway

Through individual members of CCW, there are good links with PRIO, and the Norwegian air force academy and the War College. In 2016-17 we share a research focus on Russia and Eastern Europe.

Netherlands: The Royal Netherlands Defence Academy

In 2016, CCW and the Royal Netherlands Defence Academy established an MOU that will build connections through exchanges of personnel, visiting fellowships and lectures. In late 2016, it was agreed that Dr Johnson should attend Breda annually in order to support the teaching there, but we have had the opportunity to host the Director of the Netherlands Academy to maintain our connections and will continue to attract scholars and officers from the Netherlands to participate in events, including a specific event on current operational and strategic challenges in the winter of 2017-18. 

The US Army War College: Center for Strategic Leadership and Strategic Studies Institute

The US Army has sent a number of students to Oxford since 2004 and they take up courses offered by CCW staff, are supervised by them, and they attend CCW events. In addition, Professor Antulio Echevarria of the The United States Army War College is a long standing associate of the programme and provides the link with strategic studies at Carlisle, PA. In 2015, the CCW will establish a visiting fellowship for the US Army along the lines of the US Navy’s fellowship scheme.

The Army War College 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.

Among the centres of greatest relevance to CCW are (1) the Center for Strategic Leadership (the Collins Center) which develops and conducts strategic level political-military simulations; supports Army staff exercises, analysis and research; supports Joint Staff and Combatant/ Army Component Commander exercise and engagement programmes; conducts interagency education, training, and development; hosts governmental/ military research and analysis and management activities; and supports the Army leadership’s strategic communications programme. The other is (2) the Strategic Studies Institute which engages in research in support of Army, Joint, and OSD senior leaders; publishes books, monographs and special reports on U.S. national security, Army and Joint issues; sponsors conferences to define and debate critical national security, Army and Joint issues; directs analysis for the Army Staff and Joint Staff, and engages in academic conferences linking the Army War College to the intellectual activity of leading universities and research institutes.

The Strategic Studies Institute also publishes SSI studies. These are distributed to key strategic leaders in the Army and Department of Defense, the military educational system, Congress, the media, other think tanks and defense institutes, and major colleges and universities. SSI studies use history and current political, economic, and military factors to develop strategic recommendations. Regarding books, SSI publishes about 3-5 volumes per year consisting of authored works or edited compilations. It also produces monographs – namely policy oriented reports that provide recommendations. They are usually 25-90 pages in length.

There are also the Carlisle Papers which highlight the very best of student papers from the Army War College. There are also the Letort Papers which are essays, retrospectives or speeches of interest to the defence academic community. Finally there are Colloquium Reports based on larger conference proceedings, while Colloquium Briefs are two to four page briefs are produced after the colloquia with which we have hosted or helped fund.

This approach to publications is the model for CCW going forward and the US Army War College has close links for CCW to harness and develop further.

Canada: The Royal Military College of Canada

A number of VRFs have been drawn from the RMCC and thanks to the efforts of Col. Dr Andrew Godefrey, a Memorandum of Understanding was drawn up to enable further exchanges and shared research activity. As a result, Canadian scholars have been able to attend CCW conferences, Dr Randall Wakelam became a VRF in 2013-14 and the Canadian Defence Attaché was invited to address the CCW seminar series and participate in the symposium of September 2014 on civil-military relations in the making of strategy. In 2016-17 we welcomed back RMCC membership with Prof Doug Delaney.

The Royal Military College of Canada is a degree-granting university creating military officers and it is the only federal institution in Canada with these powers. RMCC was established in 1876 and The Royal Military College of Canada Degrees Act, 1959 empowers the college to confer degrees in arts, science, and engineering. Programmes are available at the undergraduate and graduate levels on site through traditional studies and by distance learning through the Division of Continuing Studies.