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Professor Colin Gray's research into strategic theory, conducted at the University of Reading, has had a sustained, distinctive, and international impact on policymakers, military educationalists, and other defence professionals. Firstly, it has vindicated the idea of `strategy' as a coherent intellectual activity, distinct from military history on the one hand and `military science' on the other, that is and should be at the heart of military practice and officer education. Secondly, and in consequence, it has informed and structured detailed practical debates, not least through advice commissioned from Gray himself.
This case study focuses on the impact of the body of research produced by various members of the UoA's Military Ethics Education Network (MEEN). This impact has been achieved through two main routes. The first comprises the impact of MEEN research on the teaching of ethics education in military and war colleges in Europe, North America, Australia and Israel. The second comprises the inclusion of explicit ethical considerations in training and pre-deployment briefings within the armed forces of the relevant countries. These forms of impact have been achieved both through publications and also through direct dissemination of ideas. The publications have formed the explicit basis of discussion at specially-organised targeted conferences and other teaching events and are used widely in the curricula of military ethics courses in military academies internationally.
Research by staff in the Centre for War Studies at the University of Birmingham, has informed continuing professional development (CPD) and training in the Armed Forces in the UK and overseas. This includes the design and delivery of training, study tours and materials for chaplains and NATO senior officers. Additionally academics have facilitated access to research to stimulate policy debate in the Armed Forces through invited presentations to professional conferences, and nationally and internationally by informing the content of Select Committee expert evidence.
Professor Spagat's ground-breaking research on civilian conflict casualties has had a demonstrable impact on the practices of NATO, the British military and humanitarian organisations operating in Afghanistan. The output from the research has been used to reduce the civilian casualties arising from military actions in Afghanistan.
This research has directly impacted the development of resources to enhance professional practice and had an influence on professional standards guidelines or training in these organisations. There are numerous examples of citations in a public discussion, consultation document or judgement and also of citation by journalists, broadcasters or social media. In Section 5 we provide documented evidence of influence on guidelines, legislation, regulation, policy or standards on NATO, the British military and humanitarian agencies in the form of an authorised statement and a podcast made by Lieutenant Colonel Ewan Cameron, a senior medic in the British Army.
In the present document we highlight one particular underpinning study (reference 1 of Section 3) that introduced the Dirty War Index (DWI). Joint follow-up work with Cameron (reference 2) applied the DWI concept to create the Civilian Battle Damage Assessment Ratio (CBDAR). Cameron then brought this construct to the field where NATO forces and humanitarian organizations used it to minimize the civilian impact of military and humanitarian operations in Afghanistan (sections 4 and 5). The DWI research agenda, including further applications (references 3, 4 and 5), has generated substantial public discussion by journalists and broadcasters (Section 4).
The research involved the first uncensored documentation of the contemporary UK military pathway and has been used internationally to raise awareness in professional participants and the general public of the ethical and practical complexities of militarised healthcare.
The impact of this research was evidenced within three distinct> territories: 1. Informing improvements in military and civilian training leading to the creation of standard briefing materials for British deployed forces, medics and civilians to ensure early awareness of the `care pathway'; 2. Establishing additional reference points within contemporary art discourse and reflecting on the role of independent observers of conflict; and 3. Aiding patient recovery and understanding by helping individuals reconcile the profound change that they have undergone through injury and by establishing precedents for a format of comprehensive patient diaries, enabling longer-term understanding of traumatic experience.
The research conducted by Professor Timothy Edmunds has had three primary impacts. First, it has played a role in framing policy and setting the operational agenda for security sector reform (SSR) programmes by national governments and international organisations. Second, the research has had a direct influence on the substance of security and defence reforms in parts of the post-communist and western Balkan regions, particularly in relation to the consolidation of democratic control over the security sector. Finally, it has had an impact on the evolution of British defence policy and armed forces since 2007, and on the debate leading up to the introduction of a new Armed Forces Covenant in May 2011. The research addresses change and transformation in military, police and intelligence agencies through the development and evolution of the concept of SSR. In so doing, it examines how security actors can both threaten and facilitate democratisation and human security goals in post-authoritarian and post-conflict societies, and the manner in which these issues can be addressed through international policy. It also `reverse engineers' the questions and lessons of SSR to interrogate wider challenges of defence transformation and civil-military relations in western democracies, and particularly the UK.
Key questions face Western military establishments and governments concerning the likely form of future defence needs and, consequently, the size and shape of their armed forces. Following dashed hopes of a long-term `peace dividend' after the collapse of the USSR, came recognition that defence remained a fundamental concern, but that military needs might be manifested in different ways. The debate about a `war on terrorism' post-9/11 further intensified questions about the nature of future conflict. Through his research on strategy, and his guiding role in the Oxford "Changing Character of War" programme, Sir Hew Strachan, Chichele Professor of the History of War (since 2002), has made a major contribution to these debates and has helped to shape military policy making in the UK and the USA.
Building on the academic research of staff and post-graduates, the `Walberswick Project' began as a local study, emerging from the general interest in landscape fostered in the UEA School of History by Professor Tom Williamson, and more specifically from Dr Robert Liddiard's expertise in medieval fortifications and their physical setting. Such expertise was here refocused on what had previously been the almost totally neglected Second World War anti-invasion landscapes of East Anglia. The realization that an entire world of landscape archaeology was ripe for rediscovery, and that what was true of Suffolk was no less true of the 'Atlantic Wall', stretching from Norway to Spain, has led via the project's website to the delivery of high-quality academic research to organisations charged with managing European heritage. The computer technology developed here has fed into further projects that now span the English Channel and several periods of history. Successful bids for European Union and National Heritage Lottery funding have ensured impact that is international in scope, with results disseminated via websites, print publications and other media to the very widest of constituencies.
Professor Gareth Stansfield's research at the University of Exeter into aspects of post-2003 Iraq has informed UK government and international policy towards Iraq since the invasion, and has had impact on policy makers in the US and the UN, through interventions raised and derived from his research. Specifically, his research has had an impact in three areas:
Professor Richard Overy's research on key issues of air power history and theory has influenced how both UK and International air forces consider key areas of air power history and their application to current issues of air power doctrine and development. This has been achieved by contributing to the air forces continuing professional development through seminars and lectures to service audiences, participation in RAF history teaching evaluation, publication of key texts on air power issues used in service academies and regular engagement with academic and non-academic audiences on air power history.