This volume provides the most thorough and insightful analysis of a wide range of military virtues yet compiled.

Indeed, much of military training follows precisely Aristotle's understanding of how virtues are developed through repetitive practice under supervision and coaching. The concept of “virtue” in the Aristotelian sense of “functional excellence” is widespread in the military. Professor John Adair, Chair of Leadership, United Nations. Anyone who cares about the ethos of our unique Armed Services will read this pioneering book with interest and profit. They are the building-blocks of ‘good leadership and leadership for good’. In that context it explores such generic leadership qualities that have the flavour of moral excellencies, such as integrity, justice or fairness, compassion and humility. It makes a compelling case for the revival of the classical emphasis on character - the seat of moral goodness.

Military Virtues is an outstanding contribution to the growing field of military ethics. In the search for such clarity, this volume identifies 14 key virtues of the military professional and through opening commentaries and real world examples of those virtues in practice, it provides guidance for service personnel at every stage of their career. Like personnel in other professional organizations, service personnel at every stage of their career s need a complement of virtues (excellent traits) in order to navigate the stress, decisions, and temptations they face.Īt a minimum, military professionals need to have a clear and working knowledge of the ethical decisions that underpin their profession in order to evaluate situations quickly. Up until now, there has been no extant book focusing on military virtues aimed at professionals. Professor John Kelsay, Florida State University

The topics are timely, the analyses are helpful and thought provoking in all, this is a fine volume.

An excellent compilation from which military commanders would benefit in the execution of their tasks in environments where the 'Rules of Engagement' in place is the first aspect examined when there are serious repercussions.

a treasure trove of real-world international cases of military moral dilemmas-and at times, outright moral failures-of enviable breadth and depth.

anyone interested in ethics is interested in examples of the application of ethical thinking, and here we have exactly that. valuable guidance or reflection for military commanders at any level, and a valuable resource for academic study.

The master list of virtues