National Military Academy of Afghanistan

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National Military Academy of Afghanistan

Established:
Location:	Kabul, Afghanistan
Website:	www.nmaa.edu.af

The National Military Academy of Afghanistan (NMAA) is an academic institution of the Afghan military that is located in Kabul, Afghanistan. It is a four-year military development institution dedicated to graduating officers for the Afghan National Army and the Afghan Air Force. The mission of the NMAA academy is to produce officers for the Afghan National Army that also have a four year college level bachelors degree. The academy is based upon the United States Military Academy at West Point.

1 Academics
2 Military Training
3 Physical Fitness
4 Personal Character
5 Role of the Coalition
6 Relationship with West Point
7 Reconstruction
8 See also
9 External links

[edit] Academics

All cadets who successfully graduate from the academy will receive a bachelors degree. Currently, degrees are being offered in English Language, Civil Engineering, Computer Science, Management, and Law.

[edit] Military Training

All cadets will be commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Afghan National Army in one of six basic branches: Infantry, Armor, Artillery, Combat Engineer, Logistics or Communications.

[edit] Physical Fitness

Cadets are required to participate in morning physical fitness training and afternoon sports intramurals as part of their development in becoming an officer in the Afghan National Army

[edit] Personal Character

Traditionally, military leaders in Afghanistan have been loyal to either the national leader or more often, their local tribal leader. Their allegiances have been to their tribe, to their province, to the country, and their religion, in that order. The academy has undertaken the task of developing the cadet's loyalty to the constitution of Afghanistan, rather than any one individual. Another new philosophy is training the cadets to understand that there are circumstances when it is okay to disobey orders when that order is in conflict with the national constitution.

Cadets are bound to an honor code in which they pledge not to cheat, lie, steal or conspire to deceive.

[edit] Role of the Coalition

The United States has taken the lead in providing advisors and funding to the academy through Combined Security Transition Command - Afghanistan (CSTC-A). The team consists of 6 to 20 members at any given time with the responsibility of mentoring academy leadership, staff sections, academic departments and sports teams.

Turkey also provides a team of academic mentors to the academy and has assisted in establishing a Turkish Language program, computer science department and mathematics department. They have also provided funding for the establishment of some recreational facilities.

France and Germany have also provided some assistance in developing respective language courses at the academy.

Unlike most embedded training teams, the coalition teams present at the academy frequently have female officers and NCOs in order to demonstrate the capabilities of women in the army. The academy plans to admit women in 2011 or 2012.

[edit] Relationship with West Point

Colonel Patricia Dooley, Ph.D., of the United States Military Academy at West Point teaching chemistry to Afghan cadets while demonstrating teaching techniques to her Afghan counterpart.

Afghan military leaders conducted an international study in which they visited Kara Harp Okulu -- the Turkish Military Academy, Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, the service academy of the United Kingdom, and the United States Military Academy at West Point.

The Afghans selected West Point to be the model for their academy. A formal agreement between the two academies was established and West Point has been sending visiting professors to Afghanistan to provide mentorship to academy professors.

Recently, the United States Air Force Academy has also begun to provide mentors for their developing Air Corps program that will be a branch of the Afghan National Army.

[edit] Reconstruction

The current site of the academy is at the previous Air Academy that was established by the Soviet Union when they occupied Afghanistan through the 1980s. The site was nearly destroyed during the years of civil war and the coalition invasion of October 2001.

The United States and Turkey has taken the lead in reconstructing the current site while planning and developing the future site of the academy in the Qargheh section of Kabul. The current estimated cost of the reconstruction is around $100 million.

Currently cadets at West Point are assisting in the creation of a distributed application for the purpose of managing grades for the Afghan Cadets.

The final product will be a state of the art academic and military institution that will be the "Jewel of the Afghan National Army" and rival the other military academies of Central Asia^{[citation needed]}.