NWSI recently entered a new phase in its evolution from a startup organization in the NPS community to an established central connector that puts naval warfare and warfighting front and center at Naval Postgraduate School.

• In August of 2023, Col Randy Pugh, USMC (ret.), became the first full-time Director of NWSI, following three years of acting or interim directors.
• In this permanent role, the NWSI Director reports directly to NPS President Ann Rondeau and provides direct linkage to the Fleet and to the service headquarters to help align NPS with their priorities and most pressing needs.

Why it matters: While departments and individuals at NPS were already prioritizing naval warfare in their work, previously there was no central NPS organization highlighting these requirements and outcomes.

• NWSI was established in 2020, in part, to connect all those disparate efforts and to convey their collective impact both back to the NPS community and out to external stakeholders looking for precisely this expertise in naval warfare.

People First: As NWSI moves into its next phase, it will continue this work guided by the six cornerstones of naval tactics from CAPT Wayne Hughes’s ground-breaking work, Fleet Tactics and Naval Operations. The first and most important being, “people matter most.”

• “In this case,” said Pugh, “’people’ means our students and faculty. We want to ensure that they are constantly at the heart of everything that we do.”

One team, one fight: A perspective gives clarity about what unifies the diverse NPS community.

• “There’s always a question about what is at the center of NPS,” said Pugh. “Is it the students -- officers, early career engineers, and government scientists -- who come through here to gain new knowledge and skills? Or is it the faculty and their expertise and mentorship that transfers knowledge and insights to the next generation? I think the answer is neither. I think the center of NPS is the common commitment to mission.
• “If all of us agree that the primary thing we should be putting in the center of our lives is the mission, then the students will be supported and the faculty will be supported and the Mezzanine [leadership] and the warfare chairs will be supported. I believe that a successful NPS campus looks less like a hierarchy or a spider web organizational chart and more like a round table, with no one and no one’s work being considered more or less important than any other’s.”

NWSI has taken up the motto of “stronger together” to advance this collaborative vision.

• As Pugh said, “There is almost nothing that NWSI can do by ourselves. So, we connect, we advocate, we help synchronize, we support. It's all a team sport.”

Setting up faculty and staff for success:  NWSI plans to launch a program to introduce new faculty to core concepts of naval warfare that will help them support the NPS mission.

• When faculty and staff join the NPS team, said Pugh, “they become important players for the Department of the Navy, the Navy, and Marine Corps. And even if you don't wear a uniform, you are part of the NPS team that makes better warfighters.”
• NWSI wants to help build both practical knowledge and a feeling of belonging.

Pugh is working with Dr. Jomana Amara, NPS Vice Provost for Academic Leadership, to create a program for new faculty to be called “The Ropes,” after the need for new Sailors to learn the ropes when they come aboard as new crew members of a sailing ship.

• “It will go over basic information like military ranks and the different warfare-related jobs that NPS students have had,” said Pugh. “When the students in your class say I'm a combat engineer or I'm a helicopter pilot or I'm a signals intelligence officer, you’ll be able to know what that means and what kind of responsibilities they have had, both in peacetime and wartime.”
• NWSI also will continue supporting off-campus events that get staff and faculty to destinations like I Marine Expeditionary Force at Camp Pendleton, Third Fleet in San Diego, and out on a ship, in a submarine, or on an aircraft carrier.

The community of Warfare Chairs: NWSI also supports the “stronger together” philosophy by hosting a weekly synchronization meeting with the warfare chairs. These members of the NPS community are experts in key military mission areas and they help guide NPS research and education, while maintaining close connections with their warfighting communities and their priorities and needs.

• “Warfare chairs are an incredible resource, with something like a combined 300 or 400 years of naval warfighting experience,” said Pugh.

NWSI wants to make the warfare chairs a more easily available resource for the NPS community.

• “You’ll be able to come get questions answered,” said Pugh. “Or if you need a connection point, you need to go out on a submarine, you need to put a piece of equipment on an aircraft, or you need to talk to somebody at NAVAIR headquarters, we can make that connection for you so that you can continue the mission.”

One half of the NPS Research Enterprise: While NWSI was clarifying its purpose, NPS leadership also transformed the Research and Sponsored Programs Office into the Office of Research and Innovation (OR&I) and refined its mission. Together, NWSI and OR&I collaborate to align NPS research efforts with naval warfare needs.

• NWSI manages outreach with the Fleet and service headquarters to identify warfighting concept and capability needs and to promote the research products developed at NPS.
• OR&I oversees the NPS research portfolio, aligns activities, coordinates with industry and academia, and connects with the broader Naval Research & Development Establishment (NR&DE) to support research from the NPS community that meets naval warfare needs.

Pugh works closely with OR&I’s lead and NPS Vice Provost for Research, Dr. Kevin Smith. “We are perfectly in step and working things in an integrated way,” said Pugh.

• Putting together OR&I and NWSI, said Pugh, ensures “efficient, effective, and impactful research perfectly aimed at the priority problems of the Navy and Marine Corps and connected to the stakeholders at the headquarters and out in the fleet.”

What’s next: NWSI is slowly growing its staff. Rex Dillon joined the team in July 2023 as the first operations officer.

• “This position allows a level of coordination and long-range planning that we haven't been able to do over the previous years,” said Pugh. “Having an operations officer is like putting the engine in the car to make things go, and the steering wheel is Rex.”
• Pugh is also hoping to get two more members on board: a person to support the Athena collaborative research tool and a gaming, exercising, modeling, and simulation lead.

Get involved.

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