This week, my attention has been drawn to the ongoing discussions surrounding recruitment into our Air Force.
As I reflect on this, I am compelled to speak plainly, because what we are witnessing is not just a policy conversation, it is a fundamental misunderstanding of what it means to build a military.
Liberia does not suffer from a lack of manpower. We have no less than 15,000 college graduates who can meaningfully contribute to national service. We have over 250,000 high school graduates across the country searching for opportunity, direction, and purpose. These young men and women are not the problem. They are, in fact, part of the solution.
But the question we must ask ourselves is this, what exactly are we recruiting them into?
We do not have a functional military academy to properly train and shape them. We do not have sufficient technical training institutions to equip them with the skills required of a modern force. Our barracks, in many instances, are inadequate and, frankly, dehumanizing, even for those currently serving within the Armed Forces of Liberia.
And yet, we are speaking about expanding recruitment.
This approach is fundamentally flawed.
You cannot build an army without first building the institution that sustains it. You cannot strengthen a force by adding more people into a system that is already struggling to support those within it. Expansion without structure is not progress, it is instability.
Before we recruit new personnel, we must first address the conditions of the existing force. We must upgrade their training, improve their welfare, and restore dignity to their service. We must invest in the infrastructure that makes a military professional, disciplined, and effective.
But beyond that, we must also redefine how we use our military.
An army is not only for war. An army is a national asset.
A well trained and properly equipped military can build roads where there are none. It can construct bridges that connect isolated communities. It can respond to national emergencies, support disaster relief, and provide engineering services that directly impact development. It can be deployed to support agriculture, logistics, and national infrastructure projects.
This is how strong nations use their military.
Yet today, we are not utilizing the Armed Forces of Liberia to that capacity. Instead, it risks becoming a burden rather than a driver of national progress.
That must change.
We must invest heavily in our military, not just in numbers, but in purpose. We must build technical capacity within the force. We must train engineers, builders, logisticians, and professionals who can contribute to national development in times of peace.
We must also make difficult decisions. We must cut unnecessary expenditures that do not add value to the country and redirect those resources into building a strong, capable, and disciplined military institution.
Because a weak army is a liability, but a well structured and purposeful army is a pillar of national strength.
There is also a deeper concern that we cannot ignore. Many of the young people we now seek to recruit are those who have been neglected by society, those who are frustrated, unheard, and searching for a place to belong. If we bring them into an unstructured system without proper preparation, education, and guidance, we risk transferring that frustration into the very institution meant to protect the nation.
A professional military cannot be built on desperation. It must be built on discipline, training, and purpose.
We have young people who have struggled against all odds to complete high school. We have others who have fought their way through college with hope for a better future. If given the right structure and opportunity, they will not only serve, they will excel.
But we must do this the right way.
We must build the institution first. Then we build the army.
And in doing so, we must build an army that is not only prepared to defend the nation, but one that is capable of building it, serving it, and inspiring patriotism in every citizen.
Anything less is not just a mistake in judgment, it is a risk to the stability and future of our nation.