Thoroughly grasping the Party’s and Central Military Commission’s perspectives on innovating education and training, alongside the guiding principle that “The quality of a school’s training reflects the unit’s combat readiness,” the Political College  has focused on reforming its approaches towards standardisation and modernisation. By implementing comprehensive and appropriate measures, the college aims to train a contingent of political cadres who are both ideologically steadfast and professionally competent, thereby contributing to building a politically robust army.

The Political College, established on 14 January 1976, is tasked with training company-level political commissars for the entire army. Since its inception, the college has set forth its training motto: “Firmly addressing both immediate and long-term needs, the college remains closely connected with the battlefield, leveraging collective strength to improve its overall quality of work while continuously building and developing.” Particularly noteworthy is the guidance from General Vo Nguyen Giap during his visit in December 1992: “Carry forward the glorious tradition of our heroic People’s Armed Forces and strive to become a model officer training institution of our army.” These words have since served as a guiding principle and enduring goal for the college’s endeavours. Over nearly 50 years, generations of cadres, cadets, and soldiers at the college have maintained unity, fostered a spirit of democracy and discipline, and demonstrated initiative, creativity, and resilience to excel in teaching and learning. They have forged and upheld the tradition of being “Loyal, creative, united, resilient, excelling in teaching and learning.” Through their outstanding performance, they have successfully trained political cadres characterised by the motto: “Books alongside flowers, guitars beside guns, a hundred-year career inspired by Uncle Ho.” The college’s achievements and training outcomes have significantly strengthened the effectiveness of Party and political work within the army, contributing to the construction of a politically strong armed force. In recognition of these outstanding accomplishments, the college has been awarded numerous prestigious honours, including the title of Hero of the People’s Armed Forces (2024), the Second-Class Military Exploit Order (2015), two Second-Class Orders of National Defence (2018 and 2020), a Second-Class Friendship Order from the Kingdom of Cambodia (2023), and many other esteemed awards.

Leader of the College meets with its cadets at a practical class

At present, the college’s mission of education and training is carried out in a context where global and regional situations are becoming increasingly complex and unpredictable. The Fourth Industrial Revolution is progressing rapidly, creating breakthroughs in various fields, including national defence and security, bringing both opportunities and challenges. Hostile and reactionary forces are intensifying their efforts to undermine our Party, State, and army through sophisticated and insidious schemes, particularly in cyberspace, while the negative aspects of the market economy are increasingly affecting the education and training process. To fulfil its entrusted responsibilities, the Party Committee and the Princial Board of the college have determined to focus on a number of fundamental tasks and solutions.

Firstly, accelerating fundamental and comprehensive innovation in education and training to meet the demands of building the Army in the new era. This is a major, overarching issue that influences the reform of other factors in the training process. It requires the inheritance of valuable experiences from the college’s historical periods in connection with the context, characteristics, and mission requirements of building the Army during each phase of the revolution. Therefore, the Party Committee and the Princial Board have directed relevant departments and units to thoroughly grasp and implement the resolutions, directives, projects, and plans of the Party, the Central Military Commission, and the Ministry of National Defence. They are maintaining a strong political direction while promoting fundamental, comprehensive, and synchronised innovation across all aspects of the education and training process, adhering to the principles of “standardisation and modernisation” to ensure alignment with the Party’s ideology, scientific rigor, practical relevance, integration, and effectiveness. Implementation must align closely with the direction and roadmap for building a revolutionary, standardised, elite, and modern army as outlined in the Party’s 13th National Congress resolution and the practical requirements of various types of grassroots units throughout the army. Special attention is paid to specific and unique aspects of the qualities and competencies required of political cadres at the divisional level to proactively research and innovate, refining training goals and models suitable for the current era. They continue to effectively implement the “Project on reforming training processes and programmes for military cadres to meet new mission requirements,” using this as a foundation to promptly adjust, supplement, and perfect the training programmes for various groups of learners. Efforts are also being made to selectively adopt modern teaching trends, innovating content and teaching methods to suit the college’s particularities and the characteristics of individual subjects. This includes a strong emphasis on innovating the content, forms, and methods of examinations, tests, and evaluations. The focus is shifted from primarily assessing knowledge to comprehensive evaluation aligned with course objectives, training goals, outcome standards, and the overall training process. Concurrently, collaboration and coordination are being strengthened between the college and military units as well as with higher education institutions within and beyond the armed forces to foster deeper and more comprehensive integration.

Secondly, intensifying innovation in military science, enhancing the summarisation of practical experiences, advancing theoretical research, and promoting the college’s role as a centre for military social sciences and humanities research within the army. In line with the Central Military Commission’s Resolution No.1652-NQ/QUTW dated 20 December 2022 on leading military scientific work through 2030 and beyond, the college closely integrates education and training with scientific research, and links training activities with military science initiatives across all its operations. The college focuses on reforming scientific management by adopting mechanisms of competition, project commissioning, and results-oriented management that prioritise the final effectiveness of scientific tasks. It combines basic research with applied research, proactively initiating and shaping major scientific research projects. These projects aim to summarise practical experiences, develop political theory, and contribute to building the army and defending the Fatherland, thereby enhancing the quality of the college’s education and training. Efforts are made to diversify and innovate the forms of scientific research, academic exchange, and operational models to create an environment that fosters creativity and innovation. Mechanisms and policies are established to encourage and support the publication of scientific research in reputable journals, as well as the transfer and practical application of research findings. The college is also promoting the application of information technology and digital transformation to align with its development trajectory and adapt to the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Furthermore, the college strengthens its integration efforts, expanding cooperative programmes, partnerships, academic exchanges, and collaborative support with higher education institutions and research facilities both within and outside the army. Special focus is placed on areas of mutual interest and strength, particularly in the fields of science and technology.

Co-chair a seminar on developing political and mental strength for VPA officers in the new stage

Thirdly, developming high-quality human resources, focusing on building a contingent of educators and education management staff with the qualities, capabilities, and credibility required to meet their mission. The Party Committee and Principal Board have identified the integration of building a contingent of educators and education managers with the development of high-quality human resources as one of the three pillars for constructing the college in the new era. Alongside fundamental and comprehensive reform of education and training and the establishment of a military cultural environment, this focus serves as a driving force and a breakthrough step towards creating a workforce with the requisite qualities, abilities, and credibility, making this the central and foremost task in personnel management. In implementation, the college emphasises fostering the “7-dare” spirit among its staff and educators, regarding this as a primary goal and fundamental standard for evaluation and utilisation. It continues to concretise the standards for educators and education management personnel according to specific roles, forming the basis for assessment, selection, and deployment. Simultaneously, the college establishes specialised mechanisms and policies to identify, nurture, and build a contingent of leading experts in teaching and scientific research. This approach supports the college’s development and facilitates participation in teaching and research exchange and collaboration with higher education institutions within and beyond the army. The college effectively aligns the orientation of personnel utilisation with the structure of its training programmes, ensuring a suitable and progressive roadmap. Particular importance is placed on the quality of postgraduate training, avoiding a mere focus on quantity. Alongside rotational assignments and fieldwork at military units, the college promotes the rotation and appointment of personnel across different departments, faculties, and units. This strategy aims to cultivate and train educators and staff within diverse environments and working conditions, thereby enhancing their professional competence and adaptability.

Finally, continuing to enhance the quality and effectiveness of safeguarding the Party’s ideological foundation and countering erroneous and hostile viewpoints. Recognised as a “peacetime combat” mission, the college’s Principal Board motivates and mobilises the political responsibility of all personnel, strengthening their combativeness, persuasiveness, responsiveness, and incisiveness to achieve breakthroughs in quality and effectiveness. To ensure success, the college actively innovates its content and methodologies, adopting a comprehensive and synchronised approach that leverages its strengths as a centre for training divisional-level political cadres and conducting research in military social sciences and humanities. The college is gradually specialising its activities in defending the Party’s ideological foundation and combating false and hostile viewpoints based on the specific characteristics of departments, faculties, and units. It combines the development of a broad, widespread network with the formation of a core, elite force to expand the scope of these efforts, particularly in cyberspace. Teaching and scientific research are closely integrated with the mission of countering false and hostile viewpoints, with research activities increasingly focused on providing direct arguments to support the defence of the Party’s ideological foundation. The curriculum and teaching content for different training programmes are regularly updated to incorporate material on defending the Party’s ideological foundation and countering false and hostile viewpoints, ensuring alignment with the training objectives for divisional-level political cadres. The college diversifies its methods and forms of implementation, strengthening practical activities to create an environment conducive to the training and development of cadets in line with their educational progress. It actively seeks partnerships and collaboration, exchanging experiences in defending the Party’s ideological foundation with various agencies and units within and beyond the army.

In parallel with these measures, the college places great importance on building a clean and strong Party committee closely tied to constructing a comprehensively strong, “typical and exemplary” college. Additionally, it vigorously promotes the study and implementation of Ho Chi Minh’s thought, ethics, and style, in conjunction with the campaign of Promoting traditions, dedicating talents, and being worthy of the title “Uncle Ho’s Soldiers” in the new era through practical, specific, creative, and effective initiatives. These combined efforts generate a unified strength that enables the college to successfully fulfil its core political mission: training a contingent of divissional-level political cadres who are both ideologically steadfast and professionally competent, acting as the nucleus and key force in building politically strong units at the grassroots level in the new era.

Lieutenant General, Associate Professor, PhD NGUYEN HUNG OANH

Principal of the Political College