Starship Troopers is a science fiction novel written by Robert A. Heinlein. Set in a distant
future in which Earth has united under the quasi-militaristic banner of The Federation,
the story follows Johnny Rico, a young man who decides the join the Mobile Infantry, an elite
military unit which operate across the galaxy, and who inadvertently becomes entangled in an
interplanetary war against the bug-like Arachnids. Although a military adventure first and foremost,
the book can perhaps best be described as a coming of age story, as Rico matures from a privileged
and naïve teenager into a highly trained and disciplined officer of the Mobile Infantry.
Although the novel has remained popular since its original release in 1959, I imagine most of
you are more familiar with these shots from its 1997 movie adaption by director Paul Verhoeven...
Although resembling Heinlein’s work in some areas, Verhoeven essentially took a sledgehammer to the
source material, and transformed the former’s serious tale into a satirical action movie.
His reasoning? He hated it. According to him, the society of the Federation was both jingoistic,
militaristic, and worst of all, promoted fascism... As such, Verhoeven strongly disavowed,
and decided to poke fun at Heinlein and all of the aforementioned -isms with his movie adaptation.
However, after its release, few seemed to understand the director’s intent.
Some fully embraced the film as a cool science fiction action movie, while others ironically
criticized it for promoting the very militarism and ideology which it had set out to ridicule…
The problem seemed to stem from the fact that Verhoeven simply had failed to comprehend the
source material, which does tend to happen when you only read two single chapters of the book
you’re supposed to make an adaptation of. In recent years, creators like Pewdiepie
and Red Letter Media have attempted to correct the record by highlighting the movie’s intended,
but flawed critique of Heinlein’s worldview and how and why this was originally misunderstood...
Sargon of Akkad in turn has argued that the society in Starship Troopers does not even
promote fascism to begin with… Regardless, the point being is that this discussion,
kickstarted by Verhoeven’s confused misinterpretation of the story, has
focused almost solely on the political dimension, but has largely obscured the true archetypal core
of the story. Although certainly envisioning an idealized society, Heinlein also, and perhaps
primarily, wrote Starship Troopers to reintroduce modern readers to several age-old principles
of leadership and personal responsibility. In fact, it does both these things so well
that the book has been on the US military’s reading list for decades! As I will argue,
it is exactly this archetypal core that best explains Starship Trooper’s continued popularity,
and as such functions as the very essence of its timeless and universal relevance…
But how can we pinpoint these principles, and what is it that we can learn from them?
For this we need to turn to perhaps the most famous contemporary authority on
the subject of leadership, retired Navy Seal commander Jocko Willink…
Jocko has written several critically acclaimed books on this topic derived from his experiences
as a commander during the Iraq War. With Jocko’s guiding hand, this video essay will identify three
key leadership principles that we can take away from Starship Troopers, and explore how we can
implement those truths into our daily lives… So without further ado, let’s get after it…
Principle #1, Extreme Ownership: The foundational principle on which all
other leadership principles are built, is what Jocko calls: Extreme Ownership. In this view,
the true leader not only takes responsibility for himself, he also willingly chooses to take
responsibility for the wellbeing of others. Like Jocko, Heinlein puts this principle at the center
of his story, as Rico is asked to explain the difference between a civilian and a citizen…
In the society of Starship Troopers, only those who volunteer to serve, or in other words take
responsibility for the safety of humanity, are allowed the right to vote and run for office.
In the Federation, taking Extreme Ownership is seen as the greatest virtue. Moreover,
the citizen who embodies it has not only made the safety of others his primary responsibility,
he has also accepted that he is responsible for the actions of those around him. The leader who
takes Extreme Ownership acknowledges that the buck stops with him, no matter what…
Although only marginally represented in the movie this view is lavishly evoked in the book. First,
Rico is demoted during bootcamp for something his squad did while he wasn’t even around.
Not long thereafter the point is hammered home even further when his drill instructor, Zim,
takes responsibility for the fact that one of his recruits managed to hit him in the face, and as a
result was court martialed, flogged, and given a dishonorable discharge: “I wish to heaven there
were some way for me to take that flogging myself, sir.” “You’d have to take your turn, I outrank
you”, answers the Captain. “[However], neither you nor I can take it for him, even though the fault
was ours. Because the regiment has to see what happens when nine-oh-eight-oh is violated. Our
fault … but his lumps.” Finally, this principle is taken to its absolute extreme when a recruit
who deserted bootcamp was found to have murdered a girl: The M.I. take care of their own – no matter
what. Dillinger belonged to us, he was still on our rolls. Even though we didn’t want him, even
though we should never have had him, even though we would have been happy to disclaim him, he was
a member of our regiment. We couldn’t brush him off and let a sheriff a thousand miles away handle
it … The regimental records said that Dillinger was ours, so taking care of him was our duty.
In the Mobile Infantry, everyone is functionally responsible for everyone and everything, no matter
the rank. As such, an M.I. does not need to be coerced into service, because he has taken Extreme
Ownership: The root of our morale is: “Everybody works, everybody fights.” An M.I. doesn’t pull
strings to get a soft, safe job; there aren’t any … All “soft, safe” jobs are filled by civilians;
that goldbricking private climbs into his capsule certain that everybody, from general to private,
is doing it with him … This is why he enters the capsule, even though he may not be conscious of
it. … All that holds us together is an idea – one that binds more strongly than steel but its
magic power depends on keeping it intact. The leader who embodies this principle, will see
the same behavior mirrored back to him by his subordinates… In short, take Extreme Ownership…
Principle #2, Stay Humble: A leader cannot afford to become arrogant or too
good to do menial tasks. He is not to inflate himself unduly in front of his subordinates.
The true leader checks his ego, no matter his rank or level of expertise,
and stays humble. In the M.I. the officer’s live belongs to his men, he does not live for his own
glory nor for his safety. When in doubt, he is to consider the opinions of his closet subordinates,
in this case his platoon sergeant: He’s probably older than you are, more drops under his belt,
and he certainly knows his team better than you do. Since he’s isn’t carrying that dreadful,
numbing load of top command, he may be thinking more clearly than you are. Ask his advice.
You’ve got one circuit just for that. It won’t decrease his confidence in you; he’s used to being
consulted. If you don’t, he’ll decide you are a fool, a cocksure know-it-all – and he’ll be right.
However, staying humble does not equate willingly losing one’s confidence: You don’t have to take
his advice. Whether you use his ideas, or whether they spark some different plan – make your
decision and snap out orders. The one thing – the only thing! – that can strike terror in the heart
of a good platoon sergeant is to find that he’s working for a boss who can’t make up his mind.
Checking the ego also means that one is to lead by example and not feel too elevated to
do the tasks nobody wants to do. A big moment of growth for Rico as an aspiring officer is
when, during a time when his squad is strapped for time and manpower, he offers to give his mechanics
a helping hand. The true leader is not afraid to get his hands dirty every once in a while,
but is simultaneously careful to maintain the appropriate distance to his subordinates.
The leader who manages to take both extreme ownership and stay humble,
becomes the type of person who people look up to. In the case of Starship Troopers,
this is best embodied by the character of Lieutenant Rasczak. In the words of Rico:
The Lieutenant was father to us and loved us and spoiled us and was nevertheless rather remote from
us aboard ship – and even dirtside … unless we reached dirt via a drop. But in a drop – well,
you wouldn’t think that an officer could worry about every man of a platoon spread over
a hundred square miles of terrain. But he can. He can worry himself sick over each one of them.
Besides that, you knew with utter and absolute certainty that, as long as you were still alive,
the Lieutenant would not get into the retrieval boat without you. Check the ego, stay humble…
Principle #3, Discipline = Freedom: This may sound counterintuitive at first, but according to Jocko
Willink, it is only through discipline that we can attain true freedom… Without discipline we
can’t get done what we needs to get done, or it will take much longer than need be,
slowing us down in whatever it is we set out to achieve. Similarly, without discipline,
mistakes are made on the battlefield, which restrict a leader from achieving his mission.
Without discipline, members of a team cannot rely on each other to have their backs.
And although in Verhoeven’s Starship Troopers discipline is
either shown as tyrannical during training, or entirely absent during actual combat,
Heinlein goes to great lengths to display the vital importance of this principle in the book.
For instance, it is explained how only around 15 percent of recruits of the Mobile Infantry
actually make it through boot camp. However, Rico emphasizes that the toughness of the training
and its drill instructors are in no way without purpose: It was too scheduled, too intellectual,
too efficiently and impersonally organized to be cruelty for the sick pleasure of cruelty. Its
immediate purpose was to get rid of, run right out of the outfit, those recruits who were too soft or
too babyish ever to make Mobile Infantrymen. It accomplished that, in droves. Moreover, recruits
are trained to use all manner of weapons, from a throwing knife all the way to a small atomic bomb:
We’re trying to teach you to be dangerous – to the enemy. Dangerous even without a knife.
An MI is always ‘on the bounce’ and never out of the fight, always ready to adapt to changing
circumstances, and ready to apply the necessary force to achieve his objective, whether that be
the thrust of a knife, or the firing of a nuclear weapon. And in contrast to the supposed ‘tactics’,
or lack thereof, as seen in the movie, the MI in the book operate with almost mathematical
precision, speed and efficiency, as they maintain standardized battle formations,
apply the precise amount of force necessary, and extract at a designated time and place.
In the same way, it is this emphasis on strict discipline and mutual responsibility, which
provides the Mobile Infantry with the freedom to rapidly deploy and redeploy on a moment’s notice.
However, a leader should not want to transform his men into unthinking robots. But if rightly
ordered, the leader who imposes a balanced degree of standardized discipline both on himself and on
his subordinates, will generate the necessary freedom, confidence, and the ease of mind,
to be creative when circumstances change or plans inevitably fall apart. This careful balance is
exactly what enables Rico to act swiftly and adapt rapidly during the climax of the story. During
this final battle, Rico’s clearheaded leadership helps avoid his team from getting wiped out and
ultimately play a pivotal role in the successful completion of his mission, to capture a brain bug…
So remember, discipline equals freedom. To conclude, I hope this video has evidenced
that it is far too reductive to view Starship Troopers merely through a political lens,
and it certainly would be a mistake to reduce its message to a laughable propagation of jingoism,
militarism, and fascism. This is not to invalidate the debate surrounding Heinlein’s proposed ideal
society altogether, but it is to emphasize that at its core, its story is much more than that.
In essence, Starship Troopers true fundamental attraction is found in its evocation of both
universal principles of leadership, and in its general reappreciation of timeless values such
as duty, honor, and responsibility, in the pathway towards living a meaningful life.