This blog is part of a summer blog series written by the McCain Institute’s Summer Junior Fellows. Abigail Bergan is a junior fellow for the Leadership Programs team.
Most Americans do not feel connected to their own armed forces. Fewer than 1% of U.S. adults are active-duty service members, and as of February 2025, only 11% of Americans surveyed by Ipsos had immediate family serving in the military. Such small proportions indicate a significant detachment of the broader public from those who serve. It follows, therefore, that the American public is broadly losing confidence in their military, due in no small part to the barrier of unfamiliarity. Data has increasingly indicated an overall alarming decline in trust in public institutions beyond the military: in 2023, only 16% of surveyed adults trusted the federal government to “consistently do the right thing.”
As institutional confidence is declining and partisanship is rising exponentially, rebuilding nonpartisan public confidence in foundational American institutions is paramount. A core element of such rebuilding is simple: more Americans need to get to know their institutions, especially their military. I feel incredibly privileged to have had such exposure and experiences with the military across my undergraduate career.
College is all about new experiences and letting your curiosity take you in myriad directions. However, I don’t think most Duke students start their freshman year knowing nothing about the Army, and then end up conducting original research about Army Special Operations. Seeking out “new experiences” for me has meant a visit to the Navy SEAL teams based in Norfolk, Virginia, and taking a class co-taught by former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dempsey to discuss American grand strategy through the lens of Hollywood movies. The hallmark of this has unquestionably been the Counterterrorism and Public Policy fellowship: a yearlong program that brings senior military officials to study at Duke for a year. These Fellows – most with over two decades of service to the nation – audit undergraduate classes, attend co-curricular events, and conduct independent research on a national security issue of their choosing. Many of these incredible individuals, who started out as classmates, have not only been valuable resources and sounding boards for my research inquiries, but I am now honored to call them dear friends and mentors. This unique exposure and the relationships I’ve built have snowballed into me writing my senior thesis about the integration of women into Army special operations, and considering commissioning as an officer upon graduation.
My learning and understanding have only deepened over my summer living and working in Washington, D.C., as a junior fellow at the McCain Institute. I went to Arlington National Cemetery on Memorial Day to visit the final resting place of a dear friend. He, like Senator McCain, served in the Navy during the Vietnam War; also like Senator McCain, he then went on to have a distinguished career in public service. This friend, and my grandfather, a Coast Guard veteran, were my two most concrete links to the military before my Duke journey began. I like to think that they’d both be proud of me for the way I am approaching the issues facing American civil-military relations today.
Additionally, some friends and I attended the Army’s 250th birthday celebrations on the National Mall in June. Social media and talking heads across the political spectrum had spun this event in any number of directions, but unsurprisingly, the reality was very different from the caricatures painted online. The real benefit of these festivities was devoid of politicization: exposure and the development of curiosity. Getting to meet servicemembers, see vehicles and equipment up close, and watch our fighting force march down Constitution Avenue was, at its core, an excellent experiential learning opportunity.
Senator McCain once said, “We’re all Americans, and we’re all on the same team”. Not everyone needs to wear a uniform, nor take a path like I did through civil-military relations into studying the highest echelons of special operations. But if there’s anything my research has taught me, it’s that cohesion is one of the most important elements of a good team. Cohesion doesn’t mean everyone doing the same thing, nor does it mean perfect alignment. Integral to the cohesion of the great ‘American team’ we’re all fortunate to be on is an understanding of and connection to those who serve.
Civil-military relations are an oft-overlooked field of national security. This discipline doesn’t boast state-of-the-art new weapons, flashy operations, or easy political solutions. And yet, to face a rapidly changing world of various threats, it is imperative to reinforce this backbone of public trust and confidence not just in the military, but in other government institutions.