Military academy

A military academy or service academy is an educational institution which prepares candidates for service in the officer corps. It normally provides education in a military environment, the exact definition depending on the country concerned.

Three types of academy exist: pre-collegiate-level institutions awarding academic qualifications, university-level institutions awarding bachelor's-degree-level qualifications, and those preparing officer cadets for commissioning into the armed services of the state.

A naval academy is either a type of military academy (in the broad sense of that term) or is distinguished from one (in the narrow sense). In U.S. usage, the Military, Merchant Marine, Naval, Coast Guard, and the Air Force Academy serve as military academies under the categorization of service academies in that country.

The first military academies were established in the 18th century to provide future officers for technically specialized corps, such as military engineers and artillery, with scientific training.

The Italian Military Academy was inaugurated in Turin on January 1, 1678, as the Savoy Royal Academy, making it the oldest military academy in existence. The Royal Danish Naval Academy was set up in 1701. The Royal Military Academy, Woolwich was set up in 1741, after a false start in 1720 because of a lack of funds, as the earliest military academy in Britain. Its original purpose was to train cadets entering the Royal Artillery and Royal Engineers. In France, the École Royale du Génie at Mézières was founded in 1748, followed by a non-technical academy in 1751, the École Royale Militaire offering a general military education to the nobility. French military academies were widely copied in Prussia, Austria, Russia. The Norwegian Military Academy in Oslo, educates officers of the Norwegian Army. The academy was established in 1750, and is the oldest institution for higher education in Norway.

By the turn of the century, under the impetus of the Napoleonic Wars and the strain that the armies of Europe subsequently came under, military academies for the training of commissioned officers of the army were set up in most of the combatant nations. These military schools had two functions: to provide instruction for serving officers in the functions of the efficient staff-officer, and to school youngsters before they gained an officer's commission. The Kriegsakademie in Prussia was founded in 1801 and the École spéciale militaire de Saint-Cyr was created by order of Napoleon Bonaparte in 1802 as a replacement for the École Royale Militaire of the Ancien Régime (the institution that Napoleon himself had graduated from).

The Royal Military College, Sandhurst, in England was the brainchild of John Le Marchant in 1801, who established schools for the military instruction of officers at High Wycombe and Great Marlow, with a grant of £30,000 from Parliament. The two original departments were later combined and moved to Sandhurst.

In the United States, the United States Military Academy (USMA) in West Point, New York was founded on March 16, 1802, and is one of five service academies in the nation.