Three Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) students recently returned from six months studying systems engineering at the National University of Singapore (NUS) through a strategic partnership between NPS and NUS’ Temasek Defence Systems Institute (TDSI).
In a ceremony held July 11 at TDSI, U.S. Navy Lt. Cmdr. Alex Anderson and two U.S. Marine Corps officers, Capt. Susan Figlioli and Capt. Jordan Figlioli, were recognized for earning their Master of Defence Technology and Systems (MDTS) degrees through the unique exchange program that enables qualified NPS students to earn degrees from both institutions.
“Singapore is a critical Indo-Pacific partner,” noted retired U.S. Army Col. Danial Pick, NPS Director of International Programs. “The decades-old educational relationship between NPS and TDSI is an important manifestation of our partnership. Hundreds of U.S. and Singaporean graduates of our unique dual degree program are serving in important national security positions in both countries.”
For example, U.S. Navy Capt. Andy Berner, Commander of the Office of Naval Research (ONR) Global, and Col. Ong Cher Howe of the Singaporean Ministry of Defence are both graduates of the NPS-TDSI program.
An island city-state of 6.2 million people, Singapore sits astride the meeting point of the Malacca Strait, one of the busiest shipping routes in the world, and the South China Sea, a locus of international contention with the People’s Republic of China.
With a well-developed infrastructure and high political stability, Singapore is one of Asia's most important hubs for trade, finance and military operations. For more than 50 years, the U.S. and Singapore have endeavored to work closely together to cultivate a free, open and secure Indo-Pacific region.
Strengthening such strategic partnerships is a central pillar of Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro’s Strategic Guidance for the Navy and Marine Corps, issued in October 2021 and updated in October 2023.
Specifically, the Navy seeks to “strengthen military-to-military relationships with existing allies, leverage specialized allied experience in regional operations, and expand and deepen our partnerships with like-minded democracies around the world,” Del Toro wrote. “We will build opportunities for Sailors, Marines, and Civilians to train, learn, and operate side-by-side with their counterparts in partner and allied forces, and operationally integrate our allies and partners into strategic concepts and warfighting concepts to deter those that challenge us.”
Since 2001, TDSI has fostered the intellectual capital that makes this relationship thrive, according to Lui Pao Chuen, Temasek Defence Professor, a 1973 NPS operations research graduate and 2002 NPS Hall of Fame inductee in large part for his leadership in establishing the NPS-NUS partnership.
“NPS has been a strategic partner of NUS to help build the capabilities of the Singaporean Armed Forces (SAF) in the defense of Singapore,” he said. “The relationship has grown over time. I look forward to greater integration of education and research of the two institutes in the coming years.”
For the MDTS degree program, students spend six months at NUS taking courses in advanced topics including cyber security, artificial intelligence and data analytics. The NPS-TDSI program gives U.S. military students a firsthand view of current defense challenges in Singapore and the broader region, complementing their technical specialization in their NPS fields of study.
Anderson, for example, earned his NPS master's degree in electrical engineering in addition to his MDTS degree. He is now on his milestone tour as a cyber planner at U.S. Indo-Pacific Command (INDOPACOM) headquarters.
“Countless invaluable academic, cultural and social experiences were taken away from my studies abroad in Singapore,” he said. “Each of the two academic quarters involved multiple seminars and field trips around Singapore which helped apply the systems engineering approach we learned about in the classroom. The professors in the TDSI program were a mix of university professors and defense contractor adjunct professors which offered an additional level of perspective to the course materials.”
“With my valuable experience from the TDSI program, I hope to be a leading player in the relationships we have with Singapore and other partner nations in the Pacific,” Anderson added.
Three NPS students are currently enrolled in the TDSI exchange program and are studying in Singapore: U.S. Navy Lt. Alex Misenheimer, Lt. Alan Hatlestad and Marine Corps Capt. James Villaneuva, all of whom will return to Monterey in the fall to complete the NPS portion of the program.
For Hatlestad, a Meteorology and Oceanography (METOC) officer studying Physical Oceanography at NPS, the TDSI program has strengthened his technical knowledge of engineering systems relevant to METOC.
“My time in the TDSI program has been enriching,” he said. “The professors typically have many years of either military or industry experience in their respective fields. I appreciated the emphasis on interdisciplinary collaboration, which I think emulates real-world military exercises.”
“Upon my return to NPS, I will carry on with my fourth quarter with a new cognitive toolkit and framework for thinking,” Hatlestad added. “Having worked together in the same classroom for several months, I have made friends with my colleagues and counterparts from Singapore and Israel, and look forward to the next year we will all spend in Monterey.”