Elder Robert S. Wood reflects on service at U.S. Naval War College

Editor’s note: This is the second of two articles that deal with Latter-day Saints serving at Naval Station Newport and the U.S Naval War College in Rhode Island.

MIDDLETOWN, Rhode Island — Less than a decade before he was called as a General Authority Seventy, Elder Robert S. Wood was a professor on the U.S. Naval War College when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991.

As a specialist in areas of foreign and national security policy, he met commonly with delegations from other countries to debate various foreign policy subjects.

One night after going for a walk, Elder Wood bumped into the pinnacle of the Russian delegation, who invited him to sit down down and visit. As they talked, the person asked Elder Wood if he had ever heard of an American prophet by the name of Joseph Smith?

Elder Wood confirmed that he had. “Why do you ask?”

The man said his wife met two young representatives of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints while visiting Finland and was given a duplicate of the book, “A Marvelous Work and a Wonder,” by the late Elder LeGrand Richards, who served within the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. His wife read the book as she traveled back to Moscow.

Elder Wood said he had one other book for the person to read.

“I retrieved a duplicate of the Book of Mormon in Russian and presented it to him,” said Elder Wood, whose daughter had placed a box of Russian copies in his automobile trunk. “He ended up in New Zealand where he, his wife and youngsters joined the Church.”

Seated comfortably in his home on Feb. 2, the 87-year-old emeritus General Authority Seventy shared that private experience and others with the Church News as he reflected on his profession on the U.S. Naval War College and repair with Church Military Relations.

Meet Elder Robert S. Wood

Born on Christmas Day 1936 and raised in Idaho Falls, Elder Wood served within the Church’s French Mission from 1957-1959.

He graduated with a bachelor’s degree from Stanford University and earned his master’s degree and doctorate in political science from Harvard University.

While at Stanford, he met Dixie Lee Jones, whom he married on March 27, 1961, within the Idaho Falls Idaho Temple. The couple has 4 children.

Early in his profession, Elder Wood was a teaching fellow at Harvard University; an assistant professor at Bentley College; a professor within the Woodrow Wilson Department of Government and Foreign Affairs on the University of Virginia; and a Fulbright visiting professor of Political Economy and European Community Law, University of Tilburg and the University of Groningen in The Netherlands.

More than 20 years of Elder Wood’s profession were spent on the U.S. Naval War College:

• 1977-79 — Visiting professor of strategy. 
• 1980-83 — Chairman, Department of Strategy and Policy. 
• 1983-1999 — Dean, Center for Naval Warfare Studies.
• 1983-85, 1988 — Director, Strategic Studies Group, Chief of Naval Operations.
• 1984-99 — Chester W. Nimitz Chair of National Security and Foreign Affairs.

Elder Wood became widely known for his work within the areas of foreign and national security policy, military strategy, international politics and international law and organization, commonly advising the White House, U.S. Congress and the Department of Defense.

“It’s actually mystifying why I got to be first the chairman of the strategy department on the War College, after which the dean of the Naval Center for Naval Warfare Studies, given my military record, which is pretty sparse,” Elder Wood said.

Elder Wood, who represented the United States in meetings with Soviet and British officials through the Cold War, was sustained as a General Authority Seventy within the April 1999 general conference and served until 2009, when he was granted emeritus status. During those years, he served as president of the Church’s Utah North and Brazil North Areas.

Elder Wood served as an Area Seventy, regional representative, stake president, bishop, high councilor and president of the Boston Massachusetts Temple. He also represented the Church in lots of interfaith organizations and events, including the Council on Foreign Relations Religious Advisory Committee, and served as a member of the Church’s Military Relations Advisory Committee from 2001-2022.

Invitation to U.S. Naval War College

Elder Wood was a professor on the University of Virginia within the Nineteen Seventies when he was first invited to provide a lecture on the U.S. Naval War College at Naval Station Newport, Rhode Island.

Following the lecture, he was asked to increase his stay one other day to take part in a seminar on the subject of the Vietnam War, which was still underway.

In the seminar, Elder Wood asked the scholars which branches of military service they represented and learned that each one were present — Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines — in addition to the State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency.

Instead of going ahead as planned, Elder Wood went across the room and invited the scholars to share their personal experiences.

“It can be presumptuous for me to check with you about Vietnam. I don’t need to hear about the war — I would like to listen to about your war,” he said. “It was one of the vital moving experiences I actually have ever had. I used to be almost in tears by the point they finished.”

After he returned to Virginia, Elder Wood received a call from Rear Admiral Edward F. Welch Jr., then president of the Naval War College. He told Elder Wood, “You were quite successful up here. Would you think about spending a yr as a visiting professor?”

Elder Wood thought that sounded “fun,” but he had already spent a yr teaching within the Netherlands and didn’t think the University of Virginia would grant him one other yr.

Not only did the university allow it, but Elder Wood spent two years as a visiting professor on the Naval War College, then one back at Virginia before he was invited to permanently join the Naval War College faculty, which he described as a “class environment” with a “distinguished faculty.”

“I do know not only the war colleges on this country but throughout the world, and the Naval War College is basically No. 1,” he said. “It has really change into a significant beacon of research.”

Congratulated for not cursing

Elder Wood was a “good influence” on the Naval War College, said his wife, Sister Dixie Wood.

He was sitting in his office at some point when a Marine officer entered and said, “I understand you that you just don’t cuss.”

“He went on and talked concerning the incontrovertible fact that I didn’t cuss, and in the method, he was cussing every other word,” Elder Wood said. “He was really cussing up a storm, nevertheless it was funny as he was congratulating me for not ‘blankety-blank’ cussing.”

‘You individuals are Christians’

Elder Wood was periodically invited by Rabbi Arnold Resnicoff, then head of the Naval Chaplaincy School, to assist teach to the chaplains concerning the Latter-day Saints.

In the method, Elder Wood began to note one chaplain who all the time stood in the back of the room and glared at him along with his arms folded across his chest. “That’s never a great sign,” Elder Wood thought.

Finally, at some point the unfriendly chaplain approached him and thrust his finger into his chest. “You people aren’t Christians,” the person said, referring to Church members.

Elder Wood responded by handing the chaplain a duplicate of the Book of Mormon.

“You go and browse the Book of Mormon after which come back and tell me we aren’t Christians,” he said.

The chaplain left mumbling and grumbling, and Elder Wood didn’t expect to listen to from him again. But he did.

Close to a yr later, the chaplain called and said, “Dr. Wood, I read the Book of Mormon. You individuals are Christians.”

Called to Church leadership

In January 1999, Elder Wood was about to go away home for a gathering when the phone rang. He almost ignored it, then picked up. The voice on the opposite line was President Gordon B. Hinckley.

“That’s once I was called as a General Authority,” he said.

A short while later, Elder Wood met with the Naval War College President Vice Admiral Arthur K. Cebrowski to tell him he was leaving to just accept a recent Church project.

The vice admiral jumped from his chair, removed a sword from the wall, waved it over Elder Wood’s head and said, “You are going to do what?”

Elder Wood was momentarily startled, then Cebrowski, a devout Catholic who attended Mass every day, relaxed and laughed.

“He told me I wouldn’t have respected you had you not, in reality, done exactly what you probably did,” Elder Wood said.

Church Military Relations Advisory Committee

Elder Wood was grateful to serve for twenty years on the Church’s Military Advisory Committee, whose members he described as “first rate.”

One of the committee’s duties is to advise the First Presidency on military matters. Elder Wood said the First Presidency was all the time “responsive” to every request, similar to patiently working with the military to permit Latter-day Saint servicemen to wear temple garments.

“I have to say I actually have been really impressed with the leadership of this Church,” he said.

Deep appreciation for America

Elder Wood concluded by bearing his testimony of the gospel and expressed his deep love and appreciation for America.

“I actually have all the time been a flag-waving patriot,” he said, noting that at any time when people of other countries are forced to go away their homes for whatever reason, they all the time seek to come back to the United States where there may be hope and opportunity.

“There’s no place on the planet quite just like the United States, which has led me to the conviction that it’s the one place where the Restoration could have taken place, flourished and indeed established itself.”