Marines Plan New Evaluation for Colonels

PHOTO CAPTION: U.S. Marine Corps Col. James D. Fleming participates in a wargame during Integrated Training Exercise 3-25 at Twentynine Palms, California, June 7, 2025. The Marine Corps is developing a new warfighter evaluation that will test colonels seeking promotion to brigadier general through simulated command and planning scenarios. U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Cpl. Edward Spears.

The Marine Corps is developing a new warfighter evaluation that will put colonels seeking promotion to brigadier general into a simulated fight against a peer threat and judge how they plan, make decisions and communicate orders.
The Joint Warfighter Evaluation will become part of the screening process for Marine colonels eligible for promotion to their first general officer rank.
Unlike a physical fitness test, the evaluation is designed to measure command judgment and warfighting ability.
During the assessment, an officer will assume the role of a senior Marine commander conducting an all-domain operation in support of a joint task force facing a peer adversary.
The officer will be required to respond to planning and execution problems, make command decisions and produce written products explaining those decisions.
Those submissions will then be reviewed by a hand-selected panel of experienced subject-matter experts from across Marine Corps University.
The panel will be chaired by either a brigadier general or major general.
The Marine Corps says the evaluation is intended to measure an officer’s ability to develop and communicate plans, think critically and apply warfighting skills in a complex operational environment.
Eligible colonels will complete the evaluation through the Marine Corps e-Learning Ecosystem from their assigned duty stations.
The Corps expects to implement the new evaluation no later than February 2027.
Lt. Gen. Thomas Savage, commanding general of Training and Education Command, said the evaluation will give promotion officials another objective data point to consider alongside an officer’s existing performance record.
Brig. Gen. Matthew Tracy, commanding general of Education Command and president of Marine Corps University, said the scenario is being designed to challenge officers in a complex and realistic environment reflecting the changing battlefield.
The Marine Corps evaluation is part of a broader Pentagon effort to change how officers are assessed before promotion to one-star rank.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced the Joint Warfighter Evaluation initiative in September for Army, Air Force and Marine Corps colonels and Navy captains competing for promotion to O-7.
Traditional promotion boards have relied heavily on an officer’s performance reports, command history, education and assignments.
The new evaluations are intended to add something those records cannot directly show: how an officer responds when presented with a military problem and required to make decisions under pressure.
The Pentagon has not yet established exactly how heavily Joint Warfighter Evaluation results will count in final promotion decisions.
Existing performance reports are expected to remain a major part of the process.
That means the Marine evaluation is not simply a pass-or-fail exam that automatically determines who becomes a general.
Instead, the results will provide promotion officials with another measure of an officer’s readiness for senior command.
The first Pentagon-wide evaluation cycle is expected in 2027 before promotion boards begin considering candidates for one-star ranks.
For Marine colonels in that group, reaching the next rank will now include demonstrating how they would actually plan and command in a simulated fight.