Analyses of biographical data on the 851 lecturers at three senior service (war) colleges in 1964-65 and the topics of their lectures provide the basis for a discussion of how these institutions perform the function of educating higher military officers for policy roles. The colleges studied were: the National War College, the Industrial College of the Armed Forces, and the Air War College. The lecturers split into three groups, roughly equal in size: military, civilian government, and university. Analysis of their positions, academic affiliations, and a check on whether or not they figured in such biographical sources as "Who's Who in America" showed that prominence of position and, in the case of academic institutions, prestige of affiliation, were major criteria in their selection. Both in lectures and reading lists, descriptive materials, often of a journalistic type, were found to dominate over theoretical discussions or those based on the results of empirical research. These and other findings suggest that the primary function of the colleges is socialization into foreign and military policy elites. (author)