cawacko
Well-known member
I saw this column and thought it was interesting. San Francisco public schools do not allow the ROTC on campus either. I get the principle for these schools kicking the military out but do not agree with it. What this guy writes about is the result of that.
ROTC and Our Nation's Elite
On 22 April, an ad hoc committee of Stanford University's Faculty Senate recommended that ROTC return to campus, and tomorrow the full Senate will begin debating the matter. Allowing ROTC on the Stanford campus and other Ivy League schools will help ensure that the military is representative of the society it serves. For while we are at war, less than one percent of us participate directly, and a civil-military divide is growing, particularly in places like the San Francisco Bay Area.
Few Ivy League graduates serve in the military today, although the trend is toward allowing the return of ROTC. 1,100 Stanford University students (all male) were enrolled in ROTC in 1956, while a fraction of one percent of students are now enrolled, and all these students must take their ROTC courses at other universities. Despite having the most educated, trained, resourced and technically proficient military in our history, the military officer corps is drawn almost exclusively from the middle and lower classes, while elites and their offspring are largely absent. A disproportionate number of officer recruits come from rural areas, small towns, the South and inland areas, leaving the East and West coasts underrepresented. New York City once produced 500 military officers a year but only commissioned 34 in 2006, a year in which Alabama produced 174 officers--indeed, 40 percent of Army officers come from the South.
Those who support only the most judicious use of the military should be concerned that elites are isolated from the impact of war. In 1968, 68 percent of the members of US Senate had military experience, while only 29 percent did by 2007, and their children are mostly absent (10 military offspring from the 535 members of Congress currently serve). As Kathy Roth-Douquet and Frank Schaeffer noted in their book AWOL: The Unexcused Absence of America's Upper Classes from Military Service--and How It Hurts Our Country, "When those who benefit most from living in a country contribute the least to its defense, and those who benefit least are asked to pay the ultimate price, something happens to the soul of that country."
Many of those in the Bay Area legitimately question the size and use of the military, but they also distance themselves from the national debate, ironically reducing their influence. During the Base Realignment and Closure Commission in the 1990s, most military installations in Northern California were closed or scaled back. Many here do not mourn the loss of these bases, citing the need to reduce the size of the military. This is a perfectly equitable argument, but it puts the cart before the horse. The military left the Bay Area, but the military did not go away, and certainly remains the most respected governmental institution. Rather, the elites have largely taken themselves out of the discussion on military matters, leaving the high ground to those families that serve.
Having ROTC on elite campuses impacts the perceptions of other students. As an Air Force ROTC cadet on the San Francisco State University campus in the 1980s, I was literally one-in-a-thousand in the student body. Students at this most liberal of campuses in the post-Vietnam Era got to know future military officers and came to understand the military a bit better, whether in support or in opposition. I relish the fact that San Francisco State University had both Angela Davis and ROTC at one time. The question at Stanford is about whether we have a society in which the children of elites participate in the military.
Why is now the time to take this step? Primarily because the situation that caused Ivy League schools to kick ROTC off campus: the draft, opposition to the Vietnam War, and more recently the Don't Ask, Don't Tell issue are now largely in the past. ROTC should return to Stanford not in the interest of promoting militarism, but in the interest of ensuring that the military represents us, all of us.
Paul Clarke, a retired Air Force officer, military educator, and SFSU ROTC graduate, is a senior fellow at the Truman National Security Project. The views expressed are his own.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/pclarke/detail?entry_id=87867
ROTC and Our Nation's Elite
On 22 April, an ad hoc committee of Stanford University's Faculty Senate recommended that ROTC return to campus, and tomorrow the full Senate will begin debating the matter. Allowing ROTC on the Stanford campus and other Ivy League schools will help ensure that the military is representative of the society it serves. For while we are at war, less than one percent of us participate directly, and a civil-military divide is growing, particularly in places like the San Francisco Bay Area.
Few Ivy League graduates serve in the military today, although the trend is toward allowing the return of ROTC. 1,100 Stanford University students (all male) were enrolled in ROTC in 1956, while a fraction of one percent of students are now enrolled, and all these students must take their ROTC courses at other universities. Despite having the most educated, trained, resourced and technically proficient military in our history, the military officer corps is drawn almost exclusively from the middle and lower classes, while elites and their offspring are largely absent. A disproportionate number of officer recruits come from rural areas, small towns, the South and inland areas, leaving the East and West coasts underrepresented. New York City once produced 500 military officers a year but only commissioned 34 in 2006, a year in which Alabama produced 174 officers--indeed, 40 percent of Army officers come from the South.
Those who support only the most judicious use of the military should be concerned that elites are isolated from the impact of war. In 1968, 68 percent of the members of US Senate had military experience, while only 29 percent did by 2007, and their children are mostly absent (10 military offspring from the 535 members of Congress currently serve). As Kathy Roth-Douquet and Frank Schaeffer noted in their book AWOL: The Unexcused Absence of America's Upper Classes from Military Service--and How It Hurts Our Country, "When those who benefit most from living in a country contribute the least to its defense, and those who benefit least are asked to pay the ultimate price, something happens to the soul of that country."
Many of those in the Bay Area legitimately question the size and use of the military, but they also distance themselves from the national debate, ironically reducing their influence. During the Base Realignment and Closure Commission in the 1990s, most military installations in Northern California were closed or scaled back. Many here do not mourn the loss of these bases, citing the need to reduce the size of the military. This is a perfectly equitable argument, but it puts the cart before the horse. The military left the Bay Area, but the military did not go away, and certainly remains the most respected governmental institution. Rather, the elites have largely taken themselves out of the discussion on military matters, leaving the high ground to those families that serve.
Having ROTC on elite campuses impacts the perceptions of other students. As an Air Force ROTC cadet on the San Francisco State University campus in the 1980s, I was literally one-in-a-thousand in the student body. Students at this most liberal of campuses in the post-Vietnam Era got to know future military officers and came to understand the military a bit better, whether in support or in opposition. I relish the fact that San Francisco State University had both Angela Davis and ROTC at one time. The question at Stanford is about whether we have a society in which the children of elites participate in the military.
Why is now the time to take this step? Primarily because the situation that caused Ivy League schools to kick ROTC off campus: the draft, opposition to the Vietnam War, and more recently the Don't Ask, Don't Tell issue are now largely in the past. ROTC should return to Stanford not in the interest of promoting militarism, but in the interest of ensuring that the military represents us, all of us.
Paul Clarke, a retired Air Force officer, military educator, and SFSU ROTC graduate, is a senior fellow at the Truman National Security Project. The views expressed are his own.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/pclarke/detail?entry_id=87867
