A Personal Perspective on The Impact of Shrinking & Unbalanced ROTC

LTC Thomas Tennant — Wed, 17 Aug 2016 11:30:15 -0400

I remember reading this article (https://www.rallypoint.com/shared-links/no-more-urban-officers-how-an-uneven-rotc-may-change-our-military) in 2012, but I think it is even more relevant now. New England colleges, and in universities in the Northeast Corridor in general, have become even more liberal. Because of this, student participation in programs like ROTC has become harder (if not prohibitive) on multiple levels starting with finding a local Army ROTC detachment.

The main reason the article resonated with me is because, since the 1970's, I have witnessed the retreat of the ROTC from our college and university campuses. It is effectively fading away into irrelevancy. We, as a ROTC Program in particular but also has a military community, have ceded the academic battlefield to liberal progressives one campus at a time. Like our current ineffective GWOT and efforts against ISIS, we are losing the battle for the hearts and minds of future leaders because of an apparent lack of strategy and leadership rooted in the lack of political will.

This is not a "marketing issue", as some have postulated. Lack of good marketing is frankly an oversimplification and belies the historical failure to push the land-grant colleges to live up to their land-grant statuses. The benefits extend beyond the initial land-grants and into current federal government funding and support. I believe most student loans and grants are also tied to the land-grant provisions as well. So despite portions of the student body in any given institution who will always create the constant tensions associated with a New England liberal education environment, marketing is just part of the solution. Without a conscious leadership decision to aggressively apply that pressure needed on the universities and their administrations, as well as address the marketing and social issues, the ROTC program will continue to dwindle in the Northeast and other liberal academic institutions of learning.

Personally, I have watched the ROTC program cede the battlefield since the 1970’s. It coincided with the end of the draft and the advent of the "All Volunteer Army," which were both driven by political necessity at that time. I watched first-hand at the University of Vermont (UVM) where a campus administration allowed the Anti-War protesters - lead by John Kerry's "Vietnam Veterans Against the War" - take over the "old field house" where ROTC was located. They even tried to break into our arms’ vault - which was, and still is, a federal crime. In the end, ROTC was moved several times throughout the years until it was removed completely off the main campus. Each move was a compromise with the ever-increasing demands of liberal student activists. They were mostly egged on by their open socialist or communist political science professors. So much for diversity and academic freedom at UVM; it died in the early 1970's with the campus sit-ins and repetitive occupations of the ROTC department offices & classrooms.

Instead of holding the UVM administration accountable and making them live up to the original land-grant charter, the ROTC program caved every step of the way. The current off-campus location was the result of a compromise so that the interested UVM students could still attend and receive credit for their ROTC courses. The activists at the time wanted ROTC relegated to an "extracurricular" activity vs being an academic course of study for graduation credits. Now that the ROTC footprint is gone from the UVM campus, I fully expect the academic credits will be gone as well. This same onslaught was happening throughout the northeast at similar liberal land-grant colleges. But this is not the half of it! Today even more cadets have to spend a lot of time and money to travel to ROTC training and, unlike the USMC commissioning program, they have no other options. (Note: USMC "cadets" train extensively during the summers and various academic breaks throughout the year.)

In the case of UVM, its science and technology departments received heavy defense research grants and support. Like myself, a good percentage of students receive “student defense" loans and grants to this day. At every step of the way, the DOD could have easily pulled these grants until the program was fully reinstated. But when I was at UVM, during the Nixon-Ford-Carter period of American history, the political will to make those moves was not really there. Today, the excuse given is, “We are deep in the GWOT,” and the DOD is staying mum on the issue.

Now, after almost 38 years of commissioned service, I am seeing some potential and inherent dangers in this stratification within each ROTC class. We are breeding our future Army & Reserve leaders from increasingly less diverse academic populations. Inner-city northeastern urban colleges are more and more underrepresented with each passing ROTC class, and I personally think it could weaken the officer corps coming out of ROTC programs. At the same time, those institutions of higher education and champions of diversity are cutting out a vital segment of intellectual thoughts and perspectives. The intrinsic value of ROTC represents a more conservative approach to leadership and character building than currently offered on most campuses. It is, and was, an existential threat to the progressive liberal thought and leftist teachings.

Having listened to a senior graduate student - you may know him better as democratic presidential candidate and Senator Bernie Sanders - expound upon this topic in one of my advanced political science classes, I know this to be true. The bottom line for me is that the current state of the ROTC is a lose-lose deal, and this needs to be an issue that senior leadership takes up.

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Response by CSM William DeWolf made Aug 17 at 2016 12:07 PM

CSM William DeWolf — Wed, 17 Aug 2016 12:07:45 -0400

Awesome reflection on the current state of ROTC. I'm located in New England and would agree with these thoughts.

Response by CW3 Private RallyPoint Member made Aug 17 at 2016 12:19 PM

CW3 Private RallyPoint Member — Wed, 17 Aug 2016 12:19:17 -0400

I remember OCS had also decreased its acquisitions as well (my info may be dated). Could this also coincide with a ideal change of what the proper Army Officer development model is?

Response by CPT Tom Monahan made Aug 17 at 2016 12:31 PM

CPT Tom Monahan — Wed, 17 Aug 2016 12:31:50 -0400

ROTC is a State concern as much as a Federal one. Governors need to talk with public university presidents, and possibly private ones, about the needs of the Militia/National Guard. This may turn some academics' heads.

Response by SGT Philip Roncari made Aug 17 at 2016 1:57 PM

SGT Philip Roncari — Wed, 17 Aug 2016 13:57:50 -0400

The two trip wires that stand out in this post were the very weak if nonexistent ROTC programs in the northeast as most people would admit the ultra liberal stands these institutes of higher learning show in this area is historic since the Vietnam War,as far as John Kerry goes I cannot comment due to his making me sick to my stomach I'm feeling a little queasy now so I'll end this.

Response by CPT Pedro Meza made Aug 17 at 2016 4:58 PM

CPT Pedro Meza — Wed, 17 Aug 2016 16:58:33 -0400

You are aware that the ROTC programs have been disappearing along with the budget cuts, and military reductions, more so now. It is easy to blame a selective bad guy, but reality is force reduction effects all.

Response by Capt Private RallyPoint Member made Aug 17 at 2016 5:44 PM

Capt Private RallyPoint Member — Wed, 17 Aug 2016 17:44:36 -0400

You definitely make an interesting point about colleges in New England and the northeast corridor, however, I believe this issue is something that is a case-by-case struggle with different college administrations and certainly different student bodies.
I myself am a Navy/Marine ROTC graduate and I attended ROTC first via a crosstown program at University of Minnesota - Twin Cities while attending my normal classes at the University of St. Thomas (UST). UST itself had an Air Force ROTC program on campus despite being a Division III school and they offered full room and board compensation on top of your ROTC scholarship. The student body and faculty was accepting and supportive, and I found the same to be true of even the liberal Minnesotans at "The U". We had one student cross-town enrolled at Macalester College who had red paint dumped on her truck but anti-war protestors but that was just how Macalester was. I was a walk-on and when I won my ROTC scholarship, I put in for a transfer to my home state's Big Ten school, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. There I found the students and the professors to be extremely accepting and welcoming. I honestly can't recall a single instance, even during the height of discontent with the Iraq War when I went to school between 2007-2011, where I was met with anything but respect and courtesy.
I recently attended the University of Southern California ROTC and Veterans Dinner in which General Mattis was the keynote speaker, undoubtedly due to the fact that General Petraus is a Judge Whidney Professor and championed their Veteran's MBA program. The President of USC also spoke and reiterated their support for the community and held up USC's unbroken support for ROTC on campus for the last century. So while the Northeast has some difficulties with their progressives and ROTC, there is certainly still support for the military on our nation's West Coast, in the Midwest, and undoubtedly the South. Interested candidates will still seek out schools which will support their career decisions, but I find more often than not that people don't even know about that career possibility. I'd say that there is a marketing aspect to the problem, though for the Northeast specifically, you do have a progressive student culture problem as well.
What you're lamenting is what most conservatives have been lamenting for the past couple decades, and that's progressive takeover of our nation's universities, where the only diversity that matters is diversity of skin color and not diversity of thoughts and opinions. I don't know how much CO's are familiar with what grants are going to what universities and this hits me as something well up the chain. However, individual ROTC Battalion Commanding Officers do still need to stand up to liberal administrations and use their command resources to ensure their battalion's continued presence on campus. Given the anti-war students aren't the only other players in town. ROTC students and cadre can leverage the Greeks, College Republicans, on-campus veterans groups, as well as the local area Republican party officials and representatives, even some College Democrats as not all liberals are completely off the reservation. Some people would jump to take their side, but they have never been asked.

Response by SPC Private RallyPoint Member made Aug 18 at 2016 4:45 AM

SPC Private RallyPoint Member — Thu, 18 Aug 2016 04:45:25 -0400

We can always bring back Battlefield Commissions and Brevets, just saying.

Response by SPC Erich Guenther made Aug 31 at 2016 7:56 AM

SPC Erich Guenther — Wed, 31 Aug 2016 07:56:07 -0400

I disagree with you in a few respects. Spent some time at USAREC HQ and among most of the Recruiters in the field they subscribe to this same red vs blue state analysis when it comes to military Recruiting. They point to military recruiting stats which I won't get into except to say the USAREC recruiting regions are not cleanly split between North and South or Red vs Blue so the analysis doesn't get very far. The "Liberal" states are still contributing about the same recruits as the "Conservative" states even though I would agree that specific states and cities are challenging.

However, the Active Army is slowly pulling out via it's own budget tightening of communities and community support. I think that IS marketing and I am at a loss to explain why the Army is doing this. For example when I was in the National Guard in 1982, very common for us to host the Boy Scouts while they earned their marksmanship badges on our firing range under our supervision more or less. Does the National Guard do that anymore? Then there was the Army Civilian Marksmanship program which was a LOT more expansive back then. You really have to hunt to find a local Army sponsored match these days. Army was into NASCAR pretty heavily as well...........Well, thanks to Congress they are pulling back there as well. Army Recruiting events in the 1970's and early 1980's were pretty kick azz, I remember them landing a squadron of Huey's on the High School grounds right next to my house in Wisconsin back when I was a kid that made a huge impression. Does that happen now? Anywhere? If you went to the State Fair, there was the Army and Marine bands playing along with a recruiting stand. Now I have to say that still happens at the Texas State Fair but where else in the country does it happen? Local City and Town Fairs..........Army National Guard Recruiting display. At Air shows, Air National Guard Recruiting Booth. Hard to find those today as air shows have declined. So in my view the influence them when they are young approach has all but disappeared. Instead the Army shows up once or twice in a local high school and Parents view them as opportunists or used car salesmen. The reason for that is because they look that way as the Army has retrenched or retreated from almost all of it's community outreach programs from the Boy Scouts to NASCAR to Air Shows to State Fairs. What about the former big ticket recruiting events with the real helo's.....not much money for that anymore. High School JROTC........some places it's there but others it is not.