Why colleges should permit military educations

The wrong-headedness of the extreme Left irritates me to no end. For some twisted reason, they equate militarism with military education and seek to push the teaching of military history out of the colleges they attend. They also seek to remove ROTC programs and disparage any person that might consider the military as a career.

Ignorant.

I served 6 years in the military with mixed feelings. I knew then that there is a need for soldiers, sailors, and airmen to defend the USA and protect its interests. The world is full of bad guys who want what you have and are willing to take it from you. The US military prevents that from happening. This is its purpose. On the other hand, I was never a nationalist. I believed in the USA and its ideals, but I did not believe its leaders were infallible and deserving of worship (as the nationalists do).

Today, the Reserve Officer Training Corps curricula is being removed from campuses. One can no longer study war anymore the way it once was studied.  Johns Hopkins and Harvard are two schools that have reduced or eliminated topics related to military history.

Harvard has noted the problem:    

“Since the social uprisings of the late sixties, Harvard has distanced itself from the military. The Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) was banished from Harvard in 1969, the same year as the student takeover of University Hall to protest the Vietnam War. With it went the close ties between Harvard and the military that defined the institution during World War II and even into the Kennedy administration. While bringing ROTC back to campus should not be conflated with studying war, both stem from the Faculty of Arts and Sciences’ continuing apathy toward a more comprehensive study of national security.”

Colleges and universities are places of study to prepare for the world we inhabit and they should not reflect a  world of Utopian dreams when war is no more. They should prepare our students and our country for the necessity of making war.

Take a few moments and check to see if the college that you graduated from still has military history and ROTC programs. Let me know in the comments.