Columbia ROTC Coverage 2000-2004

2001:

9 October 2001 National Review column "Hypocritical Diversity: Bring back the ROTC" by By Michael Knox Beran
Autumn 2001 Columbia Political Review article "Revisiting the ROTC: Is It Time to Bring the Reserve Officers' Training Corps Back to Columbia?" by Matt Continetti.
15 November 2001 Boundless column "Oh, Say Can't You See" by Sean McMeekin..
26 November 2001 New York Times article "On Campuses, Seeing the Military With New Eyes; After Sept. 11 Attack, Students Reconsider Old Perceptions". Note: "At Columbia University, where students have for decades shared a liberal disdain for all things military, some students say they have had a change of heart. A small group has even formed a new, pro-military organization", Students United for Victory, founded by Eric Chen, Lovinsky Joseph and Jennifer Thorpe

2002:

30 January 2002 SheThinks.org column "ROTC Renaissance" by Matt Continetti. Comment: The efforts of Advocates for Harvard ROTC mentioned in this column began far before September 11th; the group has been active since 1988.
29 March 2002 Columbia Spectator column "A Time to Serve" by Eric Chen '04.
12 April 2002 Columbia Spectator column "ROTC Belongs at Columbia" by Eric Chen '04.
26 April 2002 New York Sun article "Patriotism is Columbia's Latest Cause Celebre".
28 April 2002 Forum: Should ROTC Return to Columbia? Comment: This was the initial meeting with groups supporting ROTC at Columbia. The handout is here.
10 July 2002 Columbia Spectator cartoon "Help End Anti-Military Discrimination at Columbia" by Eric Chen GS 06.
17 September 2002 Columbia Spectator column "Changing Times at Columbia" by Eric Chen. See letter and comment of 26 September.
20 September 2002 Wall Street Journal OpinionJournal item "Ivy League Sanity" in "Best of the Web Today" by James Taranto. Comment: Taranto hails Harvard President Lawrence Summers and Columbia undergraduate Eric Chen as examples of clear thinking in the Ivy League. Chen describes advances in ROTC at Columbia.
26 September 2002 Columbia Spectator letter "Columnist Failed to Grasp Consequences of ROTC Program" by Quincy Lehr. Comment: This letter was in response to Eric Chen's column of 17 September, says that the Air Force was among those with "official tables at the Sept. 20 career fair". If this is true it seems that formal military recruiting is allowed at Columbia.
30 September 2002 Columbia Spectator letter "Columbians in Military Would Ensure Greater Ethics in War".
1 October 2002 Columbia Spectator letter "University Should Regard ROTC as Essential to Campus" by Megan Romigh, BC '03.
10 October 2002 statement from Columbia University President Lee C. Bollinger announcing that military recruiters will be allowed at Columbia Law School.
16 October 2002 New York Times article "Military Recruiters Are Allowed".
22 October 2002 "Why is ROTC right for Columbia?" by Eric Chen.
23 October 2002 Wall Street Journal "'That Others May Live': A visit to the Air Force training base--a place that causes great pain to some academics" by Dorothy Rabinowitz.

2003:

11 January 2003 Kalamazoo Gazette article "Threat of war aids revival of ROTC". Comment: ROTC cadets in uniform sometimes report awkward moments on campus. One recounts "People come up and give you hugs".
29 January 2003 Columbia Spectator column "Rangel's Wake-Up Call" by Eric Chen. Comment: Representative Charles B. Rangel called for a return of the military draft because a "disproportionate number of the poor and members of minority groups make up the enlisted ranks of the military, while the most privileged Americans are underrepresented or absent." It turns out he was wrong about the racial mix of the military but he may be correct about the mix of economic backgrounds. Chen points out that the best way to rectify this imbalance of economic backgrounds is to restore ROTC at elite universities.
3 February 2003 Columbia Spectator Op-Ed "ROTC and Opportunity" by Jennifer Thorpe.
3 February 2003 Columbia Spectator article "Senate Reaches Solution For Censorship Concerns". Note: This article also discusses ROTC: "[Columbia President] Bollinger was also asked for his opinion on bringing ROTC back to Columbia, more than 30 years after it was banned from campus during the Vietnam War. Bollinger said he did not have a strong opinion in either direction and would welcome a discussion of the issue."
3 February 2003 Columbia Spectator article "ROTC Return Proposals Provoke Activist Criticism". Note: "At University Senate meeting on Friday, Bollinger made clear that any reinstatement of ROTC will have to begin at the student level, not the administrative level."I think this is something that if there are a significant number of people in the community who want to make this an issue, we should take it up," Bollinger said. "I don't think this is something that should come from the top.""
5 February 2003 Columbia spectator letter "'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' Shows Military Still Needs Reform" by Ross McSweeney, CC '02.
13 February 2003 Columbia Spectator column "The Myth of Anti-Military Bias" by Merlin Chowkwanyun. Comment: Chowkwanyun argues that the military, more than Congress, is responsible for the 1993 Federal Law mandating the "Don't ask, don't tell" policy for the military.
14 February 2003 Columbia Spectator letters "Articles Fail to Accurately Cover Campus ROTC Debate" by Shane Hachey, GS '04 and "CU Should Support Student Participation in the Military" by Jeff Sult, TC '03.
20 February 2003 Columbia Spectator column "The Truth About ROTC" by Sean Wilkes.
24 February 2003 Columbia Spectator letter "Spectator Needs to Maintain Higher Journalistic Standards" by Eric Gutman, SEAS '03.
27 February 2003 Columbia Spectator column "Collateral Damage" by Yoni Appelbaum.
28 February 2003 Columbia Spectator letter "ROTC Curriculum Does Not Match Ivy League Standards" by Merlin Chowkwanyun, CC '05.
3 March 2003 Columbia Spectator letter "Opinion Article's ROTC Arguments Fail To Convince" by Michael Noble, CC '05.
6 March 2003 FrontPage Magazine article "The Pro-America Campus Movement".
1 April 2003 Columbia Spectator article "Panel Speakers Link ROTC to War With Iraq". Comment: One student argued for not having ROTC cadets on campus because, she said, members of the armed forces are trained to "evaporate dissent". Another "condemned the entire U.S. military as racist, lamenting what she called disproportionate numbers of low-income people of color serving in the military's rank-and-file". The ROTC program that serves Columbia graduated an ROTC cadet named Colin Powell, who faced no glass ceiling in his advancement in the military and beyond.
2 April 2003 New York Times article "For a Future Soldier, Life on a Liberal Campus Can Be a Battle".
3 April 2003 Columbia Spectator column "Military Intelligence" by Brian Wagner. Comment: Wagner dissects the anti-ROTC arguments made at a Columbia College forum.
5 April 2003 New York Times article "Professors Protest as Students Debate". Comment: The article mentions the effort to restore ROTC at Columbia and the response to ROTC at Princeton. "When Gary J. Bass, an assistant professor of politics at Princeton, asked his class on "Causes of War" how many students were in R.O.T.C., two raised their hands. The rest applauded."
8 April 2003 Columbia Spectator column "Don't Question or Doubt the ROTC" by James Pulizzi. Note: See response letter on 10 April.
8 April 2003 Columbia Spectator letter "ROTC at Ivy League Will Improve Diversity of Military" by Sean Wilkes CC '06.
10 April 2003 Columbia Spectator letter "ROTC Program Would be Valuable to Columbia Community" by Eric Chen. Note: This is a response to the 8 April Pulizzi column.
17 April 2003 Columbia Spectator article "High Turnout Decides CC Student Council Election". Comment: Towards the end of the article is results from "a referendum asking if the University should prohibit the ROTC from having a chapter at Columbia". By a vote of 973 to 530, students favored allowing ROTC. The students do not have an official say in the decision.
21 April 2003 Wall Street Journal Best of the Web Today "Harvard Hangups" by James Taranto. Comment: Taranto notes the 973 to 530 student vote for ROTC at Columbia and observes how times have changed.
9 May 2003 FrontPage Magazine column "Graduation Present: It's Not 1968 at Columbia Anymore" by Ron Lewenberg.
20 November 2003 Defense Business Practice Implementation Board meeting minutes. Note: The participants in the Defense Business Board meeting discussed "implementing ROTC programs at top tier schools". Dov Zakheim mentioned the effort to restore ROTC at Columbia and said "I spoke to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and he is extremely interested ... We would like to get on the campus at Harvard. The President of Harvard has showed an interest in this." Bill Carr raised the possibility of restoring ROTC at Yale, citing the difficulty of Yale students traveling to ROTC programs at other colleges. He also discussed the tradeoff between getting top tier cadets and paying the high cost of ROTC scholarships to top tier schools. The group recommended to "approach Harvard's President first and if successful, then approach Yale, Columbia and Brown".

2004:

21 January 2004 Advocates for Columbia ROTC press release "Columbia University and ROTC". Note: Columbia now offers information about ROTC on its Web site and will list ROTC courses on student transcripts.
27 January 2004 Columbia Spectator article "ROTC Marches Back to Columbia: New Web Site, Registration Credit Give ROTC Supporters Hope for Program at CU".
2 February 2004 Columbia University "Grants and Scholarships from Sources Other than Columbia". Note: Columbia adds information about financial support from ROTC to its financial aid Web site.
3 February 2004 Columbia Spectator article "ROTC Return Proposals Provoke Activist Criticism". Note: President Bollinger "made clear that any reinstatement of ROTC will have to begin at the student level, not the administrative level."
3 February 2004 Columbia Spectator editorial "Bring Back ROTC". Note: Columbia's student newspaper calls for the return of ROTC based on the importance of integrating the military with society and ensuring a diversity of views on campus.
5 February 2004 Columbia Spectator letter "Bringing ROTC to Columbia Will Not Reform the Armed Services" by Michael Castleman, SEAS '03.
6 February 2004 Columbia Spectator letter "ROTC Trains Its Members to Be Leaders of Society, Not Just Killers" by James Bondarchuk, CC '05.
14 February 2004 Columbia Spectator letter "Articles Fail to Accurately Cover Campus ROTC Debate" by Shane Hachey, GS '04.
14 February 2004 Columbia Spectator letter "CU Should Support Student Participation in the Military" by Jeff Sult, TC '03.
17 February 2004 Letter to Columbia Provost Alan Brinkley "Restoration of ROTC" from Admiral B. James Lowe CC'51. Note: Admiral Lowe mentions a commitment from Provost Brinkley "to form a committee from the faculty senate to review the advantages and disadvantages that would be derived from restoration of the ROTC to Columbia".
21 March 2004 "Brief: Proposal to Return ROTC to Columbia’s Campus" by Advocates for Columbia ROTC and Students United for America. Note: The document is also on the Web site of the Columbia University Senate.
26 March 2004 Columbia University Senate minutes "Proposal to bring ROTC back to Columbia".
29 March 2004 Columbia Spectator article "Senate Passes ROTC Task Force". Note: Columbia is setting up a committee to look into the restoration of ROTC.
1 April 2004 Columbia Spectator article "Possible Return of ROTC to Campus Sparks Controversy". Note: "I think everybody involved with the proposal is perfectly aware that the law governing participation in the military has to change, and we will be part of that change if we can," said professor of finance and economics Michael Adler, one of the proposal's faculty supporters.
8 April 2004 Columbia Spectator letter "Racism and Homophobia in ROTC Violate Columbia's Standards of Tolerance" by Joya Banerjee, BC '04.
9 April 2004 Columbia Spectator article "Congress Pressures Colleges to Accept Military Recruiters".
14 April 2004 Columbia Spectator article "The Professor Who Abolished ROTC From Columbia". Note: Prof. Lewis Cole says he opposes university credit for courses about the practice of war, but supports credit for courses about military theory.
20 April 2004 Columbia Spectator letter "Not All ROTC Courses Would Be for Credit If the Program Returned" by Sean L. Wilkes, CC '06. Note: The writer, chairman of Advocates for Columbia ROTC, calls a recent interview with Prof. Lewis Cole opposing credit for military practice courses but favoring credit for military theory courses "a very constructive suggestion" and notes that similar criteria are used in giving course credit for music-related activities. Wilkes says Prof. Cole's suggestions give him "optimism that we can put together a broad consensus on the issue of credit for ROTC courses at Columbia". The proposal referred to in Wilkes' letter is here.
30 April 2004 Columbia University Senate minutes "Proposal to return ROTC to the Columbia campus".
5 May 2004 Columbia Spectator article "Bollinger Speaks Publicly On Strike for First Time". Note: At the end of this article is an account of brief discussion of ROTC at the Columbia University Senate meeting.
October 2004 United States Military Academy at West Point announcement "BS&L Partners with Columbia University". Note: "Starting in the summer of 2005, from 18 to 25 US Army captains per year will enroll in Columbia University and earn a Masters of Arts in Organizational Psychology". More details about the program here.
3 December 2004 Columbia Spectator editorial "CU and the military: Columbia should allow recruiters on campus". Note: The editors said "military recruiters, like the Reserve Officer Training Corps, have a place at Columbia—and more importantly, Columbians have a place in the military".
16 December 2004 Wall Street Journal article "At Ivy League Schools, ROTC, Long Banned, Plots a Comeback: Push May Stir Up Old Passions On These Elite Campuses; A Beachhead at Harvard". Note: The article discusses the movements to bring back ROTC to Harvard, Columbia, Yale and Brown, backed by the efforts of the Defense Business Board and a request from the military.
16 December 2004 Thomas P. M. Barnett Weblog "On the question of who serves, I say let 'em all in!" Note: Barnett suggests that Congress change the laws so gays can serve in some roles in the armed forces, and cites a letter he received from Cadet Sean Wilkes, Chairman of Advocates for Columbia ROTC.

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