Princeton ROTC Coverage

21 May 1957 Harvard Crimson article "Princeton ROTC Revision To Cause No Changes Here: Has 'Gone too Far'". Note: Harvard considered Princeton's move to give ROTC credit for many regular courses to be too sweeping.
15 October 1971 Harvard Crimson article "ROTC May Return to Ivy Schools".
13 January 1972 Harvard Crimson article "Princeton Students Protest Return of ROTC"
20 January 1972 Army and Princeton "Agreement for Maintenance of an Army Reserve Officers' Training Corps Unit". Note: The agreement and its associated memorandum of understanding set forth a structure under which the requirements of the ROTC Vitalization Act of 1964 for faculty appointments and course listings could be met in a way acceptable to a top university at a time of anti-military sentiment.
28 September 1973 Harvard Crimson article "A Survey of ROTC's Status in the Ivies".
29 April 1989 Harvard Crimson article "Other Campuses". Note: A summary of the status of ROTC at several elite universities.
23 October 2001 Daily Princetonian article "New wave of support spurs debate of Harvard ROTC"
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."
10 April 2003 Associated Press article "ROTC, Activists Co-Exist on Campus". Comment: A report on ROTC at Princeton, mentioning Princeton Naval ROTC graduate Donald Rumsfeld.
20 December 2003 Princeton University Army ROTC "Fifth Annual Newsletter". Note: University President Shirley Tilghman "agreed to chair the ROTC commissioning ceremony for the Class of 2004". She said “Our ROTC cadets represent the most tangible evidence on campus of the University motto, In the Nation’s Service”.
18 February 2004 Daily Princetonian article "ROTC graduates face challenges overseas".
7 July 2004 Princeton Alumni Weekly article "Graduating into the Armed Forces". Note: This was the first time in at least 15 years that the President of Princeton "presented the commissioning certificates" at the ROTC Commissioning ceremony. President Tilghman said “It is precisely at a time like this that our nation is in greatest need of highly educated and highly motivated officers.”
1 December 2004 Daily Princetonian article "Solomon Amendment ruling will not affect University". Note: Princeton explained that it allows ROTC and military recruiting to permit interested students to pursue military careers. Since Princeton does not have a law school it is not compelled by law school accreditation rules to oppose military recruiting, in contrast to other institutions.
21 January 2005 Associated Press article "Decades after Vietnam, ROTC making return effort to Ivy League". Note: The article suggests that the "Captain and a Sergeant" the military plans to post on the Harvard campus will be to run "a recruiting office".
7 April 2005 Daily Princetonian article "Referendum sought on Army ROTC: Students petition USG to take action against ROTC, military recruiting on campus".
8 April 2005 Daily Princetonian article "Petition on ROTC to be discussed".
11 April 2005 Daily Princetonian article "Senate tables amendment: Vote on proposed USG non-discrimination policy postponed".
13 April 2005 Daily Princetonian article "Whig-Clio votes to back ROTC". Note: Student Powell Fraser noted that "the on-campus Army ROTC program has roughly 30 cadets, as opposed to six in the off-campus Air Force program that trains at Rutgers University".
13 April 2005 Daily Princetonian editorial "Student body needs to voice opinion on ROTC: Debate on the issue should continue despite USG decision to table amendment".
14 April 2005 Daily Princetonian column "ROTC debate tests limits of empathy" by Jeremy Golubcow-Teglasi. Note: A student argues for expelling ROTC because "the deprivation of all is preferable to the depriviation of some", referring to gay students excluded from the military.
14 April 2005 Daily Princetonian letter "Sacrifice of ROTC cadets should not be undervalued" by Will Wrightson '88.
19 April 2005 Daily Princetonian column "ROTC debate must focus on community" by Freddie LaFemina. Note: LaFemina argues for "examining the effects of "don't ask, don't tell" on our own community, not the nation."
26 September 2005 Daily Princetonian article "Solomon Amendment: Schools file brief on recruiting". Princeton is not joining the legal action by law schools because it welcomes ROTC and military recruiting and it does not have a law school.
10 October 2005 Daily Princetonian editorial "University should lobby against Solomon Amendment".
21 November 2005 Daily Princetonian article "ROTC cadets do battle at simulated war zone in nearby Fort Dix".
13 January 2006 Daily Princetonian article "CAP's ROTC advocacy died down in 1980s". Note: When Judge Samuel Alito '72 joined Concerned Alumni of Princeton "keeping ROTC at Princeton was indeed a priority for CAP when it was founded in 1972. By the 1980s, however, ROTC appears to have disappeared as a major issue for both CAP and the University." The first issue of CAP's magazine had an "article titled "The Prospects of ROTC," which outlined the University's recent actions against ROTC... The 1972 Prospect article also stated that CAP opposed any further diminution of ROTC programs, and pledged to fight to protect Princeton ROTC. "Concerned Alumni of Princeton will take an active role in voicing alumni opinion on the matter," the article stated."
7 March 2006 Daily Princetonian article "Court backs military recruiters". Note: "Chai Feldblum, a board member of the Forum of Academic and Institutional Rights (FAIR), the coalition of law schools that sued the government, said she was "completely shocked" at the unanimous opinion ... The issue here has always been 'don't ask, don't tell.' That [policy] needs to get repealed, either by being invalidated by the Supreme Court or by Congress changing the law".
13 September 2006 Daily Princetonian article "In their shared pain, some find a new sense of purpose: The military represented a higher calling for some, but for others, the cost of serving wasn't worth it". Note: The writer interviewed Princeton alumni who have served in the military.
9 November 2006 Wall Street Journal Best of the Web Today item "It's personal" by James Taranto. Note: Taranto celebrates the example of Mark Reinhardt, a Princeton graduate who entered the military despite the views of his father, economist Uwe Reinhardt, that the military attracts people with few other opportunities.
18 January 2007 The New Republic column "Military Academy" by Anthony Grafton. Note: A Princeton professor notes that Princeton has more connections to the military than many other elite colleges, and recommends that "We who teach young men and women need to know more about what we ask some of them to do on our behalf and what it takes to do their jobs".
22 January 2007 Daily Princetonian article "Princeton, in the nation's service? With a shifting social ethos, alumni in the military are a vanishing and isolated breed". Note: "At a recruiting conference last fall, [military sociologist Charles] Moskos said, he asked recruiters whether they would rather have their advertising budget tripled or have Jenna Bush, President Bush's daughter, join the Army. Unanimously, the recruiters chose the latter option..". Not mentioned in the article is that the son of Princeton alumnus Gen. David Petraeus is in an ROTC program.
July - August 2007 The American Interest article "Beyond the Cloister" by Gen. David Petraeus. Note: The top general in Iraq argues that "We need officers comfortable not just with major combat operations but with operations conducted throughout the middle- and lower-ends of the spectrum of conflict, as well. That is why it is so important to get the officers who will be our future commanders and leaders out of their intellectual comfort zones... Just as the best way by far to learn a foreign language is to live in the culture where the language is spoken, the best way to learn about other worldviews is to go to and live in another world" such as that of a civilian university. "When I first went to Iraq in 2003, my colleagues and I were repeatedly greeted by Iraqis—in the case at hand, in Mosul—who would say to us in the course of conversation: “We love democracy!...What is it?” I particularly remember being pulled aside after a provincial council meeting by an Iraqi business professor from Mosul University who cautioned, “You know, general, this idea of free markets scares some of these individuals.” I was not surprised, because as a Princeton international relations/economics Ph.D. (and later an assistant professor at West Point) I was well aware of the uneven spread of liberal ideas. And I was not totally at a loss for answers .."
3 September 2007 Washington Post article "Talk About Field Trips!: Petraeus Gave Student Summer VIP Tour of Iraq". Note: Gen. David Petraeus took a 19 year old Princeton ROTC cadet under his wing. "I think he's universally well known for finding smart people who are interested in doing things a little differently, and I think that's a major reason for his success," says Capt. Elizabeth McNally, a West Point graduate and Rhodes Scholar who is Petraeus's speechwriter. Petraeus said "We need all the brilliant young people we can get. I'll just have to wait three years or so for this one."
11 December 2008 Wall Street Journal op-ed "Honored Roles: How Colleges Remember Their Veterans" by Bari Weiss. Note: Weiss reflects on the memorial being dedicated the next day to Columbia University's war dead and recounts how Princeton honors its war dead: "500 bronze stars, each engraved with the name of a student who died, dot the school's oldest buildings... With few exceptions, the stars are located outside the window of the dorm room where the student once lived".
17 February 2009 Princetonian column "Breaking the silence: Princeton's ROTC" by Michael Collins '11. Note: Collins argues that ROTC students should voice opinions on political questions that affect ROTC such as the "Don't ask, don't tell" law. He writes "I would prefer they support the military we want — and not the one we have."
13 May 2009 Princeton Alumni Weekly article "ROTC seeks course credit: New commander challenges University’s stance". Note: Princeton ROTC commander LTC John Stark and Princeton vice president Robert Durkee '69 disagree over whether the language in the 1972 Army-Princeton agreement on ROTC sets forth the possibility for any university credit for any ROTC-taught courses. The agreement states "academic credit applicable toward graduation will be given for successful completion of those academic courses taught by the institution [i.e., Princeton] which are part of the Army ROTC curriculum; and that academic credit for military professional subjects will be judged by the institution under the same procedure and criteria as for other institutional courses."
15 May 2009 Daily Princetonian article "ROTC may seek credit for courses". Note: ROTC commander Lt. Col. John Stark, who has a PhD and is a lecturer in the history department, is planning to seek accreditation for ROTC senior-level military science courses. Princeton Vice President and Secretary Robert Durkee ’69 said there was an "unspoken agreement" and "clear understanding by both parties at the signing of the [University’s agreement with the program] that ROTC courses would not receive academic credit”. The article did not quote from the University’s agreement with the Army, but VP Durkee provided the relevant text and his comments to Advocates for ROTC. The Princetonian article also refers to Princeton and Cornell being the only Ivy League colleges with official on-campus Army ROTC. In addition, Penn has on-campus Navy ROTC and Dartmouth has Army ROTC on campus, officially through "an extension school for Norwich University", but the Professors of Military Science have Dartmouth faculty appointments.
15 May 2009 Statement from Princeton VP Robert K. Durkee on Course Credit for ROTC.
31 May 2009 The Daily Princetonian article "Petraeus GS ’85 delivers Class of 2009 Baccalaureate address". Note: "ROTC commander Lt. Col. John Stark said Petraeus “offers a unique perspective as both an intellectual and a soldier.” He added, “For the army to have people from Princeton is a very good thing.”"
1 November 2009 New York Times article "The R.O.T.C. Dilemma". Note: Discussing Harvard's attitude towards the military and gays, President Drew Faust said “Trying to maintain two values — nondiscrimination and national service — is very complicated ... It has us all tied in knots. There are contradictions. We make these sometimes awkward arguments that are less than pure consistency. Why do we do x and not y? Why do we have the helicopters? Why do I appear at the commissioning? There are enormous complexities and contradictions. We wind up creating compromises that are not philosophically consistent. The way to resolve these inconsistencies is to permit gays and lesbians to serve in the military.” The article notes: "Harvard will not pay the $150,000-a-year cross-registration fee that M.I.T. charges to have Harvard students take military science courses there. But university staff members are used to raise that money from wealthy alumni sympathetic to R.O.T.C. And Harvard accepts about $1 million a year from the military in the form of scholarships that cover the cost of tuition for cadets and midshipmen." As a result of such "knots", the number of students in ROTC at elite colleges remains low. Taylor Giffen, a Yale Air Force ROTC cadet who graduated in June, said “They’d see me in uniform, and ask, ‘Hey, are you in a play?’ ”
19 November 2009 The Dartmouth article "College one of few Ivies with ROTC". Note: "The College gives the ROTC program a $10,000 annual training budget and a place to meet, according to Maj. Lawrence Forsyth, assistant professor of military science for Army ROTC at Dartmouth. Dartmouth’s chapter is a satellite of the program at Norwich University, meaning the faculty who train students commute from Northfield, Vt. Twelve students are currently enrolled in the ROTC program ... Military classes are given for academic credit at Cornell, [Lt. Col. Steven Alexander, professor of military science and leadership at Cornell] said. At Princeton, however, administrators will not consider offering academic credit for ROTC participation because of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, according to Col. John Stark, professor of military science at the university.“As long as this policy is in place, they will not even discuss the possibility of accreditation,” Stark said. “Last year, I sought to achieve academic credit, but now I am going with the status quo until the national policy has been changed.” Dartmouth does not offer academic credit for ROTC courses, Forsyth said."
1 December 2009 Daily Princetonian article "Active in the nation's service". Note: Princeton graduates tell of building the foundations for their future success based on their ROTC and military experience. Maj. Mark Crow GS ’08, advised future leaders that “Familiarity with the military is a benefit” in any area of political leadership or public service, and Raj Shah ’00 said “The military needs Princetonians, and I think Princeton needs the military”.
13 October 2010 Daily Princetonian article "‘Don’t ask, don’t tell’ ruling raises questions about ROTC". Note: Commenting on impending changes in "Don't ask, don't tell", Lt. Col. John Stark, head of Princeton's Army ROTC program, said "I think it’s the first step in making us part of the mainstream on campus ... Hopefully the [Princeton] administration will see it the same way."
22 October 2010 Daily Princetonian editorial "Editorial: Reevaluating ROTC". Note: The editorial looks past "Don't ask, don't tell" and suggests "By embracing the military as another laudable means of entering public service after graduation, the University can continue to encourage students to find unique and exciting ways to serve their country and the global community during and after their Princeton careers." See letter on 25 October.
25 October 2010 Daily Princetonian letter "Discriminatory practices not reason for ROTC’s status as outside organization" by Robert Durkee. Note: The Vice President of Princeton writes that "The reason that ROTC is considered an outside organization is because it is an outside organization: The ROTC program is sponsored, operated and controlled by the U.S. Army, not by the University."
20 December 2010 AEI EnterpriseBlog item "DADT Repeal’s Implications for ROTC" by Cheryl Miller. Note: "Michael Segal at Secure Nation has some great suggestions as to how universities and the military can work together to enhance the ROTC curriculum, providing high-quality courses worthy of academic credit. Advocates should also work for closer ties at those universities that currently host ROTC units, but hold them at arm’s length: Princeton, Dartmouth, and the University of Pennsylvania. Much more can (and should) be done to integrate ROTC into mainstream campus life than merely hosting a program."
5 January 2011 Daily Princetonian article "Policy on ROTC unchanged after repeal of don't ask, don't tell". Note: Princeton President Shirley Tilghman said "The only change I anticipate is the opportunity for gay students to join ROTC".
7 January 2011 Weekly Standard blog post "Do Ask, Do Tell: Insist universities explain their opposition to ROTC" by Cheryl Miller. Note: commenting on Princeton's unwillingness to consider enhancements to its relationship with ROTC, Miller asks "If learning how to manage a classroom is intellectually challenging enough to be worthy of credit at Princeton, why isn’t learning to manage a platoon?"
7 February 2011 Daily Princetonian column "Silenced soldiers" by Allen Paltrow. Note: Paltrow embellishes the WikiLeaks & ROTC controversy by changing an account of "considering using WikiLeaks material" to "increasingly using information from the leaks in their curricula and assignments".
9 March 2011 Christian Science Monitor op-ed "With DADT out of the way, Harvard and military make a great couple" by Dan Caldwell. Note: A professor of political science at Pepperdine University and former Marine officer outlines 8 reasons why ROTC should return to elite university campuses. One is "I found that officers educated at universities such as Columbia, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Stanford often had markedly different attitudes than their peers from the military academies or state universities with large ROTC programs. I believe that the presence of such officers in the military is highly desirable; they are representative of an important segment of American society that is currently under-represented in the military. They are more likely to question unreasonable or illegal orders or policies than those educated in a more militarily, hierarchically oriented environment." Another is "I served on a university committee at Stanford University that negotiated with the Department of Defense (DOD) concerning academic credit for ROTC courses. In these negotiations, the Department of Defense indicated its willingness to grant ROTC credit for courses taught by Stanford professors. For example, a course on war and conflict taught by the respected Professor Peter Paret, a translator of Clausewitz’s “On War,” would have been granted credit for the required ROTC course on military history. If DOD were now willing to accept such courses, the objection to having non-Stanford professors teaching courses for academic credit would be lessened."
22 April 2011 Daily Princetonian article "ROTC director Lieutenant Colonel Stark to be deployed to Afghanistan". Note: The new head of Princeton Army ROTC will be Peter Knight. Although the article says that Princeton's ROTC program "is not endorsed by the University", as documented in the comments, the program was set up by an agreement between Princeton and the Army, and Princeton confers "the title, Director of Army Officer Education Program, on the senior Army officer assigned to the Army ROTC detachment, indicating a rank equivalent to the senior academic rank of professor, including the prerogatives and privileges associated with the position of a professor or director as head of a department or program at the institution".
9 May 2011 Daily Princetonian article "DADT repeal does not change University's ROTC policy". Note: The "University administration does not appear to have been influenced by the DADT repeal and has yet to make any move toward formally recognizing the program as a University-endorsed organization."
7 May 2012 New York Times article "After War Room, Heading Ivy League Classroom". Note: "In the last year, Harvard, Yale and Columbia have invited R.O.T.C. back to campus after banning the program during Vietnam, citing the end of the military’s ban on openly gay troops as the reason. The hiring of retired military officers as teachers in the Ivy League is part of the same evolution... “There is almost no antimilitary bias among students,” said John Lewis Gaddis, a Yale history professor and the recipient of the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for biography, who has welcomed General McChrystal to Yale. “I wouldn’t say it’s true among the faculty.”" Also, Ivy League colleges "still shy from teaching military history, although that is changing. (The Yale historian Paul Kennedy is developing a course on the military history of the West for undergraduates and Air Force R.O.T.C. students at Yale this fall.)"
5 May 2013 Daily Princetonian article "Despite combat ban reversal, Princeton ROTC cadets' plans remain unchanged". Note: "Eight out of the nine female ROTC cadets interviewed for this article, including four of the five enrolled at the University, noted that they wish to serve in the military in non-combat positions.... Hannah Martins ’13, a graduating female cadet at the University who has already been assigned to the military police branch, said that she is hopeful about the changes outlined in Panetta’s January decision but also noted women have already been serving in harm’s way for a long time."
6 December 2013 Daily Princetonian photo essay "In the Nation's Service: A Lens into R.O.T.C.".
5 February 2014 News at Princeton press release "Princeton University, Navy re-establish campus NROTC program". Note: When Army ROTC was reestablished at Princeton in 1972, Naval ROTC did not return, as Princeton refused course credit even for celestial navigation. Now, "NROTC active duty Navy and Marine Corps instructors will lead and teach Princeton NROTC midshipmen on the Rutgers or Princeton campus". No details were given in the press release about course credit for students or university appointments for ROTC faculty.
15 April 2014 NJ.com article "Princeton U. welcomes back Navy ROTC for first time since Vietnam War". Note: "U.S. Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus joined the presidents of Princeton and Rutgers University at a ceremony marking the return of Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps — or NROTC — to Princeton. Starting in the fall, Princeton will partner with Rutgers to offer the program."
16 April 2014 Princeton news article "Ceremony heralds return of NROTC program to Princeton". Note: "NROTC active duty Navy and Marine Corps instructors will lead and teach Princeton NROTC midshipmen on the Rutgers campus, providing students the opportunity to earn a commission in the United States naval service."
23 April 2014 NJ.com editorial "Return of Navy ROTC to Princeton University is welcomed addition". Note: The editorial notes that "Although Princeton University never gave into demands to officially ban ROTC, the naval training program left campus during those turbulent times. Last week, it returned." Actually, Princeton withdrew academic credit for ROTC, which meant that under the ROTC Vitalization Act of 1964 ROTC couldn't stay without some fiddling. However, this was particularly difficult to do for Navy ROTC since the university gave academic credit for its celestial navigation course, while denying such credit for the Navy ROTC version, which was widely seen as significantly superior.
7 December 2016 Princeton alumni Weekly article "Army, Navy Report Increases: More Freshmen Join ROTC Units". Note: "Lt. Col. Kevin McKiernan, commanding officer of the Army ROTC unit, said the increase in freshman enrollment in part reflects staff efforts to reach out to high school seniors as they apply to the University." There is joint academic and ROTC credit for one course: "McKiernan co-teaches a politics course with Professor Jacob Shapiro, “The Military Instrument of Foreign Policy,” which covers part of the Army ROTC curriculum and does count for academic credit."
21 October 2018 Daily Princetonian article "ROTC Tiger Battalion sees increased interest, recent growth". Note: "There are currently about twice as many students enrolled in ROTC as there were this time five years ago. That pattern reflects a national one — U. S. colleges are reporting a nearly 50 percent increase in Army ROTC enrollment ... Some cadets attributed ROTC’s enrollment boom to the program’s notable graduates. General Mark Milley ’80, Chief of Staff of the Army, and General Christopher Cavoli ’87, Commander of the U.S. Army Europe, both received their commissions from Princeton Army ROTC... In addition, the University and Princeton Army ROTC have worked closely together to recruit more cadets. Cadet Lieutenant Colonel Max Molot ’19, Commander of Tiger Battalion, explained some of the program’s efforts to gain more exposure. He cited new, targeted outreach to high-school students aimed at widening the University's pool of Army ROTC applicants and noted that, through performances like Color Guard at sports games, ROTC has begun interacting more with the University community.... ROTC has been allowed by headquarters to offer more merit scholarships, according to Emerson, which he says has allowed for quick and noticeable growth; this year’s cadet class is three times the number of cadets commissioned last year."
12 November 2019 Princeton News article "Princeton marks 100 years of ROTC on campus during Veterans Day program". Note: "According to [Princeton President Christopher L.] Eisgruber, between 25 to 30 Princeton students were enrolled in ROTC six years ago. This fall, there are 67 ROTC students, including 47 with the Army, 13 with the Navy and 7 with the Air Force... Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley, a 1980 alumnus who began his military career through Princeton ROTC, also sent his regards via video message."

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