Air Force Academy cadets take the Oath of Office during an AFA graduation ceremony in Colorado Springs on May 29, 2013. (Craig F. Walker, Denver Post file)
Re: “Abolish West Point, and the other service academies, too,” Jan. 26 Scott Beauchamp column.
http://www.denverpost.com/ap/ci_27382266/Beauchamp:-Abolish-West-Point-and-the-other-service-academies-too
Scott Beauchamp writes that the U.S. military service academies “turn below-average students into average officers.”
Each of the academies has some of the lowest acceptance rates of any school in the country, meaning that, out of their large pool of applicants, few are accepted. Going beyond tests scores and GPA, one will find the highest concentration of student government leaders, Eagle Scouts, team captains, Honor Society members, etc., of any schools in the country.
Beauchamp refers to Colin Powell as a stellar example of what Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) programs have produced, and who could not agree? However, I doubt Gen. Powell shares the sentiments expressed by Beauchamp to close the institution that was founded by Thomas Jefferson and produced Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, Ulysses S. Grant, John J. Pershing, George Patton, Douglas MacArthur, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Norman Schwarzkopf and many others. And these are just men who graduated from West Point.
If you want to meet the leaders of tomorrow, visit an academy today.
Kent Karber,Colorado Springs
Scott Beauchamp argues that our service academies are bloated, expensive, and centers of nepotism.
I beg to differ. Having served in the Navy for 27 years after graduating from the Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps (NROTC) at the University of Colorado, I found the mix of Naval Academy, NROTC and U.S. Navy Officer Candidate School (OCS) graduates aboard ship to be an optimal mix that benefited the ship, the Navy and our country. The professionalism that Academy grads brought to a ship was immediate and apparent. When mixed with the more eclectic background of ROTC and OCS grads, the result was a stronger officer corps. I also served on several promotion boards and observed that the source of candidates’ undergraduate degrees did not play a significant role in deliberations as compared to performance of duty.
Though an “old boys’ club” may remain, its impact is far less than one might guess. I firmly believe that the American public is well served by the variety of educational backgrounds of its officer corps.
Howard Herbst,Aurora
This letter was published in the Feb. 2 edition.
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