Monday, August 30, 2010

That thar fell'a talks funnie ....

Back to a subject I first covered on the second post of this blog back in JUL 04; the shameful lack of true diversity in out military. You know, the kind of diversity it is designed to have. Via John Renehanin the WaPo;
... today Army ROTC programs are concentrated in the South and the Midwest at the expense of more populous and diverse metropolitan areas. As of 2004, according to an analysis of military data from the nonpartisan Population Reference Bureau, those two regions produced 59 percent of new Army officers.

A clear example of this shift is New York City. For the past 19 years, the city of 8 million people has been served by only two Army ROTC programs within its five boroughs, at Fordham University in the Bronx and St. John's University in Queens, which together receive roughly the same resources as the ROTC program at Texas A&M. Though the St. John's and Fordham student populations combined are just under 23,000 to Texas A&M's 38,000, those programs serve what's known as the entire "catchment" area of New York. That is the largest university student population in the country -- 605,000, according to the Census Bureau -- but in 2006, the New York City programs graduated only 34 new Army officers. The Army also offers ROTC programs at Seton Hall and Rutgers universities, in New Jersey, and at Hofstra University, in Long Island, to serve the New York area, but the lengthy commute time makes them unrealistic for many students in the city.

Alabama, with 4.7 million residents, has 10 Army ROTC programs -- the same number it had before the wave of closures began in 1989. Next door, Mississippi, with a population of 2.9 million, has five ROTC programs and has lost only one since '89. Utah and South Dakota both are home to three ROTC programs.
As a Southerner, it makes me culturally happy. Like I have said before - I have much more in common with a black person from Mississippi and a child of Cuban immigrants from Miami than I have with a dude names Erik from Minnesota. That being said, it doesn't mean that it is healthy for the military or the nation that a predominance of those in the military come from the skin-cancer belt. I don't think we need a quota system - that whole concept gives me the willies - but we should make sure we equal effort and opportunity to the taxpayers who make it all possible.

BRAC made it worse. Gutting the Bay Area Navy - even though the politicians there were horrible to the Navy - and the slow death of the New England Bases from Northern Maine to Massachusetts, has simply created more decision makers who interact little to any with the military. Not in their district, not in their scan.

Here is the core of the problem. For the same reason industry has moved South and West,
Privately, however, officers in charge of recruiting have said that it is cheaper to recruit cadets in places such as Texas and Alabama. The costs of expanding ROTC in places such as New York are excessive, they have said, and universities there have insufficient space or are not very welcoming.
That last part is BS, except for the hostility part (that is ligit). They have plenty of room for Gender Studies junk and all the FOD that comes with it. ROTC just isn't a priority - and they are not held accountable by the State of Federal authorities for their lack of support.

From the military POV, it just isn't worth the fight at Moonbat U in Yonkers, New York when Podunk A&M outside Dogpatch, Kentucky is begging for a ROTC unit. People are people, and it is hard to talk a guy from San Antonio to do a recruiting job in Long Island of all places.

That is part of it, I think. Just trying. There is also the fact that there has to be an effort and a mindset. Here is a little something URR would nod his Yankee bald head at.
But we learned in New York that it is not merely a matter of raw resources. After attending more than 75 career fairs at colleges in the area and seeing that regular Army recruiters failed to show up to most of them, Trynosky set up his own officer-recruiting table at a public service career fair at Columbia University. He was deluged. Armed only with homemade flyers and an officer's uniform, in a single day he identified three students who ultimately enlisted for the Army's grueling Officer Candidate School. By contrast, the Army's self-imposed target for officer-training programs in the New York City region is roughly 30 new officers per year.

Trynosky says Army ROTC officials have told him that they've tried and failed to expand in places like New York -- that the Army's resource allocation matches the market. But, having seen the genuine interest from students in the city, it seems to me as though the Army has been influenced by the same dismissive attitude that universities are so often accused of having toward the military. Why are our huge and diverse cities -- especially New York, with a still-gaping wound in the Earth -- allocated paltry recruiting resources? Shouldn't the armed services, which need the best talent from across the country, do more to reach beyond what they see as tried-and-true recruiting grounds?

The Marine Corps, apparently, would answer in the affirmative. According to their recruiters, the Marines aggressively target would-be officers in New York and other major metropolitan areas and get a diverse reward for their efforts. (Says one young recruiter based in the Northeast: "We kill it in the cities!")
It would be interesting to see if the Navy has some stats WRT officer demographics vs. national demographics by Congressional District.

Now THAT is a profiling system and tracking program for recruiting I would fully support. Forget DNA - try to represent the nation like we elect our politicians, the rest will come out in the wash.

Just as an aside, I worked with a small group unexpectedly doing big things during Operation DESERT FOX in the '90s. For weeks, they were all I saw except for the inside of my eyelids. All were Southerners ... except for one guy from Vermont. We all looked at him like he was from Mars and made much merriment at his expense (I made him eat a Moon Pie, methinks). It shouldn't be that way, but in many cases, it is in the military.

One thing I learned in a couple of decades of service and many years living outside the South - including New England. It is a cultural fact that the South has a more martial tradition and is more supportive, on average, than the North when it comes to the military. The Mountain West is very similar in that respect to the South. Texas is a world unto itself, of course. The rural Mid-west somewhere in the middle leaning Southern in its military opinion. That has been true for most of our nation's history.

The War of 1812 almost resulted in New England leaving the USA. The Mexican American War found more support in the South. In the War of Northern Aggression (
OK, War Between the States if you insist. A "Civil War" it was not - except in Missouri), the Southern armies killed a much larger number of Northern forces - though they lost in the end by simple attrition.

A strange cultural tendency, explained a wee-bit by Webb
and Fischer, that I think has been made worse in the last 30 years for a variety of reasons. First would be the political culture of the Northeast, second the bean counters wanting to get more for less, and lastly a predominately Southern and Western military that simply does not want to live in or try to convince Northerners to do what they don't want to do. After all, they should want to out of a sense of duty, right?

Enough of the kidding of my Yankee friends - let me leave with this point. What is the primary focus of a recruiter when you talk to them about needing to have a diverse military? Well, of course, they are going to take out the
Sherwin Williams Color Visualizer the Diversity Bullies gave them. They will quote from the multi-million dollar Diversity consultants they paid money for - consultants who only see race like former Sen. Byrd in the 1950s. You need to change that dynamic first.

38 comments:

Outlaw 13 said...

I think you may be mixing apples and oranges when talking about lack of ROTC facilities and Officer recruiting efforts in the Northern climes.  It is a valid point well taken that the majority of the military originates from the south.  It was a great shock to me to learn the other day that one of the Soldiers who works in my office is from Connecticut.  I would say that at least 20% of my current unit is from Texas, which is a good thing if you're from Texas...but kinda sucks for the other guys who end up hearing all about the Lone Star State all the time.  If the Army isn't putting a great deal of effort into the NYC area, that may be cause for concern, but before we cast that stone, it might be useful to find out numbers of recruiters assigned and what the recruiting goals are for the NYC area for instance.  ROTC on the other hand, it would be interesting to see what federal law has to say if anything about ROTC and federal funding...don't know what if anything else that could be done about that.


I don't think this is situation anything new.  I can't recall very many folks being from the North even back when I went through basic training in '86.

ewok40k said...

How cant AQ et consortes not notice US military running away from angry students, shrinking before mighty bean counters and bowing before the idols of diversity? Can such organization bring death and ruination on its country's enemies?

Anonymous said...

<span></span>
<span><span>"</span>It is a cultural fact that the South has a more martial tradition and is more supportive, on average, than the North when it comes to the military.<span>"</span></span> <span><span></span></span>  <span><span>That's the understatement of the month.  Heck, places like San Diego can pass that test.  The fact is that many of these schools and the communities around them have made very clear their attitudes towards things like ROTC.  Generally, I'd rather have an enlisted / officer (especially a new officer) recruit seek out the military rather the other way around.  It indicates things we tend to admire...initiative and motivation.</span></span> <span><span></span></span>  <span><span>That said, I can't say that the naval officers I encountered during my time were overwhelmingly from southern states.  There we plenty of Northeastern accents in every place I served.  If they came via NROTC, there was less chance that their minds would be polluted by the garbage that gets shoveled by the schools that equate uniformed college students with the SA.</span></span>

anon said...

Plenty of our founding fathers were from northern states and didn't exactly sit out the war for independence due to a lack of patriotism. Sheesh.

AW1 Tim said...

I'll say this much: I haven't the stats to back it up, only my personal experiences, but the Navy I served in had an awful lot of midwesterners in it. heck, on my first crew, 4 were born in Iowa. My Dad encountered the same thing in WWII. A great percentage (it seemed to him) of his Navy mates were from the midwest.

  That doesn't have a lot to do with this situation, I know, just thought I'd toss that out there.

   I was originally enrolled in ROTC at Utah State University, through my Junior year.  Vietnam was winding down, and we were still the brunt of a great deal of "activities" from the Young Socialists Alliance, and other assorted leftists assmaggots.  They tried hard to get ROTC (we had both Army & Air Force programs) thrown off campus, shut down, disrupted, anything they could do.  It didn't work, but they certainly hardened the opinions of your author against anyone identified as leftist.

Warrant Diver said...

Tim I always enjoy your posts, almost always for the intellectual insights but today you taught me "assmaggots"...a new adjective is always welcome!!

John said...

With no draft you cannot make them serve.

In some respects, we are indeed better off without the unwilling amongst us, despite a lack of geographic diversity.

On the other hand, it ticks me off that those Americans who believe most in service, sacrifice, self reliance, and patriotism are the ones putting their lives on the line to defend the rights of the lazy leftists who prefer to live on the liberal welfare plantation and decry the values that make (made?) our country the best in the world.  It fits their playbook where everything is handed from the producer class to the dependent class, while they b!tch about it not being enough.

Recruiting is a really sucky high pressure job, and ordering more of our men and women to fish in a pond where fish don't bite is a waste of resources, especially when the recruiters themselves get beaten up for failure to accomplish the mission.

I salute those who serve, for whatever reason. 

In some regard, the draft had benefits for society by exposure to military service, military values, and "diverse cultures" but it was not necessarily the path to the best military forces.

Interesting dilemma.

LT B said...

That was then, this is now.  A lot of our founding fathers from the north were also proponents of the U.S. Constitution, and more specifically, the 2nd Amendment, but if you go up to that region now, you can not say the same based on the current laws up there.  An overwhelming majority in those regions also supported the latest push for Government mandated health care.  I view this as un-Constitutional.  Don't compare our founding fathers to the politicians of today, please.  There are few that measure up.  Sheesh!

LT B said...

Oh yeah, juxtapose that to our latest Global Farce for Good attempt at recruiting.  Sissies!

Andrewdb said...

The article at the link says that City University of NY (yes, it is large) used to be the single biggest source of Army officers except for West Point.

Andrewdb said...

Yes, but what is cause and what is effect?  When no one you know has even kids in the military, there often isn't much support for it.

fdchief100 said...

I agree about the draft aspect. In 1966, with the influence of the draft, my train trip to Great Lakes was one of many streams flowing the river of a geographically diverse Navy. The PRR Broadway Limited was loaded with boys form Boston, New York metro area, Philly and P'burgh by the time it arrived in Chicago. Absent a draft, economic/ social pressure or a sense of duty it's easier to live with mom and dad, play video games and hang with your buds well into your thirties for some young males. That's true for north or south.

UltimaRatioRegis said...

Sorry Eric,

The supposed "regretful" vote against the US Military is not due to DADT.  That is a convenient excuse to hide behind.  I was in the Northeast during the 70s with the Berrigan brothers and all of the protest shenanigans, with the campuses voting against ROTC and expelling them amidst a hatred-filled atmosphere of bruning buildings and shouts of "baby-killer" and worse. 

The academics in the northeast loathe and despise the US Military and those who serve in it.  Their "reasoning" that it is not so, and that it is only because of a certain policy disagreement, is pure crap.  And anybody that buys it is very easily fooled and shame on them.

Eric said...

I agree. As a combat support troop in the pre-9/11 Army (ETS April 01), we had a mentality that we were our MOS 1st and (basically trained combat) Soldiers 2nd. Add the 3rd role of day-to-day caretakers of our particular piece of the Army, which took up most of our time and attention, and our MOS and Soldier roles suffered, mostly the Soldier role. 

The mentality existed in officers and NCOs, not just us sham shield lower enlisted types. Didn't bother me at first; there are only so many hours in a day. The mentality bothered me a lot more by the time I left the Army with a few FTX opfor encounters that gave me great doubt anyone in my company would survive even a squad-level SOF attack.

Mike M. said...

+1 on BRAC being a poison pill for the military.  It may have been attractive from a theoretical standpoint, but it gutted Congressional support.

There was a reason why President Adams had the Navy's first six frigates built in six different states.

Eric said...

URR,

I know that what happened at Columbia in the 60s/70s was nasty. I also know before those events, Columbia had a strong relationship with ROTC. Times changed then, and they're changing now. http://www.columbiaspectator.com/2002/09/17/changing-times-columbia

It's going to take time and work to fix it, maybe even make it better than before. I think it's worth the effort.

SCOTTtheBADGER said...

There is now a Ruth Christ Steak House in Madison now.  We Badgers are carnivores.

C-dore 14 said...

DG, Trust me, these folks don't mind looking hypocritical.  They'll just find another issue.

C-dore 14 said...

Kristen, That stuff happened at NROTC units all along the west coast.  The Stanford NROTC building was burned to the ground in '68 and there were several unsuccessful attacks on the facilities at Cal (both schools were near where my family lived).  I still had a file in my office safe of an attempt to burn down the ROTC building at UW in the late '60s.

No one was ever arrested or prosecuted in the UCLA case to the best of my knowledge.

Southern Air Pirate said...

It can't be that bad DB. Where I live the Huskie Campus honestly had to vote on whether or not a MoH winning graduate from thier Aeronautical School was deserving of having his bust placed on Campus with a copy of his MoH citation. One of the student senators claimed that the USMC doesn't produce people worthy of being called UW graduates, There are people in the neighborhood who walk around in Hamas/hezbollah Chic and wearing star of davids from thier necks, musicians and intellgensia that wear Che shirts, student who rally against the evils of companies like Microsquash/Boeing/Weyerhaeuser in the region one day and then will rally outside the politicos office the next day asking for jobs. Even worst is you get further north where my parents live now in Bellingham, WWU has been viewed by more then a few in the county as Berkely North. WWU is home of an enviormental school and teaching school and students at both cried and moaned when tution was raised at the school since they were able to drive out a Georgia-Pacific plant and have worked hard to close down a BP refinerary further up the interstate. Since the tax base is drying up the school has had to raise tution to pay for expected round of student that were suppose to be applying. Oh and WWU has some wonderful monuments up around the school celebrating thier status as part of the underground railroad of the 60's and 70's to Canada.

ewok40k said...

Well, in a perverse way, the entire closing down ROTC in some areas is making the military less diverse... and seriously there are certainly a warrior types born in NY or Boston. Some will end up in the police or as firefighters. Some will become risk-loving enterpreneurs or civilian air pilots with knack for acting on instinct. Many sadly will end on the streets within ranks of youth gangs. Army and Navy is abandoning them in a way. Marines, not surprisingly, leave no candidate behind.

LT B said...

And Alaskans say they can split their state in two and then Texas can be the THIRD largest state in the union. :)

surfcaster said...

Gee, you woulda thunk you heard this from the news, right?

Kristen said...

Tim, I apologize on behalf of Catholics everywhere.  The good news is, these days the seminaries and convents are filled with young men and women who actually believe what the Church teaches, and who want to live out their vocations faithfully.

Kristen said...

fdchief, I absolutely should have included the words "on college campuses."  My parents are members of the Sixties generation, and they are terrific people who make the world a better place.  As, I'm sure, you do as well.  I was thinking of leftist professors when I wrote the above.

Kristen said...

Yup.  If being promiscuous gets any harder, maybe people will go back to better behavior. 

Kristen said...

True.  :)

Kristen said...

Honestly, I'm so glad that's not when I was in school.  I would have hated all that so much.

Kristen said...

URR, you are a very naughty boy.  :)

UltimaRatioRegis said...

(Looking incredulous)

MOI?

*blink, blink*

UltimaRatioRegis said...

Pulling your leg.  I speak and understand enough german so that I might make people think I know more.  Some of the above words are actually German, some not so much!  8-)

Old NFO said...

With the direction the Navy at least is going perhaps we should concentrate recruiting efforts on various racial and ethnic grievance groups and gay bars.  After all, it's apparent we don't want any of those traditionalist conservative Christian types.  Too divisive, none inclusive and not representative of society as seen by those who see diversity as our proper primary focus.

C-dore 14 said...

URR, My first XO was commanding that frigate when they shot this video.  The Navy Recruiting Command was considering using part of it for actual recruiting commercials until cooler heads prevailed.

Andrew said...

True, but they were also -- almost to a tee -- all devoutly religious, though they kept their religious beliefs to themselves mainly because they thought of them as a private matter between themselves, their families, and their God(s). Also there were a higher number of prior-service types in the technical departments which I think played into it along with their scientific background and piety.

I always just found it to be one of the oddities of academia. On a bit of a tangent, I must admit I found it rather shocking how religious many of my science and engineering professors were. The scientific community is not at all the atheists' wonderland that many in the agnostic/atheist and creationist camps make it out to be; your mileage may vary of course.

Andrewdb said...

Rev. Canon Dr. William Broughton.  He just had his 80th birtheday last year or so.  He lives in Jerusalem much of the year (otherwise he is in Coronado).  The Archbishop of Canterbury awarded him the Cross of St. Augustine in 2008 for his work in inter-faith relations. 

UltimaRatioRegis said...

Johnny Walker Black, by the way, SAP!  :-D

C-dore 14 said...

Andrew, The name doesn't ring a bell but I'll ask my wife.  A number of our clergy up here in Washington State are former military who stood up at convention a couple of years back to remind their colleagues about the many current and former service members in the congregations.

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