Three military service academies report drop in number of applications

[number6]

http://stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=24744


ARLINGTON, Va. — Maybe it’s the near-daily grim reports of U.S. troops dying in Iraq, or maybe today’s high school students aren’t feeling the patriotism that flooded the U.S. military service academies with recruits three years ago. Whatever the reason, the academies have seen a dip in the number of applications for the coming school year, officials said.

The U.S. Naval Academy has noted a 20 percent drop in applicants compared with this time last year, and the Army’s West Point recorded a drop of 8.7 percent, officials said.

....>or maybe ..its ..no honor in a war based on lies ....<

[Steelangel]

1. I am not surprise..

who wants to fight the war for 'chimp'?

[TahitiNut]

2. "three"?? There are FOUR!

(Damnit!) The one service academy that doesn't take "appointments" (by Presidents, Senators, Congresscritters, or Governors) is the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in New London, Connecticut. (It's 100% by competitive examination.) Strangely enough, it's the one 'service' that actually performs a major 'service' other than wanton killing.

[nemo137]

3. I've actually debated applying to the USCGA

precisely because they serve a major service, and are not aggressive in the same way the Navy or Air Force are.

[TahitiNut]

6. That was a significant part of my reasoning.

Until one actually experiences full-blown military indoctrination, it's impossible to effectively describe. :shrug:

[qnr]

4. Darn tootin'! (original exhuberant reply self-censored) - n/t

[TahitiNut]

5. Coasties ....

... eat Post Toasties. :evilgrin:

Coast Guard n. - that hard nucleus about which the Navy forms in time of war.

(Yes, I was a USCGA Cadet in 1961-63.)

[qnr]

7. One of them there Treasury

types huh? I was in during the Transportation years. Enlisted, but I served on the USCGC Evergreen out of New London at one time.

[TahitiNut]

9. Yup. C. Douglas Dillon. Revenue Cutter Service 'n' all that.

Evergreen? a 180' Tender ... that can be some hard work (unlike anything Smirk knows). Do much Ice Patrol?



I did the USCGC Eagle over and back in the summer of '62 (training cruise) and one of the converted AVP's (damned if I can remember her name) while there. PoC: Edinburgh, Amsterdam, Canary Is., D.C. (for JFK's review of the ship - I was sideboy).



She didn't have the racing stripe when I was on her.

[qnr]

10. Actually

The Evergreen was a(n) WMEC when I was on her, no longer a buoy tender. Fisheries, law enforcement, Haitian/Alien Migrant Interdiction and SAR mostly,

Ice-wise, I served on the USCGC Glacier and the USCGC Polar Star - hit the Arctic five times and Antarctica seven times. Really pissed some friends off too :grin: they joined the Navy together a few weeks before I joined the Coast Guard, they did it specifically to "See the world."

Well, with the polar icebreakers, I hit North America (of course), South America, Africa, Australia and Antarctica.

I was COCO's Assistant/Chain Communications for the Mediterannean Sea LORAN-C network, that took me all over Europe, Africa and Asia.... My friends? They spent the whole four years in San Deigo ... I got death threats for years heheheh.

The Eagle is magnificent. Some people don't like the racing stripe on her, I do.

edit: typo-buster

[TahitiNut]

13. Most folks have no idea how wide and far the USCG goes.

I still have a soft spot in my heart for coasties. The difference in the attitudes of shipboard personnel on Navy ships and "bath tub Navy" ships seems really stark. Coasties aren't gray drones and dullards - they're comfortable and confident, not belligerent or cowed. Coasties work (and play) positively together, enlisted and officers, while the Navy seems to be more fragmented zombies. Coasties actually know seamanship. Navy doesn't. While there're assholes everywhere, they don't seem to be too plentiful in the USCG. (Coasties have better cooks, too.)

[PsN2Wind]

12. You and qnr have my utmost respect

and I'm sorry for every time I referred to a Coast Guardsman as being in the Lake Merrit Navy.

[TahitiNut]

15. Well, save it for qnr ... I only did 2 years at the Academy.

It turned out that me and the military was like oil and water. I just wasn't cut out to do the authoritarian thing. (My grades were great and conduct was quite OK -- just the "military adaptability" part.) That's why I later got drafted into the Army and sent to 'Nam, I guess. I was prepared meat.

qnr did some good 'n' heavy duty. My dixie cap's off to him.

[qnr]

16. kind of embarrassing actually

I can remember being five years old, zipping my hand over the bathtub water and knowing it was a coast guard cutter. I haven't the foggiest notion where I'd even heard of the USCG at five.

[PsN2Wind]

17. I thought from other posts of yours

that you were Army and in Nam but on reading this thread doubted my memory.
Went to school with a guy that joined the C.G. to get out of VietNam and ended up working out of DaNang doing radio and radar installations. At that he was lucky compared to another guy I met. Joined the Navy, again to beat the draft, went into SeaBees and ended up in Khe Sahn with the Marines.
My respect wasn't for the Academy, it was for service. Everyone that serves deserves that.

[qnr]

18. No, I was a little too young. Joined in 1977 n/t

[TahitiNut]

19. Oh, I see. I appreciate that. The Coast Guard really wasn't an 'out' ...

... from Vietnam. Some of the toughest duty fell almost exclusively to the USCG, especially in the run-up years of '65-'68. The USCG was almost single-handedly responsible for forcing the North to rely on the HCMT for VC/NVA provisioning. The USCG interdicted shipments and patrolled rivers all the way along the coast from North Vietnam to Cambodia and Thailand. IIRC, the Navy 'Swift Boats' were originally supplemented and guided by USCG. About 8,000 Coasties served in Vietnam. (Many of my former classsmates from the Academy served there.)

One of the guys that was killed there was Dave Brostrum. He was 2 years ahead of me at the Academy and in my company at the Academy. He was in the class that was paired with mine on the training cruises, and below is his photo. I remember him very, very well. His room was across the corridor from mine and we were both on the swim team.



The USCGC Point Welcome was attacked in the pre-dawn hours of 11 August 1966 by U.S. Air Force aircraft while on patrol in the waters near the mouth of the Cua Viet River, about three-quarters of a mile south of the Demilitarized Zone (the 17th Parallel). Her commanding officer, LTJG David Brostrom, along with one crewmen, EN2 Jerry Phillips, were killed in this "friendly fire" incident. The Point Welcome's executive officer, LTJG Ross Bell, two other crewmen, GM2 Mark D. McKenney and FA Houston J. Davidson, a Vietnamese liaison officer, LTJG Do Viet Vien, and a freelance journalist, Mr. Timothy J. Page, were wounded.

[PsN2Wind]

8. When people are no longer willing

to apply for the chance to be paid for getting one of the finest educations available and to also form relationships that will very likely benefit them throughout the rest of their lives then the services are in trouble.

[qnr]

11. I'd like to think that the upcoming generation of potential

military officers would feel that way: - ....>or maybe ..its ..no honor in a war based on lies ....<

[bluestateguy]

14. Or maybe

Or maybe they are awiting the results of the election first. You don't volunteer to work for a company if you know you will have a tyrannical boss who cares nothing for your life or welfare.

[IrateCitizen]

20. A cousin of mine did his plebe (freshman) year at West Point...

... and decided not to go back after that. When my father asked him why he wasn't going back, he said that he looked really hard at the things that Bush was doing, sending the military all over the world, and he decided that it wasn't something he really wanted to have any part of.

This cousin also comes from a family that is pretty much Evangelical Christian, which helps to show that they're not ALL against us....