Columbia ROTC Coverage

• 19 May 1951 New York Times article "The Outstanding Midshipman at Columbia"

• 12 Sept 1951 Columbia News Office Memo - The founding of AFROTC at Columbia. Article pages: Page 1, Page 2.

• 1 Apr 1952 New York Times article "Columbia ROTC Holds Blood Donation Rally"

• 22 Nov 1952 New York Times article "Midshipmen Get a Dry-Land View of Cruiser"

• 19 Nov 1956 New York Times article "Columbia NROTC Members Train on USS Laning"

• 30 Mar 1957 New York Times article "Submarine Dives Thrill Students" - Midshipmen taste adventure under water in cruise on Sound.

• 30 Mar 1957 New York Times article "Submariners are Hosts to Naval Officer Candidates from Columbia"

• 20 Oct 1965 Columbia Daily Spectator article "ROTC Has Had Tumultuous Career at Columbia"

• 26 Apr 1966 New York Times article Columbia University Cancels Awards Ceremony for Military Unit"

• 2 Nov 1967 New York Times article "Students at Columbia Vote for Open Recruiting"

• 9 Oct 1968 Columbia Daily Spectator - "Faculty Group to Study NROTC"

• 14 March 1969 Columbia University Report of the Joint Committee on NROTC.  Note:  The committee recommended that "any course offered as part of the naval training program shall carry credit toward the satisfaction of degree requirements only if it is also listed in the offerings of a regular academic department", "Personnel assigned to the training program as instructors shall not be ex officio members of any faculty of the University, and shall not hold academic rank unless appointed according to regular procedures" and the university "shall not allocate free space on campus to the Navy for drill or for instructional purposes, whether or not for academic credit".

• 28 September 1973 Harvard Crimson article "A Survey of ROTC's Status in the Ivies".

• 26 January 1976 Columbia spectator article "University Senate Passes Resolution Opposing ROTC".

• 24 Feb 1984 Columbia Daily Spectator article "CC to Avoid ROTC". Article pages: Page 1, Page 2

• 23 Feb 1993 Columbia Daily Spectator article "Columbia's Cadets"

• 21 Feb 1994 Columbia Daily Spectator article COI Refuses to List ROTC Class Grades

• 10 March 1995 Columbia University Record article "From the Senate".  Note:  The Columbia University Senate registered disapproval of laws relating to homosexuality in the military.
• 9 October 2001 National Review column "Hypocritical Diversity: Bring back the ROTC" by By Michael Knox Beran 
• 26 November 2001 New York Times article "On Campuses, Seeing the Military With New Eyes After Sept. 11"
• 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.
• 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.
• 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".
• 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".

• 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.
• 21 January 2005 Yale Daily News article "Return of ROTC is debated: Defense Department shows renewed interest in bringing program back to Ivy campuses".  Note: The article also discusses efforts to restore ROTC at Harvard and Columbia.
• 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".
• 21 January 2005 Yale Herald article "The Next Battle: ROTC at Yale: After a complex history, college military org. may reoccupy hostile territory".
• 28 January 2005 Columbia University Senate minutes "Update from the Senate Task Force on ROTC".
• 31 January 2005 Columbia Spectator article "No Change for CU in Military Recruiting".  Note: The ROTC and Military Recruiter Equal Access to Campus Act of 2004 was signed in October.
• 31 January 2005 Columbia spectator article "University Senate Debates Student Involvement in Future Task Forces".  Note:  The University Senate also heard an interim report from the its ROTC task force.  A "town hall meeting is tentatively scheduled for Feb. 15 for the task force to listen to the opinions of the Columbia community".
• 15 February 2005 Brown Daily Herald article "Interest in ROTC minimal at Brown despite debate at other Ivies".  Note:  Currently there are only two cadets.  Another student said "People at Brown are the type of people who should be filling the military in large numbers... I think the military is an institution we should be dedicated to repair and bring into the 21st century."
• 15 February 2005 transcript "Proceedings of the University Senate: Should Columbia restore ROTC? A Town Hall meeting moderated by the Senate Task Force on ROTC".
• 16 February 2005 Columbia Spectator article "Debaters Battle Military Recruit Policies at CU".  Note:  The article describes the Columbia University Senates' Town Hall meeting about the proposal to return ROTC to Columbia.  ROTC proponents discussed how ROTC at Columbia would be good for Columbia and good for the country and ROTC opponents cited the Federal Law about homosexuality in the military.
• 16 February 2005 Columbia Spectator column "ROTC, You Are (Still) Not Wanted Here" by Nick Rosenthal.  Note:  The writer calls for preventing discussion of the Columbia ROTC issue in the New York Times and says that the attitude of ROTC proponents to gays is that "we like to rape them with broomsticks".  See Chadwick , Scavone and Hwong letters in response.
• 16 February 2005 New York Sun article "ROTC Program May Be Revived At Columbia U".  Note:  The Chairman of Columbia's Senate Task Force on restoration of ROTC, Prof. James Applegate said "If the faculty senate voted to restore ROTC ... the program would probably come without academic credit, and ROTC educators would receive the title of instructor rather than professor. Drill instruction would probably take place off campus."
• 18 February 2005 Columbia Spectator article "Ghosts of '68 Haunt Latest ROTC Debate: Current Fight Over ROTC's Return to Campus is Newest Chapter in Program's Controversial History".  Note:  Participants at the Columbia Senate Town Hall on ROTC looked ahead to the wider campus debate on the ROTC restoration proposal.  Student Nate Treadwell said “This shouldn’t be up to majority opinion... Nondiscrimination is a principle that shouldn’t be waived if any number of students want it”.
• 19 February 2005 "Letter to the Columbia Senate Task Force on Restoration of ROTC" by Henry Waller, Columbia Business School '05.
• 19 February 2005 "Letter to the Columbia Senate Task Force on Restoration of ROTC" by Shane Hachey GS '04.
• 19 February 2005 "Letter to the Columbia Senate Task Force on Restoration of ROTC" by Eric Chen GS '06.  Note:  Chen discusses ROTC and Columbia's non-discrimination policy and argues that excluding ROTC jeopardizes the university's principles of diversity and inclusiveness.
• 19 February 2005 "Letter to the Columbia Senate Task Force on Restoration of ROTC" by Jason Van Steenwyk.  Note: Jason Van Steenwyk runs the Countercolumn blog.
• 19 February 2005 "Letter to the Columbia Senate Task Force on Restoration of ROTC" by Sarah Walter.  Note: Sarah Walter runs the Trying to Grok blog.
• 21 February 2005 Columbia Spectator letter "Rosenthal Wilfully Overlooks the Positive Aspects of Military Service" by Joshua Chadwick, Law ’05.  Note:  This letter responds to a 16 February column.
• 21 February 2005 Columbia Spectator letter "Columnist Espouses a “Narrow Political Agenda" by Adam Scavone.  Note:  This letter responds to a 16 February column.
• 25 February 2005 Columbia University Senate "Emails Sent to the ROTC Task Force".
• 25 February 2005 Columbia Spectator column "Free To Be You and Me" by Shane Hachey GS '04.
• 25 February 2005 Columbia Spectator letter "Columnist’s Depiction of ROTC Was Inaccurate and Harmful" by Taylor Hwong, SEAS ’92.  Note:  This letter responds to a 16 February column.
• 28 February 2005 Columbia Spectator article "U. Senate Meets, Responds to MEALAC Debate".  Note: "James Applegate, co-chair of the ROTC Task Force Committee, presented a report on the Town Hall Meeting about the issue at Columbia on Feb. 15".
• 3 March 2005 Columbia Spectator editorial "ROTC: Return".  Note:  Columbia's student newspaper said "While we oppose many of the military’s policies, particularly its “don’t ask, don’t tell” program, we recognize the valuable ideological and socioeconomic diversity that a military presence would bring to campus... As we hope the military would change our campus, so would we hope to change the military".
• 3 March 2005 Columbia Spectator column "Columbia Liberals and ROTC Conservatives Can Help Each Other" by Jason Elliott.  Note:  The author said "As the debate over whether to bring the ROTC back to Columbia rages, I’d like to be one of the first left-wingers to rise in support of reinstating the program... If we—the left wing—want to fundamentally change the way America’s military is managed, we should do it from the inside, by becoming the leadership: officers in the armed forces, or officials in the Department of Defense".
• 3 March 2005 Wall Street Journal "Best of the Web Today" item "The New Generation Gap" by James Taranto.  Note: Taranto cites the pro-ROTC editorial and column in the Columbia Spectator and suggests that students are "more patriotic today than their predecessors were in the 1960s and '70s".
• 3 March 2005 GedankenTravelExperiment blog item "ROTC".  Note:  The author criticizes reasons cited against ROTC at Columbia.
• 13 March 2005 Advocates for Columbia ROTC flyer "A Vote for ROTC Is a Vote for Affirmative Action".
• 13 March 2005 Advocates for Columbia ROTC flyer "ROTC: Democracy's Champions".
• 18 March 2005 Advocates for Columbia ROTC flyer "ROTC Addresses Class Inequality".
• 18 March 2005 Students United for America flyer "Why is the Reserves Officer Training Corps (ROTC) Right for Columbia?".
• 22 March 2005 Columbia Spectator column "Against the Proposed ROTC Restoration" by Yi-Sheng Ng, Karyn Lukoff, Katherine Redmon, Christian Sjulssen, and Dustin Brauneck.  Note:  The Columbia Queer Alliance, the Coming Out Group and Q, Barnard College’s queer student organization, say that "Members of the ROTC have been expelled after marching in a PRIDE parade, even though some were straight allies".
• 22 March 2005 Columbia Spectator column "Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Pretend Nobody Gets Hurt" by Matt Grice.
• 28 March 2005 Columbia University Senate's Task Force on ROTC "More emails to the Senate ROTC Task Force".  Note: One writer says that a "quick review" of ROTC courses suggest they are "hardly likely to be of interest to non-ROTC students".  A good counterexample is the course detailed in MIT Sloan Fellows Learn from Army During Leadership Exercise.  The same writer says the "oft-repeated claim is that military experience is widely valued by civilian employers" which the writer thinks this is "generally untrue".  Some good example on this issue are in the Associated Press article "Secretive Military Units Provide Training Ground for Israel's High-Tech Leaders".  Perhaps there would be more such examples in the United States if universities such as Columbia had ROTC programs. 
• 29 March 2005 Columbia Spectator column "When Exclusion Breeds Exclusion" by Dennis Schmelzer.  Note:  The author asks why the military, which was ahead of society in integration of blacks and women, lags on integration of gays, and suggests that one factor is the absence of ROTC programs at elite universities.
• 1 April 2005 Columbia University Senate's Task Force on ROTC "Results of deliberations".  Note:  The Task Force deadlocked 5-5 on the question of whether ROTC should return despite the "Don't ask, don't tell" law.
• 5 April 2005 Columbia Spectator article "ROTC Debate Advances Toward Senate Decision: Task Force Split on Recommendation; Debate Centers on Military's 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' Policy".  Note:  The full University Senate is planning a May 6 vote on the proposal.
• 5 April 2005 Columbia Spectator column "A Betrayal in Soldier's Clothing" by Matt Smith.  Note:  Smith calls for taxpayer-funded scholarships to be free of payback provisions such as military service.
• 6 April 2005 Columbia Spectator article "Panel Examines ROTC Conflict: Clash Between CU Non-Discrimination Policy And Military's 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' Stressed".
• 6 April 2005 Columbia Spectator article "Conservativism and Feminism Combined".  Note: Tammy Bruce, an author and former chapter head of the National Organization for Women said "the exclusion of the ROTC is no different from the exclusion of other on-campus groups".
• 14 April 2005 New York Post column "Columbia's Bigotry" by Charles E. F. Millard.  Note:  The column describes how supporters of ROTC at Columbia offered to make common cause with opponents of the "Don't ask Don't tell" law and were spurned.
• 14 April 2005 Power Line blog item "Don't ask, we'll tell".  Note:  The preference of anti-ROTC forces at Columbia for a "Teach-In" instead of a debate is criticized.
• 14 April 2005 "Union Theological Seminary, Columbia University: Statement of the Student Senate Executive Committee".  Note:  The statement said "We believe ROTC’s war-making and policy against homosexuals are violations of the sacredness of human life" and urged shunning the military "until drastic democratic reforms are made to US foreign and domestic policy ... Some of us are pacifists and others of us simply reject the US military in its current manifestation".
• 15 April 2005 Columbia University Senate "Transcript of Special Senate Meeting on ROTC".
• 15 April 2005 Advocates for Columbia ROTC handout for 15 April Columbia University Senate debate on the Proposal to Restore ROTC "Salient points for ROTC".
• 15 April 2005 Power Line blog item "Honor and disgrace".  Note:  Scott Johnson recalls the "military brief" solicited by Columbia University President Lee Bollinger in the University of Michigan affirmative action case and asks why Bollinger "isn't equally solicitous of those signatories on the subject of ROTC on campus".
• 15 April 2005 "Report to the Columbia University Senate and Personal Statement" by Nate Walker, co-chair of Columbia University Senate's Task Force on ROTC.  Note:  Walker amends his original comments on the meaning of the wide agreement that ROTC should return to Columbia if there were no "Don't ask, don't tell" law.  
• 18 April 2005 Columbia Spectator article "U. Senate Hears ROTC Findings: Task Force Split 5-5 On Proposal to Return ROTC Immediately".
• 19 April 2005 Personal Statement by Fred W. Cook "ROTC at Columbia".  Note:  This statement outlines a plan for an ROTC presence at Columbia.  It is similar to the plan discussed in 2004 for Harvard as outlined in a statement by LTC Brian Baker and covered in a 16 December 2004 Wall Street Journal article.  Fred Cook is a member of the Defense Business Board.  Transcripts of 14 May 2003, 30 July 2003 and 12 May 2004 Defense Business Board meetings discussing return of ROTC to elite colleges contain key comments by him, thus his personal statement is likely to represent Pentagon thinking.
• 21 April 2005 Columbia Spectator article "ROTC Debate Continues at Open Forum".  Note:  Nate Walker, co-chair of the Columbia University Senate ROTC Task Force, seems to indicate that all 5 who voted for the "ROTC if no DADT" resolution voted against the "ROTC even if DADT" resolution, meaning that the sole abstention on the "ROTC if no DADT" resolution was by an ROTC supporter.
• 25 April 2005 Speakers and transcript of the panel and discussion, “Perspectives on the Future of ROTC at Columbia”.
• 26 April 2005 Columbia Spectator article "Panelists Examine ROTC's Role on Campus: With University Senate Vote Approaching, 'Advocates for Columbia ROTC' Sponsors Forum".
• 27 April 2005 Columbia Spectator article "Univ. Senate Advances Toward Vote on ROTC: Executive Committee Approves Resolution on Future of ROTC for May 6 Senate Body Vote".  Note:  ROTC Task Force co-chairman Prof. Applegate raised the possibility that a vote on ROTC may not occur at the 6 May Columbia University Senate meeting.
• 29 April 2005 article ""Don't ask, don't tell" and ROTC: Taking the moral high ground at Columbia" by Michael Segal.
• 29 April 2005 "For ROTC at Columbia" by Prof. Allan Silver, Department of Sociology, Columbia University.  Note:  Prof. Silver, who supported removal of ROTC in 1969, argues for the importance in reducing the civilian - military gap.
• 29 April 2005 Columbia News Tonight segment "Should ROTC return to Columbia? A Roundtable Discussion. Guests: Nate Walker, Co-Chair, ROTC Task Force; Scott Stewart, Columbia student, former soldier."
• 1 May 2005 New York Times article "Offering R.O.T.C. a Truce".  Note:  The movement at Columbia to restore ROTC has "signaled a shift in student attitudes toward the military and encouraged vigorous conversation on campus."
• 1 May 2005 "The Case for ROTC at Columbia" by Prof. James H. Applegate, Professor of Astronomy, Columbia University, Co-Chair, Columbia University Senate Task Force on ROTC.  Note: Prof. Applegate suggests that the arguments against ROTC "arise from our looking inward and seeing Columbia in isolation".
• 1 May 2005 INTEL DUMP blog item "Bringing ROTC back to Columbia's campus".  Note:  In the responses to the item, Dave Glazier gives practical reasons why having ROTC is more important than whether recruiting is on campus.
• 1 May 2005 Outside the Whale blog item "Columbia May Reinstate the Campus Reserve Officers Training Corps Chapter".  Note:  The importance of universities such as Columbia being involved in ROTC is stressed because the military now has a "greater emphasis on dealing with the threat of terrorism but also democratization and nation and institution building".
• 2 May 2005 "Tell Me Again Why Columbia Should Restore ROTC" by Columbia Alliance for ROTC.
• 4 May 2005 "Statement for the Final Report of the Columbia University Senate Task Force on ROTC" by Sean Wilkes CC '06, Member of the Task Force and Chairman of Advocates for Columbia ROTC.
• 4 May 2005 Columbia Community Discusses "Don't ask, don't tell" and ROTC.  Note:  A set of actual e-mails debating the "Don't ask, don't tell" issue from a variety of perspectives.
• 5 May 2005 Columbia University Senate Task Force on ROTC "Final Report of the ROTC Task Force". 
• 6 May 2005 Columbia University Executive Committee "Resolution to Establish a Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) Program at Columbia University". 
• 6 May 2005 Advocates for Columbia ROTC statement on ROTC at Columbia and “don’t ask, don’t tell”
• 6 May 2005 Columbia Spectator article "Senate Rejects ROTC's Return: Resolution Overturned in Last Meeting of Year".  Note:  The Columbia University Senate rejected a proposal to invite ROTC to Columbia (this article reports the initial inaccurate tally).  The reason most cited was the "Don't ask, don't tell law".
• 6 May 2005 Columbia University Senate transcript of Senate meeting on ROTC.
• 6 May 2005 Columbia University Senate "Columbia University Senate vote on resolution to establish an ROTC program at Columbia University".  Note:  The Senate includes faculty, administrators and students.  Although the vote was reported slightly differently initially, it was 53-10 against establishing an ROTC program.
• 7 May 2005 New York Times article "Columbia U. Senate Votes Against Return of R.O.T.C.".  Note:  Alan Brinkley, Columbia's provost, said during the debate "Would we agree to an organization on campus," that allowed "African-Americans to join this organization only if they pass for white?"
• 8 May 2005 INTEL DUMP blog item "Columbia U. makes a myopic move".
• 8 May 2005 article "After the Vote: Why ROTC Belongs At Columbia" by Prof. Allan Silver, Department of Sociology, Columbia University.
• 9 May 2005 Columbia Spectator article "Reserve Officer Training Corps: After Semester of Debate, ROTC To Stay Off Campus".
• 9 May 2005 New York Sun editorial "AWOL at Columbia".  Note:  The Sun notes "the lack of protest of the policies of the Islamist enemy in respect of gay rights" at Columbia and argues that one is not "helping the causes of tolerance or civil rights by staying on the sidelines of this war".
• 9 May 2005 Inside Higher Ed article "Columbia Says No, Still, to ROTC".
• 11 May 2005 Wall Street Journal editorial "A Tale of Two Columbias: The patriotic and the politically correct".  Note:  See responses on 17 May and 26 May.
• 13 May 2005 Wall Street Journal column "Neither Fools Nor Cowards: Barriers between military service and higher education do a disservice to both" by Eliot A. Cohen.  Note:  Prof. Cohen discusses the civilian-military divide in light of Columbia's rejection of ROTC and the fact that "the institutional military is not all that eager to re-establish a ROTC presence on elite campuses".  See letter in response on 18 May.  Prof. Cohen, a Harvard ROTC graduate, is pictured here at his son's Harvard ROTC commissioning.
• 13 May 2005 Villainous Company blog item "The Wisdom of Solomon".  Note:  Cassandra discusses the University Senate vote against ROTC at Columbia and argues that using the Solomon Amendment for ROTC removes the argument that universities with ROTC are tacitly expressing approval for the "Don't ask, don't tell" law.
• 16 May 2005 New York Sun article "Fossella: Federal Money at Risk For Columbia".  Note:  A New York City congressman suggests that the Secretary of Defense could invoke the Solomon Amendment over Columbia's rejection of ROTC.
• 17 May 2005 Wall Street Journal letter "Columbia, ROTC and Sexual Orientation" by President Lee C. Bollinger (also on Columbia's Web site).  Note:  Responding to an editorial, Pres. Bollinger writes "After acknowledging that reasonable people can differ over the military's prohibition on openly gay and lesbian servicemen and women, the editorial goes on to suggest that those of us who disagree with that prohibition are anti-military, and to question our motivations."  However, this is not an accurate portrayal of the debate at Columbia.  As the Columbia ROTC Task Force report makes clear, proponents of the return of ROTC to Columbia also opposed "Don't ask, don't tell".  The disagreement between pro and anti-ROTC sides at Columbia was whether the benefits of ROTC outweighed the disagreements with the federal law.  Pres. Bollinger went on to blame the government for putting an end to the discussion about ROTC at Columbia, noting that his vote against return of ROTC "was based on a serious concern for the integrity of the university in the face of the federal government's use of the power of the purse to force institutions to compromise their principles".  However, the best indications of Pentagon intentions available before the vote were that "the Pentagon cannot provide a positive request or indication to Columbia to reestablish an ROTC unit on campus because, to do so, would trigger the Solomon Amendment should Columbia turn down the request".  See also a letter in response on 26 May.
• 18 May 2005 New York Sun article "Columbia To Consider Bringing ROTC Back to Campus".  Note:  The chairman of the board of trustees, David Stern, said he is pushing to the forefront of the board's agenda the issue of the university's policy toward ROTC.
• 18 May 2005 Wall Street Journal letter "Denying Students ROTC" by David Thomas.  Note:  Responding to Prof. Cohen's article on 13 May, Thomas states that "denying students exposure to ROTC and military history is as short-sighted as eliminating, say, women's studies."
• 19 May 2005 New York Sun editorial "Wisdom of Solomon".  Note:  The Sun calls for the trustees of Columbia to restore ROTC and notes that "many of those most committed to pressing the government to change its policy toward gays in the military are those asking that Columbia open its doors to ROTC."  For examples, see the Columbia University Senate Task Force Report, this email discussion and this proposal for immediate changes in the law.
• 19 May 2005 Inside Higher Ed article "ROTC Debate Not Over at Columbia".  Note:  The board of trustees will meet on 4 June and "has invited Senate representatives from both sides of the debate to answer questions on that, and a host of other issues". 
• 20 May 2005 New York Daily News editorial "Columbia declares war on ROTC".
• 23 May 2005 New York Daily News column "Columbia's old elite a new ROTC enemy" by Shane Hachey.  Note:  The submitted text is here.
• 23 May 2005 Voice of America story "U.S. Supreme Court Will Review Law that Denies Funding to Campuses that Bar Military".  Note:  Columbia University student Scott Stewart, a gay veteran who supports ROTC on campus, says you have to associate with the military to influence it.
• 26 May 2005 Wall Street Journal letter "Columbia's 'Compromising' Exactly What Principles?" by Irving Louis Horowitz.  Note:  Prof. Horowitz responds to President Bollinger's letter about the editorial on ROTC at Columbia.
• 30 May 2005 Washington Times column "Honor thy soldiers" by Suzanne Fields.  Note:  Fields discusses the University Senate vote against ROTC at Columbia and quotes Harvard President Lawrence Summers as saying that military service is "vitally important to the freedom that makes possible institutions like Harvard".
• Spring 2005 Columbia magazine article "University Senate Says No to ROTC".  Note:  Although the Senate vote was not binding "the administration has pledged to respect the vote".  Nate Walker '08TC, who co-chaired the ROTC Task Force, said "It's clear to me, from my work on the senate, that when the military stops its invidious discriminatory practices, Columbia probably will support ROTC's return", referring to the "Don't ask, don't tell" law.  Provost Alan Brinkley, who abstained from voting as is his custom, despite an impassioned anti-ROTC speech, said "there does not seem to be strong intrinsic opposition toward the military, other than with regard to this discriminatory policy".
• August 2005 American Council of Trustees and alumni article "Universities and the Military: What You Should Know About the Upcoming Supreme Court Case" by Melvin H. Bernstein.  Note:  The article recounts the history of the Solomon Amendment and compares the attitude of the presidents of Harvard and Columbia towards ROTC.
• September 2005 VFW Magazine article "Anti-Military Sentiments Persist on Elite Campus".  Note: Many of the leaders of the Columbia effort were quoted, including Advocates for Columbia ROTC chairman Sean Wilkes and alumni group Columbia Alliance for ROTC chairman Ted Graske CC'59.
• 12 October 2005 American Council of Trustees and Alumni press release "Hypocrisy 101: The Academy and Military Recruiters".  Note:  ACTA lists the federal funds at risk under the Solomon Amendment.  Of the listed colleges barring ROTC, Columbia leads with $457 million at risk.
• 21 October 2005 Columbia University Senate "Minutes of September 16, 2005".  Note:  Senator Paul Duby reported on the discussions at the June Columbia University Trustees meeting about the ROTC issue.  When "a Trustee asked if there was anything else the Trustees were expected to do on this subject; Sen. Duby said Provost Alan Brinkley answered in one word: No".  The minutes also note that "the Task Force made some recommendations for improving conditions for Columbia students who are pursuing ROTC off campus, at Manhattan College or Fordham. One was to provide more assistance in the form of transportation, or maybe a small office on the Columbia campus. Another was to assure that any students barred from ROTC because of their sexual preference would be eligible for equivalent financial support from Columbia. Sen. Duby said he and Sen. Applegate would discuss these issues with the provost."
• 25 October 2005 Columbia Spectator column "Columbia Plays Dirty Pool" by John Mateus.  Note:  A Columbia Law student calls interference with military interviews, which blocked him from being interviewed, "underhanded and sabotage" and criticizes the unwillingness of Columbia to stop the interference.  See also responses by Karyn Lukoff, Michelle Rutherford and Cuauhtemoc Ortega.
• 7 December 2005 Columbia Spectator article "Supreme Court Hears Solomon Amendment Case".  Note:  The article mentions how Solicitor General Paul Clement began to argue that the 2004 change to the Solomon Amendment did not demand greater access for the military than other employers and Justice Scalia said he was "galloping in the wrong direction".
• 12 January 2005 GayPatriot blog item "Columbia University Wants It All".  Note:  A gay servicemember says "If Columbia University doesn’t want the federal government on its campus, fine. But they shouldn’t expect federal dollars."
• 18 January 2006 Columbia Spectator op-ed "Veterans Deserve Better" by Chris Kulawik CC'08.  Note: Kulawik describes an incident on Activities Day in which a student visiting the Columbia Military Society table was "publicly insulted for being both a minority and a veteran" by three people in a "violent rant" in which "the table nearly flipped".  The student "submitted a complaint to his dean with hopes of a thorough investigation and ultimately disciplinary action against those students who harassed him" and got no response from the administration.  See responses by Jonah Birch, CC ‘05 and Todd Murphy, GS '08.
• 25 January 2006 Columbia Spectator article "A Firm Stance: CU Marine Reservist Targeted In Angry Confrontation; No Disciplinary Action Taken".  Note:  An anti-military incident recounted in an Op-ed column is covered by the Columbia student newspaper.  The Spectator claims that students urging other students to sign up for ROTC was "not allowed on campus" at the time.  This seems wrong.  Even after the 3rd Circuit court decision allowing bans on external recruiters, students always retained the freedom to urge other students to enlist to fight for their country.  After the Supreme Court agreed to review the case, the 3rd Circuit halted implementation of its ruling, removing the restriction on external recruiters.
• 25 January 2006 U.S. Military Veterans of Columbia University press release "Anti-Military Discrimination at Columbia".  Note:  The group "asks that Columbia University amend its Discrimination and Harassment Policy to grant all veterans and military-related persons protected status."
• 27 January 2006 Columbia Spectator Op-ed "The Conservative Witch Hunt" by Zach Zill CC '06.  Note: One of the students who "confronted" pro-ROTC students in the "anti-ROTC incident on Activities Day" denounces the 25 January Spectator news article as part of a "witch-hunt" and denies having made offensive remarks attributed to him.
• 30 January 2006 Columbia Spectator column "Revisiting Vietnam" by Monique Dols GS '06.  Note: Dols observes that "ROTC supporters are making headway by recruiting for the Fordham University and Manhattan College ROTC programs on campus. By increasing the ranks of military personnel on campus, they are laying the groundwork for the program’s future return."  She regards this as a negative development and urges people to "expose the ugly underbelly of US aggression in the world".
• 1 February 2006 New York Sun article "Veterans Take Grievances to Columbia Provost".  Note:  The provost, who spoke passionately against ROTC on campus in May 2005, was to hear complaints about harassment.  The article lists an incorrect tally for the Columbia Senate vote on ROTC in May 2005; it was 53-10.
• 9 February 2006 Columbia Spectator article "Sanchez Lodges Protest: Reserve Marine Files Grievance With SDA Against ISO Protest".  Note:  University spokeswoman Susan Brown said Columbia already includes military status as a protected category in its speech code, and the protection is not limited to Vietnam-era veterans.  International Socialist Organization member Monique Dols GS ’06 said post-Vietnam veterans should not have such protection since they enlisted voluntarily.
• 13 February 2006 Columbia Spectator Op-Ed "ROTC and the Ivory Tower: Cease Fire" by Adam Weinstein.  Note:  A self described "liberal war resister" suggests that if you have disagreements with current military practices "You bring ROTC back to Columbia, and you sign yourself up".  He suggests that to do otherwise is to "keep the military and the ivory tower separate and go on with your life of smug self-satisfaction" and will result in "marginalizing yourselves and alienating potential supporters".  See letter in response on 21 February.
• 21 February 2006 Columbia Spectator letter "Military Veterans Bring Diverse Voices to Columbia Community" by The Executive Board of U.S. Military Veterans of Columbia University (MilVets).  Note:  The MilVets point out that Adam Weinstein’s February 13th column is an example of the political diversity of military veterans on elite campuses.
• 23 February 2006 Columbia University statement of nondiscriminatory policies "Equal educational opportunity and student nondiscrimination policies and procedures on discrimination and harassment".  Note:  The statement begins with the words "Columbia University is committed to providing a learning environment free from unlawful discrimination".  Since the previous antidiscrimination rules had been used to argue against ROTC on the basis of discrimination against openly homosexual people in the military this wording is interesting because "Don't ask, don't tell" is the law, and there fore not unlawful. 
• 6 March 2006 Columbia Spectator article "Supreme Court Upholds Solomon Amendment: Columbia Could Face Choice Between ROTC and Federal Funding".  Note:  The ruling says nothing about ROTC and the reasoning used in upholding the Solomon Amendment, that "recruiters are not part of the law school", does not apply to a full ROTC program, where instructors are faculty members and ROTC courses are in the university's list of courses.  However, the Pentagon's likely offer to Columbia was an ROTC satellite office, not a full ROTC program, for which the faculty appointment and course offering issues would not apply.
• 8 March 2006 Columbia Spectator article "Supreme Court Upholds Solomon Amendment: Unanimous Ruling Affirms Military’s Right to Recruit on College Campuses".  Note:  ROTC opponent Nate Walker TC '07 said it was likely that the Pentagon would use the court victory to seek to restore ROTC at Columbia, while Sean Wilkes CC '06, head of Advocates for Columbia ROTC, said it was unlikely.
• 10 March 2006 The New Republic article "War College" by Peter Beinart.  Note:  Beinart describes the scene outside the Columbia University Senate vote on ROTC on 6 May 2005: "Outside the senate auditorium, some pro-rotc students hung a banner reading a vote for rotc is a vote for the heroes of our generation. With the Court decision as her pretext, Senator Clinton's opportunity is clear: Go to Columbia and tell its leaders that those students are right... Today, the Serviceman's Legal Defense Network--which represents gays and lesbians in the military--understands the same thing. Which is why it does not oppose rotc on campus, even as it struggles heroically against "don't ask, don't tell." It is Bollinger and Brinkley who, by shunning the military, have placed themselves in the oppositional, anti-liberal tradition of the New Left."
• 22 March 2006 Columbia Spectator column "Rumsfeld 1, Columbia 0" by Chris Kulawik CC '08.  Note: Kulawik points out that Columbia has many programs that discriminate by race and gender and concludes that to "claim that ROTC is the only such case ... is blatant hypocrisy".  He also recounts how anti-ROTC students told him that “The racist military takes advantage of minority students; they aren’t able to understand what exactly they’re getting into.”
• 24 March 2006 Columbia Spectator article "Discrimination Policy Amended: New Policy Wording Adds Military Status to Protected Group List".  Note:  When Columbia revised its antidiscrimination rules to include all military veterans it began the statement with the words "Columbia University is committed to providing a learning environment free from unlawful discrimination".  Since the previous antidiscrimination rules had been used to argue against ROTC on the basis of discrimination against openly homosexual people in the military this wording is interesting because "Don't ask, don't tell" is the law, and therefore not unlawful.  However, this Spectator article adds another possible explanation.  University spokesperson Susan Brown said that the new statement "is a semantic clarification, not a policy shift. New York State Law had already held military status as a protected category, and the old policy included “any other legally protected status”".  This suggests the possibility that Columbia may have been trying to include in its policy all forms of unlawful discrimination without meaning to accept forms of discrimination mandated for the military by federal law, but Columbia has not commented more definitively on the wording change.
• 24 March 2006 Columbia Spectator editorial "Opportunity Disguised".  Note:  "Getting as many liberal-minded Columbia lawyers as possible, both gay and straight, into the military’s judge advocate general corps would be one of the best ways to turn the tide against “don’t ask, don’t tell” ... Shunting ROTC off to Fordham is a great symbolic way to protest the military’s policies, but it does very little to accomplish real progress. Increasing Columbia’s involvement with the military through recruiting and ROTC might rankle some, but it would be the best way for Columbians to work for justice."
• 5 April 2006 Detroit News column "Military academy attracts new 'greatest generation'" by Thomas Bray.  Note: Bray observes that 62% of the Army's officers come from ROTC programs "which been making something of a comeback on college campuses" and notes the student-led effort to return ROTC to Columbia.
• 28 April 2006 WNET TV (Channel 13) NY Voices report "Campus Politics".  Note:  Sean Wilkes CC '06, chairman of Advocates for Columbia ROTC discusses the history of ROTC at Columbia.
• 10 May 2006 My Learning Curve blog item "Shane Hachey (GS 04) letter to Columbia University Senate.  Subject: Columbia v. The Military".  Note:  On the first anniversary of the Columbia University Senate vote against ROTC Hachey notes that "this vote had no tangible effect on the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy. It did not "send a message" to anyone in Washington except that our university is hostile to the military".
• 17 May 2006 New York Sun article "At Columbia, First ROTC Event Since '72".  Note:  In contrast to the annual ROTC Commissioning ceremony at Harvard, "the commissioning ceremony is sponsored by the students, not the university."  Columbia Provost Alan Brinkley, who spoke passionately against ROTC at the 6 May 2005 Columbia University Senate meeting that rejected ROTC, will attend the 19 May commissioning.
• 1 June 2006 "Columbia Hosts ROTC Commissioning Ceremony".  Note:  The ceremony was held on 19 May.
• 31 August "The Movement to Restore ROTC at Columbia: Historical Background" by Sean Wilkes CC'06, Chairman, Advocates for Columbia ROTC.
• 8 September 2006 "Military Recruiting at Columbia's Activities Day".
• 12 September 2006 Columbia Spectator column "Agents of Change" by Joanna Bove.  Note: Bove suggests that those who blocked changing Columbia's policy on ROTC were agents of change.  See letter on 15 September.   
• 15 September 2006 Columbia Spectator letter "ROTC not Such a Victory: Progressives Should Welcome Change" by Eric Chen GS'06.  Note:  Responding to a 12 September column, Chen notes "it is an irony that those who blocked changing Columbia's policy on ROTC would call themselves "agents of change"".
• 11 October 2006 Columbia University event Discussion of Citizenship and Military Service at Columbia University.  Note:  Kathy Roth-Douquet and Frank Schaeffer, co-authors of AWOL: the Unexcused Absence of America’s Upper Classes from Military Service—and How It Hurts Our Country talked and answered questions at Columbia.
• 20 October 2006 Columbia Spectator letter "LGBT Groups Create Community, Should Also Focus on National Issues" by Sean Wilkes, CC '06.  Note:  A recent ROTC graduate discusses an article focusing on the atmosphere for gender identity at Columbia and urges activists to focus on national issue too, such as changing the "Don't ask, don't tell" law.
• 24 October 2006 Columbia Spectator article "Doing Our Part in a Time of War" by Eric Chen.  Note: One of the main leaders of the ROTC and veterans movements at Columbia wonders whether to re-enlist or stay in civilian life after graduation.
• November 2006 The Eye (Columbia Spectator) article "Columbia’s Warrior".  Note:  Matt Mireles interviewed Josh Arthur CC '04, in Iraq after graduating from Columbia College and Army ROTC.  Arthur describes how he decided to go into an Army combat unit.
• 3 November 2006 Columbia Spectator column "Reassessing Kerry's Botched Joke" by Brandon Hammer.  Note:  Hammer says it is "pretty true" that students who don't do well in school get "stuck in Iraq".  See response on 10 November.
• 10 November 2006 Columbia Spectator Op-ed column "Stupid Soldiers" by Matthew Dunn and Michael Podberesky.  Note:  Responding to Brandon Hammer's 3 November column, they assemble the evidence that soldiers are above average on many measures of intelligence and income, with fewer at the high and low extremes.  The lack of an ROTC program at elite colleges may account for some of the data.  Similar data was assembled by the New York Times.
• 14 November 2006 Columbia Spectator Op-Ed column "Wake Up Dems, Liberalism is Dead" by Rudi Batzell.  Note:  Batzell calls for increasing the proportion of the military that comes from higher socioeconomic groups, but doesn't call for restoring ROTC at Columbia.
• 25 November 2006 The Eye (Columbia Spectator) article "Letters From Baghdad: Our First Dispatch From the Front Line" by Josh Arthur CC '04.  Note:  Arthur, recently graduated from Columbia and ROTC, is stationed in a Sunni area and describes finding bodies of Shiites "in open fields near mosques, on heavily trafficked corners, or simply in sites that are known as places to expect to find bodies."
• 1 December 2006 The New Republic article "The Academy and Iraq: War College" by Andrew Delbanco.  Note:   Prof. Delbanco writes "For the vast majority of students and faculty in places like Columbia--it's different for support and maintenance staff, who are more likely to have friends or family in the line of fire--war is an utter abstraction rather than an imaginable fact.  Perhaps the deepest divide in our country today runs between those for whom the war is a relentless threat to loved ones and those for whom it is a TV show to be switched on and off.  At places like Columbia, the former is our most underrepresented minority group."  See the 18 December Weekly Standard response and the 1 January response by Austin Byrd.
• 2 December 2006 The Eye (Columbia Spectator) article "Letter from Baghdad - Dispatch # 2" by Josh Arthur CC '04.  Note:  Arthur, recently graduated from Columbia and ROTC, describes how Iraqis are targeting each other more than Americans, but counterinsurgency remains important.
• 4 December 2006 New York Post column "Diversity Double-Talk: Ivy's 'Inclusion' Excludes Military" by Matt Sanchez.
• 5 December 2006 BWOG (Columbia University Blue and White Blog) item "Here we go again...".  Note:  An item on the incident in which Columbia student Matt Sanchez was insulted for his military service is followed by a wide-ranging discussion that included ROTC.  Issues discussed include the question of why Columbia bans ROTC, citing discrimination against gays, but does not ban Red Cross blood drives in which gay men are not allowed to give blood.
• 16 December 2006 Marine Corps Commissioning Ceremony at Columbia University - Mark Xue, CC 06.
• 18 December 2006 The Weekly Standard Scrapbook item "Utter Abstractions at Columbia".  Note: Responding to Prof. Andrew Delbanco's New Republic article the Weekly Standard notes "Delbanco never mentions in his essay that in Columbia's case (as with many other elite universities) there is a simpler explanation than social class for the situation he laments. Columbia banned the Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) from its campus in 1969 at the height of the Vietnam war. And as recently as May 2005, Columbia's Senate (an advisory panel of faculty and students) voted 53-10 to keep Morningside Heights pristinely military free."  See the 1 January response by Austin Byrd.
• January/February 2007 Columbia College Today letters from Josh Arthur CC'04: 7 November, 13 November, 25 November, 19 December.  Note:  Arthur, recently graduated from ROTC and Columbia, describes his deployment and experiences in Iraq.
• 1 January 2007 The Weekly Standard letter "Knights of Columbia" by Austin Byrd.  Note:  A first year student and Marine Corps officer candidate responds to the 18 December Weekly Standard item on the military and Columbia by noting that "the general feeling toward the military community is one of apathy, which in some ways is more difficult to confront than the passion of campus radicals".  Byrd explains that the pro-military students at Columbia "have adopted the strategy of promoting interaction between the military community and the general student body" to overcome this apathy.
• 1 January 2007 Marine Corps Times column "Missing the big picture" by Matt Sanchez.  Note:  Military veteran and Columbia student Matt Sanchez describes how at a recruiting event a group of students started chanting "The military exploits minorities!" to which he responded "I'm a minority; I joined the military, and I don't think I'm being exploited." and was told "That's because you're stupid — too stupid to realize you're being used as cannon fodder." Sanchez goes on describe that "For the academics, joining the Corps over attending an Ivy League school was an obvious sign of desperation."
• 8 January 2007 The Morningside Post (official blog for Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs) blog video item "Columbia's Student Soldiers". Note: Columbia Provost Alan Brinkley said "We're not a particularly attractive campus for ROTC because we don't have space, and the level of interest among our students would probably be relatively low and the Pentagon has not asked us to host an ROTC unit, so its not as if we've refused".
• 15 January 2007 The Eye (Columbia Spectator) article "Special Web-Only: Interview with Lt. Josh Arthur, CC ‘04" Matt Mireles.  Note:  Arthur, recently graduated from Columbia and ROTC, describes how he decided to serve in the military.
• 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 Columbia Spectator op-ed "No Shame in Service" by Sean Wilkes CC'06.  Note:  The recently graduated head of Advocates for Columbia ROTC quotes Lt. Gen. Sir William F. Butler, who warned that "The nation that will insist upon drawing a broad line of demarcation between the fighting man and the thinking man is liable to find its fighting done by fools and its thinking by cowards."
• 24 January 2007 Military Recruiting at Barnard's Activities Fair 2007
• 27 January 2007 Wall Street Journal Op-Ed "Gliberalism" by Ruth Wisse.  Note:  Professor Wisse, a member of Advocates for Harvard ROTC, cites the ban on ROTC at elite universities as a prime example of an attitude "that leaves to others the responsibility for governance, and arrogates to itself the right to criticize".  See 28 January comment by Columbia Prof. Allan Silver.
• 28 January 2007 Comments on Prof. Ruth Wisse's article "Gliberalism" by Prof. Allan Silver.  Note:  Silver, a sociology professor at Columbia and a a leading proponent on the faculty for return of ROTC to Columbia, suggests that both the universities and the country's leadership could do better to create an atmosphere conducive towards return of ROTC to elite universities.  His comments were prompted by Prof. Wisse's 27 January article in the Wall Street Journal.
• 1 February 2006 The Eye (Columbia Spectator) article "Letter from Baghdad - Dispatch # 3" by Josh Arthur CC '04.  Note:  Arthur, recently graduated from Columbia and ROTC, describes an engagement with a lone sniper and how his men showed restraint until they were confident they had identified the attacker.
• 8 February 2006 The Eye (Columbia Spectator) article "Letter from Baghdad - Dispatch # 4" by Josh Arthur CC '04.  Note:  Arthur, recently graduated from Columbia and ROTC, describes his most enduring memory in Baghdad, retrieving a soldier with a fatal wound. 
• 15 February 2007 Columbia Spectator Op-Ed "When Anti-war is Anti-peace" by Eric Chen GS'07.  Note:  One of the leaders of the ROTC and veterans' movements at Columbia observes how anti-war sentiment is undermining nation-building. Through an error, a non-final version of this article was published.  The version that was suppose to be published is here.
• 22 February 2007 Wall Street Journal article "A Retreat From Big Cities Hurts ROTC Recruiting: Though Army Seeks More Ethnic Officers, It Shuns Northeast" (free link with the article attributed to AP here).  Note: By having few ROTC programs in big cities, the military is missing out on recruits who have familiarity with foreign cultures and languages. One of the offices said of New York City "There were times when I felt like I was back in Iraq. There were people dressed in those man-dresses that they wear in Iraq. The women had veils. I know I shouldn't say this, but it made me want to look for IEDs".  Some additional material is at this free WSJ link.  See 25 February Intel Dump blog item for discussion.
• 25 February 2007 Intel Dump Blog item "ROTC retreats from American cities".  Note:  Blogger Phillip Carter discusses the 22 February WSJ article and many respond, including sources for the original article.
• 16 March 2007 film "Indoctrinate-U".  Note:  According to the film maker Evan Coyne Maloney, "about 5 minutes or so in the film" is material dealing with ROTC "near the end of the film. A number of people have told us they feel it is the most infuriating footage in the film." "The segment discusses both ROTC and military recruiters on campus, and the various efforts to bar them from campus. We have footage from San Francisco State, U.C. Berkeley, Columbia and Hobart. U.C. Santa Cruz, Yale.... We get right inside the protests themselves, some of which were quite nasty. All of this is discussed in the context of what sorts of views are welcome on campus (Ward Churchill, for example) and what is not (quite literally, the American flag, which was actually removed from a number of campuses immediately following the September 11th attacks). It packs quite an emotionally powerful punch."
• 19 March 2007 Columbia Spectator column "Bringing the Military to Columbia" by Matt Sanchez.  Note:  Sanchez describes discussions with Columbia officials about healing the rift between Columbia and the military.
• 17 May 2007 Remarks by the President at Joint Reserve Officer Training Corps Commissioning Ceremony.  (Video here)  Note:  President George W. Bush said "All of you have made many sacrifices to receive your commission. Yet some of you have had to endure even greater hardships -- because your universities do not allow ROTC on campus. For those of you in this position, this can require long commutes several times a week to another campus that does offer ROTC, so you can attend a military class, participate in a drill. Most of all, it means living a split existence -- where your life as a cadet or midshipmen is invisible to most of your fellow students.  Every American citizen is entitled to his or her opinion about our military. But surely the concept of diversity is large enough to embrace one of the most diverse institutions in American life. It should not be hard for our great schools of learning to find room to honor the service of men and women who are standing up to defend the freedoms that make the work of our universities possible. To the cadets and midshipmen who are graduating from a college or university that believes ROTC is not worthy of a place on campus, here is my message: Your university may not honor your military service, but the United States of America does. And in this, the people's house, we will always make a place for those who wear the uniform of our country."  Among the officers sworn in at the ceremony were Erik Sand of Harvard, Diana Clough of Stanford and Bret Woellner from Columbia.
• 17 May 2007 Associated Press article "Bush says ROTC has a place on campus".  Note:  "Three of the officers in the White House ceremony came from schools that don't allow ROTC on campus, including Harvard University, Stanford University and Columbia University. Bush saluted their extra sacrifice."
• 17 May 2007 United States American Forces Press Service article "Gates Commissions ROTC Cadets at White House".  Note:  "A change in the 2007 National Defense Authorization Act allows the president, vice president or secretary of defense to administer the oath of commission or enlistment".
• 17 May 2007 United States Department of Defense photos "White House Commissioning Ceremony".  Note:  One of the photos is of U.S. Marine Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff with graduating Harvard ROTC student Erik Sand and his mother.  More photos here and here.
• 17 May 2007 Chronicle of Higher Education News Blog item "Bush Assails Colleges That Shun ROTC Units".  Note:  The Chronicle notes that in addition to colleges that ban ROTC there are colleges where there is no ROTC program because the Pentagon concluded that there were "poor prospects of finding good recruits".
• 17 May 2007 New York Sun article "Bush Rebukes Universities On ROTC Ban".  Note:  "Yesterday's ceremony featured a diverse group of cadets from all 50 states and included a graduate student at Columbia, Bret Woellner, who was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Army.  The president's statement took officials at a few leading universities aback. Spokesmen at NYU and Harvard and Yale universities, which also do not offer ROTC on campus, did not respond publicly.  Riaz Zaidi, president of Columbia's Hamilton Society, a military group, said the president's words were "gratifying."  Mr. Zaidi, a cadet in the Fordham ROTC program, said that while he thought the military should reconsider the "don't ask, don't tell" policy, Columbia should reinstate the officer-training program regardless."  See response by Paul E. Mawn, head of Advocates for Harvard ROTC.
• 18 May 2007 New York Sun reader comment "Observations on the commissioning select ROTC students in the White House" by Paul E. Mawn.  Note:  The head of Advocates for Harvard ROTC responds to the previous day's article and wrote that universities "need diversity which is also based on opinion and provides a climate of tolerance and acceptance for undergraduates who believe in duty, honor and country".
• 18 May 2007 New York Sun editorial "Redeeming Columbia".  Note:  Citing Columbia's rejection of ROTC in 2005 and the ROTC commissioning of Columbia student Bret Woellner, the Sun wrote "a generation or so hence the shame of Columbia will be lessened, its honor redeemed by the fact that Lieutenant Woellner made his choice, got up early, did his drills, learned to lead, and, in the East Room of the White House, stepped forward to accept a commission from the Congress in a time of war."
• 27 May 2007 Washington Times editorial "Bring back ROTC".  Note:  "It's time for Harvard, Columbia, Yale and other schools to heed what President Bush said last week: "It should not be hard for our great schools of learning to find room to honor the service of men and women who are standing up to defend the freedoms that make the work of our universities possible." It's time to give ROTC a chance."
• 30 May 2007 Letter from Columbia University School of General Studies Dean Peter J. Awn inviting members of the armed services to apply to Columbia.  Note:  Dean Awn wrote that "the experience and talents that these students bring to Columbia enhance immeasurably the academic discourse in the classroom" and announced Columbia's new military-veteran Web site: www.columbia.edu/cu/gs/military.
• 7 September 2007 Wall Street Journal letter by Shane Cotner.  Note:  Responding to an article about the role of alumni in university governance, Cotner wrote "Dartmouth alumni are fortunate to have a man like T.J. Rodgers to represent their views, and a mechanism that allows those alumni to elect leaders like him to its board of trustees. As an alum of Columbia, my views have no comparable representation of which I am aware. When I hear about Columbia pursuing policies such as the banning of ROTC, and its lack of punishment for students who abuse conservative speakers, I realize I have no recourse whatsoever."
• 20 September 2007 Weekly Standard column "Columbia University: Ahmadinejad Yes, ROTC No" by William Kristol.  Note: Kristol contrasts hosting a talk and question period by the Iranian president with Columbia's prohibition of ROTC based on its campus.  
• 20 September 2007 Wall Street Journal "Best of the Web Today" item "Columbia's Priorities" by James Taranto.  Note:  Taranto embellishes William Kristol's point about the Iranian president and ROTC by noting that Iran executes people for homosexual acts.
• 20 September 2007 New York Sun article "Outrage Builds Over Ahmadinejad Visit to Columbia".  Note: Mr. McCain said "A man who is directing the maiming and killing of American troops should not be given an invitation to speak at an American university. Rather than rolling out the red carpet for the leader of a terrorist-sponsoring regime, Columbia should be welcoming the Reserve Officers' Training Corps back on campus to honor the men and women who put their lives on the line every day defending our freedom."
• 21 September 2007 Wall Street Journal editorial "Lee Bollinger, Tough Guy".  Note:  The Journal criticizes Columbia for hosting the Iranian president, yet not allowing ROTC.
• 22 September 2007 Fox & Friends Interview with Ted Graske Jr., Chairman of the Columbia Alliance for ROTC.  Note:  Graske discussed the irony of Columbia hosting Iranian President Ahmadinejad and banning ROTC from campus.
• 24 September 2007 Fox News interview with Columbia student Kelley Victor-Gasper '09.  Note:  Victor-Gasper, a Marine corps officer candidate notes the irony of Columbia's welcoming of Iranian President Ahmadinejad and banning of ROTC from campus.  He notes that the ROTC ban is a protest against US law about homosexuality in the military, yet Ahmadinejad's regime executes people for homosexuality.
• 27 September 2007 speech by Senator John McCain at the Hudson Institute.  Note:  McCain noted that the Iranian president was welcomed at Columbia but ROTC was not, and said "Harvard and other great American universities remain closed to ROTC, whose graduates represent the bulk of the officers commissioned into our Armed Forces each year.  Some academic elites may not like ROTC, and they are free to voice their objections.  But they are wrong, and I stand with the many graduates of these institutions who for years have been trying in vain to bring ROTC back to their campuses."
• 4 October 2007 Columbia Spectator column "ROTC Presence Is Not a Free Speech Issue" by Rebecca Evans.  Note:  Evans observes "We certainly did not, and will not, invite Ahmadinejad to set up a campus-based institution intended for recruitment and training... A more apt and pressing statement is this: if Columbia truly cares about questioning the ideologies and actions of those with whom it disagrees, it will welcome a military or government official who would be willing to speak to—and be spoken to by—the Columbia community".
• 29 October 2007 Columbia Spectator column "Why Columbia Needs the Marine Corps and Vice Versa" by Michael Christman.  Note:  A 2000 engineering graduate joined the Marines and urges others to do the same.  "How can Columbia hope to produce the next generation of American leaders if it refuses to walk a mile in the shoes of those of whom we ask the most?"
• 14 November 2007 Fordham Law Review 76: 955-79 "Myth and Reality of University Trusteeship in the Post-Enron Era" by José A. Cabranes.  Note:  Judge Cabranes, a trustee of Columbia University, notes how "trustees play no significant role even on major questions relating to the external relations of universities to the government that subsidizes them in so many ways, for example, whether a university should offer its students the opportunity to participate in reserved [sic] officers’ training corps (ROTC) programs.  The usual playbook is this: Trustees are informed by presidents that, for a variety of political or academic reasons, the faculty would find the return of ROTC intolerable and that any action to the contrary by trustees would make the president’s own position within the university untenable. Given the power of the faculties, the president is probably right. In any case, trustees will be reluctant to make the president vulnerable in the polity he knows far better than they."
• 2 December 2007 Army ROTC Commissioning Ceremony at Columbia University.

2008:

• 15 January 2008 Federal News Service transcript "The Democratic Debate in Las Vegas".  Note:  Moderator Tim Russert asked "There's a federal statute on the books which says that, if a college or university does not provide space for military recruiters or provide a ROTC program for its students, it can lose its federal funding.  Will you vigorously enforce that statute?" Senator Clinton said "Yes, I will...  I think that everyone should make available an opportunity for a young man or woman to be in ROTC, to be able to join the military and I'm going to do everything I can to support the men and women in the military and their families."  Russert followed-up by asking "Of the top 10 rated schools, Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Stanford, they do not have ROTC programs on campus.  Should they?" and Clinton responded "Well, there are ways they can work out fulfilling that obligation. But they should certainly not do anything that either undermines or disrespects the young men and women who wish to pursue a military career."  To the same question about ROTC Senator Obama responded "Yes. One of the striking things, as you travel around the country, you go into rural communities and you see how disproportionally they are carrying the load in this war in Iraq, as well as Afghanistan. And it is not fair. Now, the volunteer Army, I think, is a way for us to maintain excellence."  Senator Edwards also responded affirmatively but switched immediately to discuss veterans' issue.  None of the candidates mentioned the "Don't ask, don't tell" law cited by these universities in banning ROTC. 
• 22 January 2008 Young America's Foundation ad "Bring ROTC back onto Columbia's campus!" in the Columbia Spectator.  Note:  The quotes are from the Las Vegas Democratic presidential debate.
• 28 January 2008 Columbia Spectator column "ROTC Policy Opens Columbia to Awkward Comparisons, Criticisms" by Josh Hirschland.  Note:  Hirschland observes that "student and administrative actions have made it easier for those from outside the University to caricature it as anti-American" and "Columbia may have to adapt to changing circumstances or risk irreparable damage to its standing".
• 29 January 2008 Columbia Spectator editorial "ROTC, Not DADT".  Note:  Columbia's student newspaper called for the return of ROTC to campus, arguing that "the military has too integral a role in American culture and society to be summarily banned from campus... to deny the military access to campus outright disengages Columbia from military issues and renders the University largely irrelevant in discussions of how issues like DADT should be addressed."  See letter on 31 January and a note from the editor on 31 January.
• 31 January 2008 Columbia Spectator "Letter to the Editor" by Aries Dela Cruz.  Note:  The vice president of the Columbia Queer Alliance criticizes the Spectator editorial that took a position on ROTC rather than following "Spec’s intended role as an objective instrument of campus media" and upholding "fundamental values of equality and justice".
• 31 January 2008 Columbia Spectator "Note From the Editor".  Note:  The editor clarifies that the 29 January editorial "was intended to convey the belief that Columbia should meet the needs of all its students. This includes the needs of those who desire to enlist in the ROTC program—but this also includes the needs of those who believe ROTC violates basic human rights."
• 4 February 2008 Columbia Spectator article "Candidates, Cadets Wrestle With ROTC Presence".  Note:  The article discusses how to create an atmosphere supportive of ROTC at Columbia, from increasing the number of ROTC students to pleading with the military ‘Please take us seriously—we want to serve.’
• 8 February 2008 Columbia Spectator column "Keep Columbia Out of the War" by David Judd.  Note:  Judd writes that it is a "black mark" on Columbia that a tenth of a percent of its endowment is invested in defense contractors, and "by maintaining its investments, Columbia does not maintain its neutrality. It has chosen to own a piece of the war".  He argues that Columbia should not support ROTC since the mission of the military "currently centers on a disastrous occupation".
• 25 February 2008 Columbia University Hamilton Society "Why We Serve" Event.  Note:  Photos from the even described the next day in a Columbia Spectator article.
• 26 February 2008 Columbia Spectator article "Military Men Reflect on Careers, Motivations".  Note:  The Hamilton Society, an undergraduate military advocacy group, sponsored a program in which recent veterans described their experiences in the military.  Air Force Staff Sergeant Jason Kimberling said “I’ve walked through a lot of villages in Afghanistan where the Taliban has come through and cut the hands off all the children... When you see those things, it’s pretty clear in my mind the difference between what’s right and what’s wrong. I know why I’m there.”  Photos are at this link.
• Spring 2008 Columbia Owl article "Invaluable Vets".  Note: Columbia "boasts the largest number of vets in the Ivy League".  Provost Alan Brinkley said “The opposition to ROTC was based on the military’s ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy that violates our own anti-discrimination rules...  I don’t believe those who opposed ROTC on those grounds had any animus towards veterans or the military.”

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Last updated 13 April 2008