Opinion dismisses judgment of many on campus

Brown University and the ROTC | Letter

October 27, 2011

RE “BROWN should restore ROTC, bridging college-military divide’’ (Oct. 22): The Globe editorial calling upon the Brown University governing board to reverse the recent decision not to reinstate ROTC on campus dismisses the judgment of a majority of those who work and study there.

Your claim that Brown’s decision to continue the 1969 policy on ROTC “hints at a broader objection to the military, more cultural than political,’’ rests on a deeply misleading distinction. Questions about discrimination against soldiers on the basis of their sexual or gender identity are both cultural and political - as, in a different way, are questions about spending vast sums of public money to support corrupt undemocratic regimes instead of investing it in jobs, schools, and health care.

Furthermore, your emphasis on overcoming the “cultural divide’’ between universities and the US military is based on the illusion that university academic programs can directly alter military policy and culture. Military politic is determined by political forces operating on and within a hierarchical structure of command that is at odds with the free, independent intellectual inquiry that all universities and colleges are supposed to foster.

The most important thing universities can do in a time of war is to preserve their commitment to intellectual independence, debate, and open-mindedness.

This is particularly important now, when the United States is engaged in a series of unpopular wars involving secretly determined tactics such as targeted assassinations and drone strikes.

William Keach

Providence