Northwestern University and Evanston's Only Daily News Source Since 1881

The Daily Northwestern

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Northwestern University and Evanston's Only Daily News Source Since 1881

The Daily Northwestern

Northwestern University and Evanston's Only Daily News Source Since 1881

The Daily Northwestern

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Feeling the pull of patriotism

On Sept. 11, most Northwestern students were in living rooms or offices or malls, not knowing what to feel or do as the tragedy on television united the country in horror and disbelief. Most were not, like Speech junior Joshua Lindsay, on a naval base training for war.

Lindsay is a member of the Naval Reserve Officers’ Training Corps at NU, a program that prepares students for military leadership after college graduation. He was at the Great Lakes Naval Base when the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were hit by hijacked airplanes, and Lindsay gathered with others on the base to hear the latest developments.

“After that, it gave purpose to what we were training for,” he said.

But while patriotic feelings have surged, armed services officials said they’re unsure if the feelings will translate into increased enlistment numbers. They said a draft is unlikely despite the concerns of many NU students and their parents, who lived through the last draft during the Vietnam War.

Among those students are Naval ROTC members who are mentally preparing themselves for the new challenges that may await them once they graduate.

“More now than last year,” Lindsay said, “I’m seeing this as more of a military career than just a job after school.”

Lindsay said he felt encouraged seeing new members of the Naval ROTC view the disaster with “determination and maybe more commitment than what could have been a ‘what did I get myself into’ attitude.”

Lindsay said Americans across the nation are beginning to see the Navy and the Marines as opportunities to serve the country.

But Brian Curtice, a Navy public affairs officer representing the Chicago area, said that while interest in the Navy has increased since the tragedy, recruitment has not.

“We’re getting a lot of phone calls and a few more walk-ins,” he said. But Curtice added that over half of the people making inquiries were veterans.

“People are looking to reaffiliate with the reserves” in particular, he said.

Nicola McCuin, a spokeswoman for the Marines in the Chicago area, said she is seeing a similar pattern and that recruiting efforts will not be intensified.

“A national tragedy such as this is not something the Marine Corps would usually use for recruitment purposes,” she said. “We’re still focused on the same ideals to get physically, morally and mentally qualified applicants.”

Naval ROTC students cannot be called into active duty until graduation, NU recruiting coordinator Autumn Swinford said.

“While we’re here,” she said, “we’re safe.”

But despite the challenges of war, Swinford said she hopes more people consider joining ROTC programs and the nation’s armed forces.

“People could shy away because it feels like danger,” said Swinford, a Weinberg sophomore. But recent events also could “foster feelings of strength and even greater patriotism and wanting to fight for the country.”

Sociology Prof. Charles Moskos, a former military adviser to President Clinton, is skeptical. Regardless of the heroism recently seen amid the rubble of the World Trade Center, he said national sentiment will not extend beyond rabid flag-waving to increased enlistment. Nor will the Naval ROTC experience greater enrollment. And that, he said, is a problem.

“No one’s running to join the armed forces, but it makes us all feel good to fly flags,” he said. “It’s make-believe patriotism. I think it’s a lot of self-delusion.”

Moskos added that there weren’t enough Naval ROTC students to begin with, and said that NU’s Naval ROTC members “are precisely the kinds of officers the military needs.”

He also said a lack of willing talent might spur new initiatives such as a national security force, in which college-age Americans would serve one or two years in airport security or sky marshalling, possibly in exchange for educational grants. It also might “bring back talk of the draft,” he said.

“I would go to war for my country,” said Imran Khan, a Weinberg freshman. “If I were drafted, I would.”

Yet Khan’s faith in American ideals has been tested by recent anti-Islamic backlash in the wake of the terrorist attacks. Khan said a friend of his sister’s was run over multiple times last week by a man driving a sport utility vehicle who targeted her because of her traditional Islamic appearance.

Khan said it is important to enter a war fueled by patriotism and not hatred, and he worries there will be a bias against Muslims like himself for many years to come, even in a war during which he fights for the United States.

Weinberg freshman Matthew Koppel said he was concerned that if people were drafted, many would not understand the implications.

“I don’t see anything wrong with drafting people, but we have to take into consideration that it is a different world than it was in the ’60s,” he said. “People’s priorities have changed. The world has changed. America has changed a lot. And we don’t even really understand who we’re fighting yet.”

He added that despite his belief in America, he morally opposes taking the life of another human being and so would feel greatly conflicted if asked to go to war.

But Weinberg sophomore Rachel Bloom said that she feels democracy is worth fighting for.

“I have a very strong feeling of the necessity of democracy in this country, and I am willing to fight if that’s what is necessary in order to keep the democracy alive,” she said.

“We’re fighting a war for safety in our own country,” she added, “so I think people would be much more willing to give their lives for a cause like that.”

But Brig. Gen. Andrew Davis, the director of Marine Corps Public Affairs at the Pentagon, said NU students won’t have to put themselves at risk. He said that while inquiries since the attacks have not “yet translated into firm enlistments,” recruitment has not been a problem in the past and he does not believe that it will be now.

Harold Heilsnis, a public affairs officer for Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, said the possibility of a draft is “extremely remote,” but added that he understands concern among college students.

“In terms of the number of people needed, we don’t perceive dramatic increases that would require a draft,” he said. “Although the military will be a component of this, this will not be a large set-piece battle like Desert Storm,” Heilsnis said.

The Department of Defense has not yet released statistics on how enlistment has been affected by the attacks, but according to Heilsnis, the volunteer force has “worked well” for over 25 years and should continue to be successful. He added that many initiatives besides the draft are being discussed, including issuing war bonds and airline security initiatives similar to those suggested by Moskos.

“There’s a lot of ideas out there,” he said. But “we’re concentrating right now on getting the terrorists.”

Meanwhile, Joshua Lindsay plans to continue his Naval ROTC training so that he can offer his leadership skills to the military once he graduates.

But Moskos said all Americans will be affected by the fallout of the terrorist attacks. He said that approximately every 70 years, a crisis arises that defines a generation.

“Your generation is due,” he said.

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Northwestern University and Evanston's Only Daily News Source Since 1881
Feeling the pull of patriotism