West Point Magazine Fall 2022

The mission of West Point magazine is to tell the West Point story and strengthen the grip of the Long Gray Line.

PUBLISHER

West Point Association of Graduates

Todd A. Browne ’85, The Honorable & Mrs. Robert A. McDonald ’75 President & CEO

EDITOR IN CHIEF

Jaye Donaldson editor@wpaog.org

ASSOCIATE EDITOR

Keith J. Hamel

EDITORIAL ADVISORY GROUP

Patrick Ortland ’82 Samantha Soper

Terence Sinkfield ’99

CREATIVE DIRECTOR

Marguerite Smith

CONTENT

Keith Hamel Jenn Voigtschild ’93

Erika Norton

ADVERTISING

845.446.1646 | ads@wpaog.org

ADDRESS UPDATES

West Point Association of Graduates

ATTN: Data Services Team

698 Mills Road, West Point, NY 10996-1607

845.446.1644 | address@wpaog.org

MEMORIAL ARTICLE MANAGER

Marilee Meyer HON ’56 and ’66

845.446.1545 | memorials@wpaog.org

Opinions expressed in this magazine are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, policy, or attitude of the U.S. Army, United States Military Academy, West Point Association of Graduates, its officers, or the editorial staff. The appearance of advertisements in this publication does not necessarily constitute an endorsement by the U.S. Army, United States Military Academy, West Point Association of Graduates, its officers, or the editorial staff for the products or services advertised.

POSTMASTER

WestPointis published quarterly in Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall. Send address changes to: WestPointmagazine, West Point Association of Graduates, 698 Mills Road, West Point, NY 10996-1607 WestPointis printed by Sheridan NH.

SUBSCRIPTIONS

Subscriptions may be ordered for $25 (domestic mail) online at WestPointAOG.org; by calling 800.BE.A.GRAD; or by sending a check to WPAOG, WestPointmagazine, 698 Mills Road, West Point, NY 10996-1607.

ON THE COVER: Over 600 cadets participated in Air Assault training at West Point during Cadet Summer Training.

Photo: Christopher Hennen/USMA PAO

THIS ISSUE

7 Ready to Lead. Ready to Serve.

8 Meet the Dean: A Conversation with BG Shane Reeves ’96 BG Reeves discusses his first year as Dean, his priorities for the Academic Program, and the importance of engagement.

12 COVER STORY: USMA Academic Program Update: An Overview 20

24

28

34

36 USMA 2026

On R-Day 2022, more than 1,200 soon-to-be plebes reported to West Point to begin their 47-month experience. 38

3 From the President

4 From the Superintendent

6 WPAOG Military Retiree Recognition Program

10 Parents Corner

18 WPAOG News

32 Poster: Lake Frederick Tent City

53 Gripping Hands

59 Mailbox

For

Dear Fellow Graduates:

I am excited to share with the Long Gray Line that our Board Chair and Distinguished Graduate, the Honorable Robert A. McDonald, Class of 1975, and his wife, Diane, have committed $10 million dollars in support of our Association of Graduates.

This tremendous and historic gift is the largest ever in support of your WPAOG. Bob and Diane’s investment in our mission, To Serve West Point and the Long Gray Line, is a transformative gift that will play a vital role in supporting and growing the association’s programs well into the future. In the past six years, with your support, we have expanded our programs and services for graduates, launched new initiatives in support of West Point and the local community, and continued to increase philanthropy for our beloved alma mater. This gift will ensure that WPAOG builds on this momentum, bringing us closer to our vision, For the Long Gray Line to be the most highly connected alumni body in the world.

Setting the example for philanthropic leadership, Bob and Diane are the largest donors to WPAOG, top five in lifetime giving to the Academy, and the current lead donors to the Class of 1975 50th Reunion Class Gift. In addition, Bob has agreed to serve as Chair for the West Point Ready Campaign, currently in the nucleus phase (more to come on this exciting effort!). Bob and Diane’s enduring commitment to West Point and WPAOG, both in volunteer leadership and generosity, is an inspiration.

WPAOG will recognize this extraordinary commitment with the naming of the President and CEO position and office

suite at Herbert Alumni Center. I am honored to be the first person to hold this position named for Bob and Diane. They inspire us all!

One of WPAOG’s new initiatives is the Hudson Valley Project, the goal of which is to improve the vitality and vibrancy of Highland Falls. This initiative directly aligns with our mission to Serve West Point and the Long Gray Line. The vitality of the village is critical to USMA’s ability to attract the best cadets, staff, and faculty, which is one of USMA’s lines of effort in its strategic plan. A vibrant Highland Falls is also important in our efforts to encourage graduates to visit their Rockbound Highland Home and stay connected to their alma mater. Fundamental to the health of the local community is a strong school system, so one of our first efforts is an after-school program. After a successful pilot last spring, we have launched a five-dayper-week after-school program called CONNECT that provides high quality educational experiences.

Speaking of the fall semester, we had another successful summer at West Point as we welcomed the Class of 2026 (“To Country We Commit”) and their parents. Now that we are into the academic year, this issue of West Point covers all the latest developments of USMA’s Academic Program, with several articles written by members of the Dean’s Team. I thank them for their contribution. They have submitted articles on West Point’s applied research model, the Academy’s faculty, the general and specific points of the Academic Program and more.

Fall is also the season for the Nininger and Thayer awards at West Point. I would like to congratulate Lieutenant Colonel Robert Beale, the 2022 Alexander R. Nininger Award recipient, and Mr. Ken Fisher, Chairman and CEO of Fisher House Foundation, the 2022 Sylvanus Thayer Award recipient. You will have the opportunity to read about both in the 2023 Winter issue of West Point.

Grip Hands!

The Honorable Robert A. McDonald, Class of 1975, and his wife, Diane.

WEST POINT ASSOCIATION OF GRADUATE S

Todd A. Browne ’85

The Honorable & Mrs. Robert A. McDonald ’75 President & CEO West Point Association of Graduates

Long Gray Line Teammates:

It is an honor and privilege to return to our Rockbound Highland Home to serve as your 61st Superintendent. Betsy and I are humbled by the opportunity and journey that the Army has allowed us to embark on here at West Point. Many thanks to General Darryl Williams and his spouse, Erin, for their steadfast and devoted service to the Military Academy over the past four years. They led our institution during some challenging times, and we are better for it.

Returning to West Point reminded me that most of us jump on the train and just try to hang on. This summer was no exception. Our summer training of all classes introduced some new technology, leadership techniques, and blocks of instruction across all of cadet training. Our first months have been fast, furious, and rewarding. As we concluded summer training, I challenged the Corps, and the entire West Point Team, to maintain the momentum from the summer and carry the energy and motivation into the academic year. Our teams continue to deliver. There’s a high level of motivation throughout the Corps as they continue to inspire each other.

I’ve enjoyed meeting with and speaking with many of you over the past few months as you’ve returned to West Point for various cadet and alumni events. My thanks to all of you, especially our 50-Year Affiliate classes, for gripping hands with the Corps during the recent milestone events (March Back, Acceptance Day, Affirmation Ceremony and Ring Weekend), as well as the many alumni who returned for the WPAOG Leaders Conference and class reunions.

While I’ve completed my first 100 days as your Superintendent, we continue to conduct routine assessments of our programs and lines of effort to ensure we continue to pursue excellence as the world’s preeminent leader development institution. My focus is ensuring that your Academy continues to provide the best possible leader development experience for the Corps, as we educate, train, and inspire them to lead, fight and win on the 21st century battlefield.

As I’ve shared with you over the past several weeks, the “inspire” aspect of our mission statement is critically important. While education and training prepare us to serve, inspiration helps define why we serve, underpinned by our values, ideals, and shared commitment to support and defend the Constitution.

When you grip hands with the Corps and each other, especially with our younger graduates leading throughout our Army, you inspire them with your example of honorable service and

leadership. They see what “right” looks like in us. This is critically important, as our nation looks to West Point to see what right looks like, which is why the Chief of Staff of the Army refers to USMA as the “gold standard.” Therefore, it is important that we “get it right” every day, and we rely on your support and inspiration to help us do just that.

As we inspire the Corps through our example, they, in turn, inspire us through their accomplishments, character, and motivation. Those of you who have been here recently saw this first-hand, and many of you shared with me personally how inspired you were by these outstanding young men and women.

Those of you who have visited West Point recently have undoubtedly noticed our ongoing construction and modernization efforts. Construction continues on the future Cyber and Engineering Academic Center, and we anticipate an August 2025 grand opening. We recently started the renovation of Cullum Hall, which will house the USMA Archives in the lower two levels (the first and second floors will be relatively unchanged). Additionally, the construction of the “Patton Swing Facility” between Jefferson Library and Johnson Stadium at Doubleday Field will be crucial to enabling our broader academic building upgrade program over the next 15 years. We’ve completed the first phase of renovations at Camp Buckner and Phase Two is underway, with subsequent phases to follow over the next few years. Additionally, Phase Two of the cemetery expansion is complete and we’re excited for the ribbon cutting this month.

These efforts are part of the broader initiative to enhance and expand our capabilities. We are grateful for the tremendous support we continue to receive from the Army, as well as for your generous support through various Margin of Excellence programs.

In addition to developing highly trained leaders of character for the Army, I’m also committed to helping solve the Army’s most pressing challenges as a center for intellectual capital. This issue of West Point magazine focuses on the Academy’s outstanding and nationally recognized Academic Program, highlighting that intellectual capital and how we educate critical thinkers to lead in the 21st century Army.

Once again, I’m honored and humbled to be your Superintendent. Thank you for your continued support of your alma mater and inspiring our nation’s future leaders of character.

GO ARMY!

Steven W. Gilland ’90 Lieutenant General, U.S. Army 61st Superintendent, U.S. Military Academy

Offer or Find Help with the Grads Helping Grads Program

Grads Helping Grads works to connect grads in need of assistance with information that may help or with grads who can assist. The program matches offers and requests based on need. Many of the individuals involved don’t know each other but they are forever connected through the Long Gray Line!

Military Retiree Recognition Program

WPAOG’s Military Retiree Recognition Program honors our military retirees for their service and sacrifice. If you retired on October 1, 2017 or later, you and three guests are eligible for a free Grad Insider Tour, as well as a free night at The Thayer Hotel, subject to restrictions. We will also publish your name in West Point magazine, with your permission.

If you wish to participate, please contact retiree@wpaog.org to learn more.

The following graduates retired from active, reserve, or National Guard duty. We thank you for serving this great nation, and the Association looks forward to serving you. 

Name Class

COL Jeffrey A. Agee 1992

LTC John E. Livingstone 1993

LTC Charles A. Sulewski Jr. 1996

COL Christopher A. Bachl 1997

LTC Jeffrey S. Dietz 1998

Ready to Lead. Ready to Serve.

OnAugust 12, 2022, the Honorable Robert A. McDonald, Class of 1975, and his wife, Diane, committed $10 million in support of the West Point Association of Graduates. To recognize this tremendous and historic gift, the largest ever in support of WPAOG, the President and CEO position, as well as the President’s office suite at Herbert Alumni Center, have been named for Bob and Diane.

The Honorable Robert A. McDonald—8th Secretary, Department of Veterans Affairs; Retired Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer, Procter & Gamble; current Chairman of the West Point of Graduates; and Cabinet Chair of WPAOG’s current seven-year campaign—is one of West Point’s major supporters and an inspiration for all members of the Long Gray Line. In 2012, he and Diane established the McDonald Conference for Leaders of Character (MCLC) in partnership with the Department of Behavioral Sciences and Leadership and its Head, Colonel Everett Spain ’92. Since its inception, MCLC has touched the lives of more than 600 undergraduate student and senior leaders from across the globe, bringing them together in an effort to bolster leadership skills, foster critical thinking and collaboration, and develop strategies for addressing pressing global issues. In 2019, Bob and Diane funded the Ulysses S. Grant Monument and surrounding plaza, which was placed along Washington Road near Trophy Point and unveiled at West Point on April 25, 2019. On January 1, 2022, Bob began a three-year term as Chairman of the West Point Association of Graduates Board of Directors, after previously serving two terms as a board director. In his inaugural correspondence to fellow graduates, he said, “Let us all rededicate ourselves to the ideals of West Point—Duty, Honor, Country—and continue to stand out as leaders of character inspired by values which are selfless and immutable even in changing times.”

Setting the example for philanthropic leadership, the McDonalds are among the largest donors to WPAOG, top five in lifetime giving to the Academy, and the current lead donors to the Class of 1975 50th Reunion Class Gift. Their enduring commitment to West Point and WPAOG, both in volunteer leadership and generosity, should inspire us all.

A 2017 Distinguished Graduate of the United States Military Academy, the Honorable McDonald graduated in the top two percent of his class in 1975 and was recognized by the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufacturing, and Commerce for the “most distinguished academic record and significant role in cadet activities.” He served as brigade adjutant. In 1978, he earned an MBA from the University of Utah, where he is also a Distinguished Alumnus.

Diane is a graduate of Chatham College. She has been involved in many volunteer and philanthropic activities over the years. From her work with local groups like the Girl Scouts and PTA to her establishing a global non-profit to care for Proctor & Gamble families, Diane’s caring leadership always comes through.

Honorable McDonald’s lifetime of service was recently highlighted by two former presidents as he received the Horatio Alger Award. George W. Bush said, “Bob is a great citizen of the United States and a fine businessman and a friend,” and Barack Obama noted: “Bob often says that he aims to choose the harder right instead of the easier wrong. From his time at West Point onward, we can see that Bob has lived a life of choosing the ‘right.’…May we all strive to follow Bob’s example of humble service and principled leadership.”

The Honorable Robert A. McDonald, Class of 1975, and his wife, Diane.

Meet the Dean

Photo: Erika Norton/WPAOG

A Conversation with BG Shane Reeves ’96

By MAJ Renée Sanjuán ’09, Guest Writer

Brigadier General Shane Reeves ’96, the 15th Dean of the Academic Board at West Point, holds a J.D. from the College of William and Mary, an LL.M. in military law from the Judge Advocate General’s Legal Center and School, and a B.S. from the United States Military Academy. He was commissioned into the Army in 1996 as an Armor officer. After law school in 2003, he transitioned into the Judge Advocate General’s Corps, taking on several assignments: Senior Trial Counsel, International and Operational Law Professor, and Deputy Staff Judge Advocate of Joint Special Operations Command. Reeves has written more than 30 articles and book chapters on the law of armed conflict and national security issues, and he co-founded West Point’s Lieber Institute for Law and Land Warfare. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Reeves most recently served as U.S. Military Academy Professor and Head of the Department of Law. He is married to Kimberly Reeves, and for more than 10 years they have called West Point their home, where they have raised their three children: Charlie, Samantha, and Beth.

Q: What are you most proud of from the past academic year?

A: May 27th marked one year since I started this position. My biggest takeaway is that the work across the directorate is tremendous, and I could not be prouder to be a part of this brilliant and impactful team. We had more Rhodes and Marshall scholars this year than any other school in the nation, and we had a historic number of National Science Foundation Fellows. Our AIAD program is back in full swing, sending nearly 950 cadets across 31 countries and 34 states! Our faculty members were awarded millions of dollars in public and private funding for their groundbreaking research. These successes come back to our incredible team at the Academy. I challenge anyone to find a more collaborative faculty dedicated to mission accomplishment. We pursue excellence for the sole purpose of developing cadets for the intellectual rigors of future warfare.

Q: Could you expand on your recent emphasis on engagement?

A: Engagement has been a huge initiative for me! We established an Engagement Team within the Dean’s directorate, led by our first-ever Vice Dean for Engagement, Professor Rob Barnsby ’96. We have also made significant strides in amplifying our academic success and capabilities through comprehensive social media outreach on all platforms. For the first time, our directorate took over the entire Army’s social media account on Projects Day—a spectacular success providing Department of the Army- and Department of Defense-level visibility to our annual academic Super Bowl. To better leverage and showcase our intellectual capital for external and internal audiences, we launched a Dean’s fireside chat series for cadets and faculty, which involves a diverse array of speakers, ranging from senior officers to policy practitioners to business leaders. We have also fostered several new partnerships in government, industry, and

academia to support the Superintendent’s efforts in this regard while continuing to reinforce the Academy’s preeminence at the nexus of academia and military innovation.

Q: What are your priorities for the remainder of your tenure as the Dean?

A: Looking ahead, I have four priorities. Although we have complex efforts to support each, I will highlight a few. My first priority is driving a rigorous education that prepares cadets to thrive in complex and uncertain environments. We are growing our commitment to research through the Academic Research Division. Through a robust applied research and project-based educational model, paired with a broad liberal arts education, cadets are challenged every day to overcome challenges and lead through uncertainty. My second priority is fostering a culture of commitment to cadet development by emphasizing standards, collaboration, and innovation. Coming back from the height of COVID-19, I am placing a strong emphasis on ensuring that our academic spaces are meeting—and exceeding—the standard so we can focus on driving collaboration and innovation. My third priority is having a world-class military and civilian faculty that is professional and deliberately recruited, developed, and enabled. Our Center for Faculty Excellence has several new faculty development initiatives to ultimately enhance the classroom experience. Lastly, my fourth priority is leveraging the Academy’s intellectual capital to benefit the Army and the nation. Our new Engagement Team provides Dean-level emphasis and resources for strategic communications and partnership initiatives. Our centers and institutes do the hard work of building and strengthening our partnerships and collaboration opportunities.

Q: Aside from your many recent initiatives over the past year, what else should graduates be looking for within the Academic Program?

A: Where do I start? First and foremost, be on the lookout for our staff and faculty’s tremendous accomplishments, which we will highlight every chance we get! Our scholars’ dedication to enriching the cadet experience through their personal growth and that of their disciplines is astounding. Next, related to faculty excellence, we are launching a West Point Press! The West Point Press will serve as the publishing arm of the United States Military Academy at West Point. West Point’s position as the intellectual center of the Army and the Academy Leadership’s desire to remain a top-tier institution that attracts and retains the best cadets and faculty necessitates the founding of a West Point Press. [Editor’s Note: The West Point Press is a top Margin of Excellence funding priority.] It will embody and advance the Academy’s mission and core values by publishing practical knowledge to cadets, scholars, and leaders around the world. The Press will disseminate knowledge via open access monographs, e-textbooks, journals, blogs, and podcasts. I find great importance in grounding the academic year in a theme. For

the 2022-23 academic year, we have launched a theme entitled “Called to Serve: Military Leadership in a Democratic Republic.” Through a speaker series, fireside chats, podcasts, and more, the Academic Program will explore how to best steward our military profession and understand the officer’s role and influence on soldiers, the public, and our political leaders. Through all our efforts, we strive to inspire our cadets and Army officers to dedicate their academic and professional efforts to the greater purpose of enriching and stewarding our profession.

MAJ Renée Sanjuán ’09 is an Assistant Professor and the Associate Dean for Policy and Communications (ADPC). As the ADPC, she works on policy for the Dean’s directorate and serves as the Dean’s Strategic Communications Director. Sanjuán also teaches political science in the Department of Social Sciences. She previously served as the Executive Secretary for the West Point Graduate Scholarship Program. She received an M.A. in security studies from Kansas State University and an M.P.A. in urban and social policy from Columbia University. She also serves as the founder of the GSP Alumni Network (WPAOG shared interest group), is a founding board member of the non-profit Fierce Civility, and is a 2016 Presidential Leadership Scholar.

Parents

Corner

Parents Clubs at 2022 WPAOG Leaders Conference

The 2022 WPAOG Leaders Conference, sponsored by the Class of 1967, included representatives from 16 Parents Clubs across the country. During the conference Colonel Jim Riely ’96, Director of Cadet Activities, and members of his staff spoke with Parents Club leaders, sharing the services and activities provided by DCA. Parents Club representatives also heard from members of the Army West Point Athletic Association, who shared information about football tickets, tailgates, and the Army A Club. Parents Club attendees also had an opportunity to network with geographically nearby West Point Societies for future events and West Point outreach.

WPAOG Resources for Cadet Parents

The West Point Association of Graduates offers many resources for cadet families. Check out WPAOG’s Parent Portal at WestPointAOG/ ParentResources to see the entire list of resources, including:

• L istings for more than 75 West Point Parents Clubs nationwide

• A link to the most current Parent Handbook

• Archives of Parent Review, WPAOG’s monthly e-newsletter exclusively for parents

Then Cadets August Rannow ’22 (left) and Shane Hickman ’22 (right), from “Team Night Storkers,” present an improved design of the “Autonomous, Adaptable Cargo Delivery system” to the Dean on Projects Day 2022.

USMA Academic Program Update:

By Dr. Susan Carter, Guest Writer

United States Military Academy graduates currently make up roughly 20 percent of the officers entering the U.S. Army, all arriving with a Bachelor of Science degree. A broad liberal arts core curriculum, along with the opportunity to major in 36 different subjects in a range of fields, creates the groundwork new officers need to be lifelong learners and ready to tackle the uncertain and complex environments of the Army.

The Academy’s success is nationally (and internationally) known. In 2022 U.S. News rates USMA 11th on its “National Liberal Arts Colleges” list. (The publication also ranks USMA 2nd in their “Public” component of the same category and 4th in “Best Undergrad Engineering Programs.”) Forbes ranked USMA 29th on its 2021 “America’s Top Colleges” list. USMA’s prestige is also seen in the number of highly competitive postgraduate scholarships cadets receive. This past year alone the Class of 2022 had four Rhodes, three Marshall, and six

National Science Foundation scholarship winners, just to name a few of the scholarships.

Most of all, however, West Point’s success should be measured by how it prepares cadets for their future in the U.S. Army. Completing a minimum of 40 academic courses during their four years, cadets are exposed to a knowledge of and appreciation for the U.S. Constitution, the history of war and the United States, the ability to employ the scientific method, and more. Through their major, cadets dive deep into their discipline and develop analytical skills and abilities to solve problems. With approximately half of graduates majoring in a science, technology, engineering, or math (STEM) subject, USMA supplies the Army with almost 40 percent of all officers with an undergraduate degree in a STEM field. The other half of USMA cadets choose a social science or humanities field, and all together USMA is equipping the Army with officers with a broad range of perspectives and insights.

Photo: Rebecca Rose/WPAOG

An Overview

USMA Dean and Academic Department Heads:

Front: (L to R) COL Heidi Demarest ’01 (D/Social Sciences), COL John Hartke ’88 (D/Physics and Nuclear Engineering), COL Chris Mayer ’93 (D/English and Philosophy), BG Shane Reeves ’96 (15th Dean of the Academic Board), COL Gail Yoshitani ’92 (D/History), COL Everett Spain ’92 (D/Behavioral Sciences and Leadership), COL Tina Hartley ’90 (D/Math), COL John Burpo ’92 (D/Chemistry and Life Science).

Back: (L to R) COL James Raftery (D/Electrical Engineering and Computer Science), COL Alan Boyer ’96 (D/Military Instruction), COL Mark Read ’92 (D/Geography and Environmental Engineering), COL Rich Morales ’89 (D/Systems Engineering), COL Winston Williams (D/Law), COL Nicholas Gist ’94 (D/Physical Education), COL John Baskerville ’90 (D/Foreign Languages), COL Bret Van Poppel ’92 (D/Civil and Mechanical Engineering). key additions included “The Army of the Republic,” which aimed to provide a foundation in the study of the army profession and its place in American society, and the capstone course “Officership,” which brings together military and academic courses in a purposeful and inspirational way. Changes in the curriculum also provided space for an increase in disciplinary depth, which is found in the academic major.

Humanities and Social Sciences

War is rapidly evolving. To be successful leaders in the U.S. Army, graduates need to believe in what they are fighting for, understand conflict and the human dimension of warfare, and be able to work with people from different cultures in the United States and around the world.

As the academic experience evolves, many traditions remain steadfast. Classes are taught by dedicated faculty who are consistently rated “the most accessible” by Princeton Review Assigned to classrooms that are typically capped at 18 students, faculty challenge cadets to actively partake in their learning, such as “taking boards” to solve a derivative in calculus or debating and analyzing a text in English literature.

In addition to academic courses, the Academic Program supports academic clubs, cultural experiences, and research opportunities to develop cadets even more. USMA remains committed to providing the intellectual opportunity and environment for cadets to be ready for their future careers.

Core Curriculum

The Academic Program underwent some significant changes in 2014. The principles for USMA’s core curriculum remained, but

First and foremost, all West Point graduates walk away with an understanding of and appreciation for the foundation of the United States and the Constitution. They develop that knowledge through courses in history, American politics, constitutional and military law, and the culminating course “Officership.” These same courses, along with ones in international relations and philosophy, also prepare cadets to understand war and the military: how war has changed over time; how the military and the American political system interact; the social, cultural, economic, human, moral-ethical, political and psychological contexts of war; and the unique moral-ethical and leadership challenges inherent to war. Whether it’s leading a platoon, serving on a humanitarian mission within the United States, or deploying abroad, Army officers need to be culturally aware and able to organize and inspire those they work with and for. Two required foreign language courses cover basic communication in other languages, as well as historical and cultural information on countries where such languages are spoken. Two psychology courses teach cadets how to be better leaders through an understanding of human, organizational, and sociological sciences and how these apply to their future as officers. Additionally, the core economics course teaches future officers about micro, macro, and trade while focusing on trade-offs, incentives, optimal decision making, and working in uncertainty. The core physical geography course is integral in teaching cadets a thorough understanding of the physical landscape which prepares them for future training and deployment.

Math, Science, and Engineering

Officers need to be analytical thinkers who can solve problems quickly but in an informed way. Courses in math, science, and

engineering develop those skills in a different way than those found in their humanities and social science courses.

While math is a preparatory course for many of the other core and major subjects, its importance on its own cannot be overstated. Those entering the Corps of Engineers will, not surprisingly, need to use their math skills, but other branches will have officers that also use mathematical principles in different ways. Those in Field Artillery, for example, will train to deliver accurate fires on the battlefield through manual calculations. Additionally, as the world becomes increasingly data focused, the required probability and statistics course helps all cadets understand principles of uncertainty, the basics of analyzing data, and statistical concepts.

Just as the military has developed a greater understanding of cyber technology, so have West Point cadets. Cadets complete a course on the fundamentals of computing and cyberspace during their plebe (freshman) year, followed by a programing course their cow (junior) year.

The science courses in the core provide each cadet with a fundamental knowledge of the experimental and analytical techniques of the basic sciences while employing the scientific method. All cadets complete three science courses: one in physics, one in chemistry, and a third in either of those two subjects or in biology.

West Point was founded as an engineering school when the Army specifically needed engineers to enhance the postRevolutionary War Army. A final component of the core

curriculum today is the Core Engineering Sequence. All cadets who do not major in an engineering subject must complete three courses of an engineering sequence. These courses expose cadets to the fundamentals of engineering, whether it is through infrastructure, cyber, robotics, environmental, nuclear, or systems engineering.

Writing

Weaved throughout the curriculum—both in core and major courses—is writing. All graduates need to be thoughtful, agile, and clear communicators. The West Point Writing Program (WPWP) has a mission to work across the curriculum to provide cadets with continuity, depth, and coherence in their study of composition, critical thinking, academic argument, writing pedagogy, and professional communication. Cadets complete an average of 8 to 10 courses with a signature writing event. Those courses start with general composition in their first year and gradually progress through courses in the core and in their major that stress increasing discipline- and profession-specific forms of communication. Cadets of all writing experience can seek writing help through the Mounger Writing Center. The WPWP also operates a Writing Fellows Program (see page 50).

Majors

Cadets have an option of 36 different majors in a range of disciplines. Each major falls within an academic department or department of instruction. The academic departments are run by officers called “PUSMAs” (Professor, USMA), who have

Photo: Elizabeth Woodruff/USMA PAO

Cadet Olivia Santo ’25 prepares for class on a nearby bench last spring.

Majors by Department

Behavioral Sciences & Leadership

Engineering Psychology

Management

Psychology

Sociology

Chemistry & Life Science

Chemical Engineering

Chemistry

Life Science

Civil & Mechanical Engineering

Civil Engineering

Mechanical Engineering

English & Philosophy

English

Philosophy

Electrical Engineering & Computer Science

Computer Science

Cyber Science

Electrical Engineering

Foreign Languages

Foreign Area Studies

Foreign Language

Geography & Environmental Engineering

Environmental Engineering

Environmental Science

Geography

Geospatial Information Science

Military Instruction

Defense and Strategic Studies

Physical Education

Kinesiology

History

History

Law

Law and Legal Studies

Mathematical Sciences

Applied Statistics and Data Science

Mathematical Sciences

Operations Research

(with Systems Engineering)

Physics & Nuclear

Engineering

Nuclear Engineering

Physics

Space Science

Social Sciences

Economics

International Affairs

Political Science: American Politics

Systems Engineering

Engineering Management

Systems and Decision Sciences

Systems Engineering

both military and academic experience, ensuring that they continue to prepare cadets to be officers in an academically rigorous manner.

Declaring a major allows cadets to dive deep into a discipline and solve problems in a more sophisticated manner. Cadets will solve those problems through the lens of such majors as Mechanical Engineering, Cyber, Data Science, Kinesiology, Philosophy, Chemical Engineering, Space Science, History, Economics, Political Science, and more. Some majors also underwent recent restructuring, such as the evolution of the Information Technology major into the new Cyber Science major or the merging of the International Relations and Comparative Politics majors into the International Affairs major. New majors in Space Science and Applied Statistics and Data Science were also created with an eye toward meeting the future needs of the Army. Regardless of whether the chosen major requires someone to perform a scientific experiment or derive a labor supply function by hand, cadets develop the analytical tools to solve complex problems through all the majors offered at the Academy.

Some academic majors will closely align with the branch that a cadet chooses (e.g., Cyber majors joining the Cyber branch or the Civil and Mechanical Engineering majors to the Corps of Engineers). All majors prepare officers with foundational

PLEBES

English Composition

English Literature

History (U.S. or World)

History (Army)

Psychology

Math Modeling

Physics Calculus

Chemistry IT

Personal Fitness

Boxing

MS100

Declare Major

problem-solving and analytical skills upon which they can build to be successful, regardless of their future branch.

Minors

Cadets also have the choice of 19 different minors. While completely optional, a minor can help round out a cadet’s education. For example, they may choose to major in History but take a Space Science minor. Or they can major in Electrical Engineering with a Terrorism Studies minor. For cadets that study abroad, they might also double major with a language or minor in Foreign Area Studies. Over 150 cadets from numerous academic disciplines study abroad per year in programs led by the Department of Foreign Languages.

Enrichment

In addition to academic courses, the Academic Program offers enrichment opportunities which again help support the interests and passions of cadets, while also preparing them for their future. Throughout the year, cadets can participate in academic clubs (hosted by departments), taking part in competitions, pursuing research, or attending lectures or conferences. The Office of the Dean makes it a priority to offer a wide variety of experiences, continually expanding the access to and choices of many academic enrichment opportunities. Participation in clubs

Sample Schedule

YEARLINGS

Philosophy

Geography

Economics

Language (1)

Language (2)

American Politics

Probability & Statistics

Science (choice)

Military Movement

Survival Swimming

MS200

Major Course

Major Course

Start Major

COWS

Military Leadership

Military History

International Relations

IT/Cyber

Engineering Course

Engineering Course

Army Fitness

Combat Apps

MS300

Major Course

Major Course

Major Course

Major Course

Start Engineering Sequence

FIRSTIES

Constitution & Mil Law

Officership

Engineering Course

Lifetime Sport

Major Course

Major Course

Major Course

Major Related Course

Major Related Course

Major Related Course

Major Integrative Experience

Branch and Post Assignments

is another way cadets can find and develop their passion for different topics.

Research opportunities also support cadet development outside of the traditional classroom and they come in many forms. Numerous disciplines have incorporated independent study opportunities, research groups, research-focused capstones, and research-focused summer internships (see the West Point Research Model article on page 38).

All cadets must also complete an academic, military, or physical individual advanced development experience during one of their summers at the Academy. On the academic side, these experiences could include traveling abroad for language and cultural immersion experiences, interning at the National Security Council in Washington, DC, or doing scientific research in biomedical engineering. Complementing the Academic Program, they provide opportunities for cadets to grow intellectually outside of a classroom. Many of these outof-classroom opportunities are made possible by Margin of Excellence private funding.

Faculty

USMA’s broad academic curriculum has another advantage as well: it ensures that the Army has military officers and Army civilians with diverse expertise who can help the Army directly through their leadership and research.

Over half of the faculty at the Academy are “rotators,” military officers who have their master’s degree or doctorate and serve as

instructors for typically two or three years before returning to the operational Army. Through their time in graduate school and as instructors at West Point, these officers develop as strategic thinkers who provide new and innovative human capital back into the Army, along with the communication skills developed through teaching (see the Faculty Excellence article on page 45).

The faculty—both junior and senior, civilian and military— also remain at the top of their discipline by producing scholarly research, which helps improve the Army and the nation.

No one can say with certainty where the U.S. Army will be fighting in 20 years and what that warfare will look like. West Point, therefore, has an obligation to provide officers who can adapt and learn. That foundation for lifelong learning is developed in USMA’s Academic Program through the robust common core curriculum as well as through individual curiosity and exploration in major courses and enrichment opportunities. 

Dr. Susan Carter is an Associate Professor and the Vice Dean for Academic Affairs (VDAA) at the United States Military Academy, West Point. As the VDAA, she oversees academic curriculum, faculty development, and assessment; and she also teaches economics in the Department of Social Sciences. She previously worked as a Research Analyst in the Office of Economic and Manpower Analysis at West Point. She received her B.S. in mathematical economics from Wake Forest University and her Ph.D. in economics from Vanderbilt University.

Photo: Christopher Hennen/USMA

COL Diana Loucks, an Academy Professor and the Director of the Space and Missile Defense Command Research and Analysis Center in the Department of Physics and Nuclear Engineering, works with cadets on their “Aurora vs. GPS: Towards Arctic Dominance” research project.

WPAOG News

2022 WPAOG Leaders Conference

After being virtual the last two years due to COVID-19, the West Point Association of Graduates Leaders Conference, sponsored by the Class of 1967, returned to an in-person event in 2022. Themed “It Starts with Us,” the 27th annual Leaders Conference welcomed more than 200 volunteer West Point Class, Society, and Parents Club leaders to the Academy so that they could collectively learn about the services and initiatives WPAOG provides to the Long Gray Line. The multiday event featured updates from WPAOG and Academy leadership, educational and leader sessions, and a cadet panel. The conference concluded with the “Expanding the Possibilities” dinner, which featured LTG Steven Gilland ’90, the 61st USMA Superintendent, as the guest speaker.

WPAOG Podcast Closes in on 50 Episodes

The WPAOG Podcast, a strategic initiative focused on tailored audible communications to further inform graduates on current WPAOG projects and USMA updates, has been going strong since July 2021 and now has nearly 50 episodes. Recent podcasts include ones with Mike “Coach K” Krzyzewski ’69, BG (R) Rebecca S. Halstead ’81 (Founder and CEO of STEADFAST Leadership), and BG (R) Michael Meese ’81 (President of the American Armed Forces Mutual Aid Association). All content is provided by WPAOG and produced in partnership with a grad-owned podcast production company. The Podcast is distributed by PodBean and is available on Audible, Google Podcasts, iHeartRadio, and at WestPointAOG.org/Podcast.

Photos: Erika Norton, Rebecca Rose/WPAOG

West Point Association of Graduates (WPAOG) Annual Meeting and Election

All USMA graduates are encouraged to vote in the WPAOG 2022 Annual Election. No later than October 15, 2022, proxies will be emailed or mailed to each graduate. Graduates whose email address is on file at WPAOG will receive an email that contains a link to the personalized, confidential online voting site maintained by Amplitude Research, Inc. Other graduates will

receive paper proxies via the U.S. Postal Service. Voting closes at 5pm ET on November 14, 2022, the evening before the WPAOG Annual Meeting and Election, which will take place at 5pm ET on November 15, 2022. This year the Annual Meeting will take place at the Herbert Alumni Center.

WPAOG 50-Year Affiliation Program Going Strong

Representatives from three USMA classes returned to West Point to celebrate milestone events with cadets of their 50-Year Affiliation classes. Members of the Class of 1975 were on hand at the Cadet Field Training graduation ceremony to present the Class of 2025 with its class flag, representatives from the Class of 1974 attended the Affirmation ceremony for the Class of 2024 and offered coins and wisdom to the Second Class cadets, and LTC (R) Jack Buttine ’72 was present at Eisenhower Hall on August 4, 2022 to hand out 2LT bars to five members of the Class of 2022 who graduated and commissioned on that date.

Partnerships, Projects, and Innovation

Colonel Chris Korpela ’96 and Dr. Hitoshi Nasu (pictured above) regularly discuss the value of the “killer robot” debate that has permeated academic circles. With many years of experience in researching and exploring the intersection between robotics, machine learning, and the law of armed conflict, they were both curious as to why this debate continues to attract public attention. They saw the need to develop a counternarrative from their unique vantage points as the Director of West Point’s Robotics Center and Professor of Law in West Point’s Lieber Institute for Law and Land Warfare. Nasu’s legal expertise has been mustered to shore up the Robotic Center’s research efforts, with recurring visits to familiarize himself with the algorithms behind robots and drones. Korpela’s fascination with the use of robotics on the battlefield meant that the applications of such technology were often up for debate with the ethicists, lawyers, and philosophers he has collaborated with

By MAJ Renée Sanjuán ’09, Guest Writer

for years at West Point, some of whom were his neighbors on Post. The work done within West Point’s research centers is not just theoretical—it’s practical, and it’s real. Future warfare requires innovative and adaptive leaders. At West Point, the Academic Program’s centers and institutes are essential to developing such leaders.

Over the years, the Academy’s academic departments have established corresponding centers and institutes to synchronize engagement efforts, export intellectual capital, and facilitate meaningful research opportunities. Many of these centers are made possible by Margin of Excellence private funding, and they are as expansive and diverse as their host departments. Yet, each serves a strategic purpose for West Point. Every project, AIAD, and engagement strengthens West Point’s reputation and its capacity to best serve the nation. The following centers

Photo: Elizabeth Woodruff/USMA PAO

Above: Professor Hitoshi Nasu (Department of Law) and COL Chris Korpela ’96 (Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering) pose with technology from their recent research.

are just a few examples of the excellence permeating the Academic Program.

Center for Molecular Science

The Center for Molecular Science (CMS) produces intellectual capital on soldier protection, energy, and materials science research. Housed within the Department of Chemistry and Life Science (CLS), the CMS facilitates the department’s guiding principle: “education through research.” The CMS research model starts as early as plebe year, when cadets join research groups comprised of cadets from various year groups and led by CLS faculty members. About 50 percent of CLS cadets continue within this model throughout their time at the Academy. For up to seven-and-a-half hours a week, the labs come alive with cadets exploring theories, conducting experiments, and mentoring each other.

During his time at West Point, Second Lieutenant Ryan Kreiser ’22 compiled an outstanding research record as he pursued his fascination with developing therapeutics for protein-misfolding diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s, which affect combat veterans at an increased rate. Under the supervision of Dr. Ryan Limbocker, Kreiser led the research team his yearling year, producing six peer-reviewed publications and collaborating with research partners at Cambridge University. Their group, “Team Neuroprotectors,” won third place in the Combat Capabilities Development Command’s Warfighter Innovation in Science & Engineering Challenge for their work on the application of neurodegeneration research to potential biological and chemical threat agents on the battlefield, as well as for their research on promising molecular countermeasures. Kreiser also won the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship and the Purdue Military Research Institute Fellowship. He is studying biological sciences this fall at Purdue before continuing his service in the operational Army. Kreiser’s success is due to the strength of academic enrichment opportunities made possible by the CMS. As he explains, “There’s no better academic experience than taking in what we learn in classes and turning it outwards towards a problem in society.” With an eye toward applied research, USMA’s centers and institutes ensure that cadet learning is intertwined with multiple stages of the innovation process.

Combating Terrorism Center

The right people at the right place with the right access. The Department of Social Sciences’ Combating Terrorism Center (CTC) has the in-house expertise and diverse connections to produce intellectual capital on complex problems through a blend of policy experts, academic scholars, and practitioners. Within one year, a CTC researcher might teach a class, present research at an academic conference, supervise cadets on an AIAD, or conduct fieldwork while forward-deployed with a Special Operations unit. These experiences contribute to the center’s mission of educating cadets, advising practitioners, and producing research.

Just recently, an elite Army unit turned to West Point to provide an analysis on biological threats. To answer the call, the CTC

assembled leading counterterrorism, policy, and science experts to provide their perspectives and analysis. The CTC turned to the CLS for scientific input. This collaboration resulted in a set of two special multi-disciplinary issues for the CTC Sentinel publication. As Colonel John Burpo ’92, CLS Department Head, explains, “The interdisciplinary synergy at West Point, like this partnership, makes it possible to effectively translate experience and expertise from the lab benchtop to the operational battlespace, and this double issue was a great teamof-teams effort!”

“All the CTC lines of effort nest within each other and tie back to faculty and cadet development,” explains Dr. Richard Yon, CTC Director of Terrorism Studies. “We take our experiences from the field and research and apply them to our lessons in the classroom. We leverage our connections for cadet enrichment. And cadet enrichment activities strengthen and broaden those connections.” The CTC goes to great lengths to stay connected to policy experts and practitioners. The CTC’s Terrorism

than taking in what we learn in classes and turning it outwards towards a problem in society.”

—2LT Ryan Kreiser ’22

Chemistry and Life Science cadets conduct laboratory work during CH275: Biology.

The 2021-22 members of Team Neuroprotectors present their research to BG Shane Reeves ’96, 15th Dean of the Academic Board, during Projects Day.

Studies minor is more than the typical minor. Cadets take five courses but also have a cadet leadership structure that facilitates enrichment activities such as a guest speaker series that brings in prominent individuals like General Joe Votel ’80 (Retired) and Ms. Jen Easterly ’90, as well as research with CTC faculty. Thanks to generous WPAOG donors, the CTC sends up to 20 cadets on AIADs each summer (approximately 25 percent of the minor!). As with all their endeavors, the level of access is unprecedented and invaluable to the cadet experience.

The Terrorism Studies minor’s trip sections are crucible experiences for cadets, providing them with hands-on opportunities to explore classroom topics from a practitioner’s perspective. For one course-focused trip section, cadets rush into buildings with controlled burns to put out fires at the FDNY

Academy—the same induction training as FDNY firefighters. Cadets also conduct a graded functional exercise that simulates a homeland security crisis at the FDNY Operations Center in Brooklyn, New York. Facing first responder challenges personally provides different perspectives on their incident command system studies from the classroom.

The CTC serves as a hub that bridges the gap between academia and government, helping the Army develop innovative leaders who have the ability to understand multiple perspectives, both theory and practice.

Center for Innovation and Engineering

With a portfolio boasting 40 research projects, the Center for Innovation and Engineering (CIE) is one of the largest research centers at West Point. The center’s disciplinary expertise is wide ranging, from biomechanics to hydrology and everything in between. Managed by 13 faculty and staff members from the Department of Civil and Mechanical Engineering (CME), the CIE offers these project-based learning opportunities to cadets through yearlong capstone designs, AIAD internships, and independent studies. To fully develop engineering students beyond just theory “we need cadets to experience the ‘second half’ of engineering that involves manufacturing and testing,” explains Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Bellocchio ’97, CIE Director. “The CIE facilitates that second half through realworld, complex design challenges aligned to all the Army modernization priorities.”

The CIE provides direct impact to the Army and nation. At any moment, cadets and faculty could be working with one of the center’s 30 DoD agencies, 15 industry corporations, eight universities, and six state and local governments. This past

Cadets minoring in Terrorism Studies visit the Pentagon to meet with senior leaders as part of the annual trip section hosted by the Combating Terrorism Center.

Cadets enrolled in SS464: Homeland Security & Defense, a course taught by the Combating Terrorism Center, visit the FDNY's Fire Training Academy at Randalls Island and don fire gear to perform building rescues during controlled burns.

summer alone, about 85 percent of CME majors traveled worldwide on over 90 AIAD internships, and 28 capstone projects are underway this fall. Cadets work on real-world problems during these capstones by designing, building, and testing their solutions. These projects provide cadets with the opportunity to have a real impact. As Bellocchio explains, “Sometimes a sponsor always wanted to explore an idea but didn’t have the time and space to do so.” West Point provides that resource while directly advancing learning objectives and the quality of intellectual capital entering (or reentering in the case of rotating military faculty) the operational force. With the CIE, cadets can explore their curiosity through research. Second Lieutenant Emma San Martin ’22 embarked on her first of many CIE research projects as a plebe. San Martin heard about a surprisingly high number of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) crash stories from her military instructors. She noticed they were often due to the UAV’s engine freezing as it flew at high altitudes. As a yearling, she led a team of cadets to build a functional prototype of a device to heat the carburetors of UAVs. San Martin’s faculty mentors urged her to submit the design to the U.S. Patent Office for development in military UAVs as well as in the private aviation industry. The Patent Office confirmed the device’s originality and it is currently “patent-pending.” As a Military Intelligence officer, San Martin will lead soldiers overseas and may well oversee UAVs improved by her own research. After completing her Marshall Scholarship and operational assignments, San Martin hopes to combine her biomechanics and aeronautics research experiences to contribute to the emerging field of bioastronautics, the study of life in space. The ingenuity and wide-ranging expertise found in the CIE (and their expansive list of partners) make experiences like San Martin’s possible. The CIE equips leaders like San Martin with

the knowledge and capability to think big and strive to solve complex problems.

Driving Innovation

West Point graduates are prepared to face the complex and uncertain environment of 21st-century warfare. When these graduates meet the demands of war, they can lean back on the intellectually challenging problems they’ve faced through their research. They can also lean forward to connect various disciplines and perspectives to provide the innovative perspective our Army needs. West Point centers and institutes will continue strengthening cadets’ ability to think critically and creatively through an applied research and collaborative partnerships model. Serving in this role requires deliberate effort to cultivate partnerships and to ensure that the Academic Program is in tune with current needs and able to project future needs. Organizations consistently seek out West Point to dive deep into complex problems. Through these efforts, West Point serves as a strategic innovation enabler for the Army and the nation. 

MAJ Renée Sanjuán ’09 is an Assistant Professor and the Associate Dean for Policy and Communications (ADPC). As the ADPC, she works on policy for the Dean’s directorate and serves as the Dean’s Strategic Communications Director. Sanjuán also teaches political science in the Department of Social Sciences. She previously served as the Executive Secretary for the West Point Graduate Scholarship Program. She received an M.A. in security studies from Kansas State University and an M.P.A. in urban and social policy from Columbia University. She also serves as the founder of the GSP Alumni Network (WPAOG shared interest group), is a founding board member of the non-profit Fierce Civility, and is a 2016 Presidential Leadership Scholar.

Photos: Submitted by CIE; Submitted by CME

Left: Recent mechanical engineering graduate 2LT Emma San Martin ’22 tests the airflow from a wind generator used in the experimentation of small aerial drones.

Right: Faculty and cadets working on the 2021-22 Space Engineering and Applied Research-Hypersonic Rocket Team prepare for launch at Spaceport America, New Mexico.

USMA is Laser Focused on Intellectual Capital for the Army and the Nation

By COL John Hartke ’88 , Guest Writer

In March 2020, many parts of the country began shutting down in response to the emerging threat of COVID-19; however, at the United States Military Academy, cadets and faculty were completing an important demonstration of a future weapon system. The U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command brought their High Energy Laser Mobile Test Truck (HELMTT) to West Point to demonstrate and educate future Army leaders on this potential weapon system. The HELMTT is a 50-kilowatt-class laser mounted on a Heavy Expanded Mobile Tactical Truck and designed to defend against rockets, artillery, mortars, and unmanned aerial systems. While at West Point the system was on static display in the Cadet Area, with experts on hand to describe the system and its capabilities to cadets and faculty. It also was fired at the West Point ranges, shooting holes in steel and concrete and dropping a quadcopter from the sky. West Point became the fourth Army installation—following White Sands Missile Range, Redstone Arsenal, and Yuma Proving Ground—to fire the laser, demonstrating that ranges across the Army could accept, train with, and fire this emerging capability. The HELMTT demonstration has paved the way for researchers and cadets involved with West Point’s Photonics Research Center (PRC) to develop the Outdoor High Energy

Laser Laboratory, which is a 5-kilowatt laser mounted in a trailer and designed to measure the impact that the atmosphere and weather have on a laser beam near the surface of the Earth. The results from this work are being sent to the U.S. Army Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technology Office for inclusion in the development of laser weapons systems expected to be prototyped for soldiers in fiscal year 2023 and beyond.

The experimental test results are only the tip of the contributions the PRC, a Margin of Excellence funding priority, has been making to the Army. Established in 1987 in an agreement between West Point and the Army Research Laboratory, the PRC has the mission to create a class of officers generally familiar with lasers, laser technology, and the application of both to defense. Over the years cadets and faculty in the PRC have made contributions to numerous projects that involve the generation of light, image processing, and the measuring of light interacting with different materials. Some of the center’s early work included data compression of digital images for easier storage and transmission, characterizing the spectral signature of materials and the camouflage patterns and materials of uniforms, and developing vertical cavity surface-emitting lasers.

Photo: COL Peter Chapman

Each of these projects has contributed to work for the Army on current or emerging needs, and many involve disciplinary expertise from multiple departments across the Academy. One of the longer-term projects whose contributions are making it to the modern battlefield is the High Energy Laser (HEL) project. In 2006 an interdisciplinary group of cadets and faculty from the departments of Civil and Mechanical Engineering, Systems Engineering, Physics and Nuclear Engineering, and Law began looking at how much laser power is needed to accomplish a counter-mortar mission, whether that much laser power could fit inside an armored vehicle, and possible legal issues associated with laser weapon systems. The project has evolved to modeling and testing how lasers interact with artillery metals and mortar shells, as well as with paints and other materials on the surface of unmanned aerial systems. Now that high energy laser systems are in the prototype phase (in anticipation of fielding a system), cadets and faculty are studying how the atmosphere may degrade laser performance in

comparison to laboratory conditions. They are also involved with translating the science and engineering of the laser to measurable military effects. Their work will help commanders place lasers for the greatest effect on the battlefield and help them decide who shoots at which target for the greatest effect in the shortest time.

The intellectual capital for the Army goes far beyond the experimental results. Arguably, the more important contribution is the multitude of new graduates who have worked on the project and moved to the operational force prepared to lead soldiers and employ these laser weapon systems. The problemsolving and analytical skills they applied to their research easily translate to the challenges they will face on the modern battlefield. First Lieutenant Tina Le ’19, a physics major who worked on HEL during three of her four years at West Point, says: “The research challenged me mentally and intellectually. It allowed me to be comfortable with asking questions, even if there were no answers. The rigor of research is something I will

Photo: COL Peter Chapman

Then Cadet Tina Le ’19 establishes a monitoring station on the roof of Bartlett Hall to study the effects that various weather conditions have on optical turbulence.

“The research challenged me mentally and intellectually. It allowed me to be comfortable with asking questions, even if there were no answers. The rigor of research is something I will always value because it taught me that there is no limit to learning. ”

—1LT Tina Le ’19

always value because it taught me that there is no limit to learning. My experience researching HEL in the Photonics Research Center set my foundation of knowledge for something I am deeply passionate about and plan on returning to in the near future.” When Captain Jordan Kelley ’18, a Chemistry major who studied the interactions between lasers and explosives, reflects on her experiences with the program, she says: “The challenges posed to us were real and applicable to the future fight, and the significance of having opportunities to try and solve the Army’s problems during our time as cadets was invaluable, to say the least. At first, I would have told you that research was interesting, but purely academic and didn’t really do much for my platoon leader Engineer time. However, despite laser research not being a direct impact on my day-to-day, the skills gained from experimentation, research, and the ability to extrapolate information and work as a team most definitely served me well as an officer, and still do to this day.”

The intellectual capital that infuses the Army also finds its way back to West Point to energize the next generation of leaders. Captain Jordan Smith ’13 participated in the High Energy Laser project as a cadet, experimentally validating how laser energy heated inside a rotating mortar round causes that round to deflagrate in flight. After a successful company command, Smith received his master’s degree, for which he conducted research on high energy laser propagation. He has returned to the Department of Physics and Nuclear Engineering faculty ready to inspire and educate the next generation. Smith says, “My research as a cadet on the High Energy Laser in the Photonics Research Center provided me with the incredible opportunity to gain valuable experience in the field of photonics,

which inspired and prepared me to earn my master’s degree in optics and photonics from the University of Central Florida.” During Smith’s three-year faculty tour, he will not only inspire cadets in the classroom while he teaches physics, but he will also mentor cadets during their work on the HEL project. Through these interactions Smith will get to practice his field grade competencies: creating an organizational climate, operational planning, mentoring junior leaders, and effective communication of complex ideas. Upon completion of his tour on faculty, Smith will return to the operational force as a field grade leader ready to apply his advanced degree and experiences coaching, mentoring, and teaching to the challenges that Army operational leaders face every day.

It won’t be long before the Army sees high energy laser weapon systems on the modern battlefield defending and protecting national interests. West Point graduates will lead those formations equipped with the knowledge, skills, and abilities to support the Army’s research and development efforts. In the Photonics Research Center and across West Point, the future of the Army is embodied in cadets working on projects such as the High Energy Laser. 

COL John Hartke ’88 commissioned into the Corps of Engineers. He has a Ph.D. in optical sciences from the University of Arizona and has been involved in high energy laser research and development since 2006. He has served as the Director of the Photonics Research Center and is currently a Professor of Photonics, a United States Military Academy Professor, and Head of the Department of Physics and Nuclear Engineering.

Photo: COL Peter Chapman

As understanding laser-material interactions is critical to ensuring commanders get needed target effects on the modern battlefield, cadets involved with the Photonics Research Center investigate the effects of directed energy on a thin metal coupon in the High Energy Laser Lab.

Cadet Summer Training | 2022

Photos: U.S. Army photo by SGT Gregory Muenchow; Christopher Hennen/USMA PAO; Erika Norton/WPAOG

Cadet Summer Training (CST) consists of a variety of training events to educate, train and inspire future leaders. This year training was led by Task Force Leader, which was primarily from the 1st Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team (“Rakkasans”), 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) from Fort Campbell, Kentucky. Training that falls under CST includes Cadet Basic Training, Cadet Field Training, Cadet Leader Development Training and Cadet Troop Leader Training. Each training has a significant role that advances cadets toward joining the Long Gray Line.

The backbone of CST is the cadet cadre, which qualifies toward each cadet ’s West Point Leader Detail graduation

requirement. Cadets serving in these positions learn how to lead small units in complex environments, maintain and enforce standards of excellence, and acquire knowledge to prepare, conduct and assess training of subordinates.

For new cadets, it all begins with Cadet Basic Training (CBT), or Beast, during their first summer at West Point. Starting on Reception Day, it is a six-week training consisting of academic briefs and rigorous testing to prepare the new cadets to join the Corps. The new cadets then develop their entry-level soldier tasks, including basic marksmanship, land navigation, patrol bases and other additional skills.

Photos: Christopher Hennen/USMA PAO; Erika Norton/WPAOG

Next is Cadet Field Training (CFT), where the rising yearlings are refreshed on what they learned during last summer’s Beast and complete their Basic Officer Leader Course (BOLC) A requirements. Cadets complete a Water Confidence Course, the Marne Obstacle Course, marksmanship qualifications, Night Vision familiarization and more.

Most rising firsties and a few rising cows participate in Cadet Leader Development Training (CLDT), the culminating summer training event for West Point cadets. It is 20 days of training, broken down into 10 days of preparation and 10 days of field training exercise, or FTX. The FTX consists of ambushes, raids, defenses and more at the platoon level.

Photos: Marco Copat ’22, Christopher Hennen, Michelle Matos/USMA PAO

Cadet Troop Leader Training allows cadets to experience leadership in operational Army units, while Military Individual Advanced Development programs provide cadets with specialized tactical and technical skills at Army Schools, including Air Assault, the Sapper Leader Course and the Combat Diver Qualification Course. 

Photos: U.S. Army photo by SPC Osias-27thPAD; SGT Gregory Muenchow; Christop her Hennen/USMA PAO

“Now I see the secret of making the best person, it is to grow in the open air and to eat and sleep with the earth.”

—Walt Whitman

Photo: Erika Norton/WPAOG

Moments That Matter

WPAOG’s Strategy to Unlock the Power of the Long Gray Line

WPAOG’s strategy to Unlock the Power of the Long Gray Line impacts six stages in a graduate’s life journey. As shared in previous Moments That Matter articles, for over 150 years

WPAOG has served cadets, graduates, surviving spouses and families with impactful programs and services that respond to their needs throughout these life stages. Memorialization is one of the Association’s most significant and honorable moments that it celebrates. WPAOG’s Class Ring Memorial Program (and its popular Ring Melt ceremony) is committed to memorializing graduates and further connecting them and their families to the Long Gray Line. Thanks to the generosity of the Class of 1996 and the Class of 1966 Legacy Endowment in Memory of Fallen Brothers, the Ring Memorial Program and Ring Melt will be supported in perpetuity.

After “Class Dismissed!” one of the most anticipated and poignant cadet commands might be “Don Your Rings!” which

By Jenn Voigtschild ’93, WPAOG staff

is given annually by the First Class Ring and Crest Committee chairperson. Although all U.S. Military Academy graduates have a diploma they might frame and hang on the wall, it is their class ring that is a more portable and tangible reminder of their formative experience at the Academy and commitment to selfless service. When the Legacy Gold is poured into the crucible as a part of the Ring Melt ceremony, it can truly be said that the Long Gray Line can physically “grip hands, tho’ it be from the shadows.”

For First Class cadets, the class ring is one of the first symbols of their transition from cadet to graduate and officer. However, as time passes and the feathers on the Academy crest eagle soften with wear, many graduates start to think about their final transition and about leaving a legacy to the future members of the Long Gray Line. Every year since 2001, WPAOG has accepted donations of class rings from West Point

Photo: WPAOG archives

graduates—both deceased and living—and melted those rings into an ingot of gold at the annual Ring Melt. Most of the resulting gold ingot is added to the commercial gold that will constitute the rings of that class. Small shavings from each year’s gold ingot, however, are preserved and added to the rings that are being melted for the following year’s Ring Melt. Once that new ingot is made, new shavings are taken, and the process continues for each subsequent Ring Melt. The gold shavings from this Ring Melt process are known as the Legacy Gold because they literally contain gold and symbolically contain the essence of each grad wearer from every ring that has been donated over the years. Therefore, each West Point ring since 2002 contains these elements from 740 class rings of previous generations of the Long Gray Line.

Second Lieutenant Katerina Christianson ’21, class president, added the Legacy Gold shavings to the donated class rings during the January 2020 Ring Melt Ceremony for her class. Ten months later—delayed two months by the global pandemic—she and the rest of the Class of 2021 received their rings on a fall day at the Trophy Point amphitheater. She recently reflected, “Each and every ring donor gave up the last physical piece of connection they had to a loved one they had lost. And they did that for a group of cadets they had never even met—total strangers. They believe in the power of legacy. They believe in something greater than themselves and were willing to give of themselves so that their loved one might continue on to inspire the next generation.”

Each class ring is a special object, a unique symbol of a graduate’s commitment to Duty, Honor, Country. Some will be passed down to descendants to remind them of their loved one’s service, others unfortunately sold or melted for the monetary value, and one per class (two for the Class of 1980 and beyond) can be donated to the USMA Library Ring Display so that current cadets can visit a single location to ponder almost 200

years of class rings and their meaning. Since 2001, class rings can also be included in a very special moment that generates the Legacy Gold.

Trudy Hall, widow of Colonel Charles Johnson ’55 (USA Retired), commented after watching Charles’s son, Colonel Samuel Johnson ’82 (USA Retired), place his father’s ring in the crucible: “Sam said that the engraving inside the ring—Duty, Honor, Country—was worn away for one simple reason: Charlie had worn these words into his heart. Honestly, that moment for me was almost as emotionally challenging as the funeral ceremony. I knew it would have meant so very much to Charlie. As Sam saluted the cauldron filled with rings which now included his dad’s, I swear I could see Charlie in uniform saluting right along with him.”

Not only does Legacy Gold connect members of the Long Gray Line throughout their shared post-Graduation experiences, but sometimes the Grip is strengthened by both gold and blood. Second Lieutenant Valentina Vincent ’22 placed her grandfather’s class ring in the crucible at the Class of 2022’s Ring Melt ceremony in February 2021. Captain Harvey Jokinen ’72 was killed in an aircraft accident in Germany in 1978. Stated Vincent at the ceremony, “He had grit and determination to fight through adversity without complaint…the kind of guy you hope is on your team. I wish I could have met my grandfather, but I feel his presence alongside me at West Point daily.” Thinking forward to receiving and donning her own ring later that year, Vincent further commented, “I will be able to look down at my ring and see him in it. …He will now be physically with me wherever I go.” The Ring Melt touches cadets, graduates and their families with equal impact. This connectedness of the Long Gray Line is an intangible that WPAOG will continue to foster with all graduates, no matter where they are in their life journey. 

Photos: Christopher Hennen/USMA PAO; WPAOG archives

“Each and every ring donor gave up the last physical piece of connection they had to a loved one they had lost. And they did that for a group of cadets they had never even met—total strangers.”

—2LT Katerina Christianson ’21

USMA 2026 JOINS THE CORPS

R-Day, March Back and A-Day

On Reception Day, June 27, 2022, more than 1,200 candidates reported to West Point to join the Class of 2026 and begin their 47-month experience. Throughout the day, members of the class began their transition from civilian to USMA cadet by receiving uniforms, haircuts and their first lessons in marching, military courtesy and discipline. They also endured one of West Point’s memorable traditions, reporting to the Cadet in the Red Sash (with some having to report multiple times before they reported correctly). R-Day culminated with the new cadets standing on the Plain before family and friends to take the Oath of Allegiance from the U.S. Military Academy Commandant of Cadets, Brigadier General Mark Quander ’95. Then they were off to complete six weeks of Cadet Basic Training to learn the fundamental skills of being an Army soldier: marksmanship, land navigation, rappelling, and more. Finally, the Class of 2026 completed the more than 12-mile March Back from Camp Buckner and officially joined the Corps during the A-Day Parade. The Class of 2026 was selected from a pool of nearly 12,600 applicants and includes 40 percent minority enrollment, 261 women, 11 combat veterans and 16 international students. Regarding academic honors, 78 members of the class were valedictorians and 35 received National Merit Scholarship recognition; regarding activities, 129 were their high school class or student body president, 171 were part of JROTC, and 756 were a varsity athletics team captain. 

View the March Back for the Class of 2026: bit.ly/wpmarchback2026

March Back

March Back

March Back

Photos: Erika Norton/WPAOG; John Pellino/USMA PAO

Photos: Kyle Osterhoudt, John Pellino/USMA PAO

Growing Agile and Adaptive Thinkers: West Point’s Applied Research Model

By LTC Brad McCoy’01 and MAJ Renée Sanjuán ’09, Guest Writers

West Point’s research model is integral to the cadet academic experience. Through a combination of capstone and thesis projects, independent studies, and field research and internships, West Point cadets experience breadth and depth in their disciplines. The Academy’s applied research model is like no other, with faculty advisors at the nexus of military experience and academic expertise and an unprecedented level of interdisciplinary collaboration.

Through project-based learning, cadets develop hands-on research skills, in many cases engaging with research projects over a period of years. This approach enables these soon-to-be second lieutenants to bring agile, adaptive, and creative thinking to fight and win in a complex environment.

Thanks to ongoing relationships between academic departments and the West Point Association of Graduates, research funding and formalized partnerships have grown and led to an impressive cadet research output last year. These results contribute to the Academy’s reputation through national rankings and

competitive awards and scholarships. For example, National Science Foundation, Rhodes, and Marshall scholars from the Class of 2022 collectively published 25 articles, presented 43 papers or posters, have one pending patent, and participated in more than 60 academic enrichment activities. These now second lieutenants exceeded the standard in many ways, highlighting the opportunities available to cadets who are seeking a challenging and impactful academic journey at West Point.

Projects Day

Through project-based learning, cadets have an opportunity to exercise leadership among research groups. Every department has its own research model: for some, cadets start research within a team as early as plebe year; for others, they focus on higher-level electives until the culminating capstone experience during their firstie year. Regardless of the model, a great number of cadets present their work every year on Projects Day. A culminating experience for many cadets, the Academy’s 23rd

Photo: Kyle Osterhoudt/USMA PAO

Annual Projects Day this year served as a way for over 1,000 cadets across the Academic Program to showcase their work to more than 400 guests, as well as to staff, faculty, and peers. Cadets are challenged as they present to experts within their field. Cadets are equally challenged to present complex material to prominent guests from outside their discipline. Presenting work in this way builds the critical thinking and communication skills needed in Army officers.

Projects Day also serves as an opportunity to welcome and celebrate over 80 external partners who contribute to cadet-led projects. Whether through generous donations or collaborative work, these partners are central to providing relevant and timely research opportunities for cadets. One example of a partnerbased project is the “Center for Army Analysis Capstone Project on the Strategic Competition and Crisis Wargame,” which won the Dean’s Inter-Departmental Award in 2022. Comprised of two Defense and Strategic Studies majors, two Systems Engineering majors, and one Operations Research major, the team for this project studied a crisis wargaming system as an educational method to understand and explore the effects of interstate military interventions. The prototype gaming system was used by the U.S. Department of the Army Headquarters, G-3/5/7 Strategy Directorate and every Army Service Component Command (ASCC) during the development of the Global Strategic Framework for military competition. “The project will support ASCC and Geographic Combatant Command staffs with understanding how military activities in

competition nest within and support the other aspects of national power (diplomacy, information, and economics),” explains a representative from the Center for Army Analysis.

“The cadets’ additions have increased the system’s ability to analyze tradeoffs and risks associated with Combatant Commands’ campaign plans when looking globally.” This is a fitting example of how cadets can indirectly shape strategic effects through the power of interdisciplinary research and client-based projects.

Beyond the Classroom

Academic enrichment opportunities, many of which are made possible by graduates’ and friends’ Margin of Excellence funding, also serve to deepen the Academy’s ties to the needs of the Army and nation, informed by global considerations. The Academy’s robust Academic Individual Advanced Development (AIAD) program sends cadets all over the world to apply what they have learned during the year to complex applied research challenges.

Due to the Academy’s strong partnerships, cadets have impactful research opportunities rarely afforded to undergraduates at other institutions. The Darkweb (sic) Retrieval, Examination, and Detection (DREAD) capstone project, for example, provided a mutually beneficial experience for the cadets involved in the project and the New York City Police Department (NYPD). The Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science’s

Then Cadet Konrad Babraj ’22 presents his research on the effect of U.S. civil-military relation trends on unethical uses of force in counterinsurgencies.

DREAD capstone team had the opportunity to directly apply their big data and network analysis skills to national security. In this case, cadets helped the NYPD bridge gaps in finding and investigating hidden services on the dark web. These illegal services include drug and weapons sales, human trafficking, and child pornography. There are several challenges associated with crawling the internet, parsing large files, connecting to the dark web safely, testing potential dark web links to confirm if they are active, and mining keywords from dark web sites to identify the type of illicit activity hosted. The DREAD capstone team explored means to connect tens of thousands of dark web hidden services, download as much content as possible, and index that content into a system searchable by law enforcement. The team designed and built a proof of concept that takes a common crawl of the internet and parses it for dark web links. The cadets’ project also updates a searchable database with dark web link status and keywords associated with active sites. The proof-ofconcept database is already accessible to NYPD detectives to use in investigations. “Project DREAD afforded us the opportunity to interact with a multitude of cyber- and computer sciencerelated aspects and demonstrate our technical knowledge up to that point,” explains Second Lieutenant Kyle Krange ’22. In many instances, departments integrate AIAD opportunities into electives, independent studies, and capstone coursework so that cadets can build on their knowledge and experiences over time. Most recently, then Cadet Hannah Blakey ’22 maximized her academic opportunities by taking the most advanced courses the Persian program offered. She then had a transformative experience in 2019 during her travel to

Uzbekistan, where she studied Persian at the Samarkand Institute of Foreign Languages and immersed herself in Uzbekistan culture. She quickly learned how challenging it can be to build relationships across cultural divides. After returning to West Point, Blakey designed an independent study of the Persian diaspora in the United States. She read the memoirs of Iranian exiles and conducted interviews with Persian scholars, Iranian-American business leaders, and heads of Persian cultural centers. Her goal was to understand the challenges immigrants faced as they moved to the United States and left family members behind in Iran. Last fall, Blakey developed this research into a capstone project about the effects of forced migration in Persian-speaking communities and then presented her work. Due in part to her impressive academic work, Blakey is now studying at Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar, where she will study refugee and forced migration studies. Such an example highlights how focusing on problem-solving and project-based research during a cadet’s education can prime him or her for success when it comes to handling ambiguous and complex problem sets.

The USMA research program forges partnerships between government, industry, and academia. These partnerships enhance cadets’ academic enrichment opportunities and enable the faculty to stay engaged and relevant within their respective disciplines. Through these ill-defined challenges, cadets engage in those research processes and methodologies needed to develop critical thinking skills beyond what can be taught in the traditional classroom setting. These research experiences— whether through AIADs, independent study, or capstone projects—further the development of cadets, allowing them to

“Project DREAD afforded us the opportunity to interact with a multitude of cyber- and computer science-related aspects and demonstrate our technical knowledge up to that point.”

— 2LT Kyle Krange ’22

Left: Then Cadet Hannah Blakey '22 poses to celebrate her selection as a Rhodes Scholar. Right: Blakey meets with local leaders during a trip to Uzbekistan, where she studied Persian at the Samarkand Institute of Foreign Languages.

grow as agile and adaptive thinkers who are capable of leading and winning on the complex battlefield of tomorrow. 

LTC Brad McCoy ’01 is the Associate Dean for Research (ADR) and an Academy Professor in the Department of Civil and Mechanical Engineering. As the ADR, he is the Director of the Academic Research Division and leads the research enterprise across departments and research centers and institutes. He also teaches civil engineering courses in the Department of Civil and Mechanical Engineering. McCoy holds a B.S. in civil engineering and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in civil engineering from North Carolina State University. In addition, he serves as chair of the American Society of Civil Engineers Sustainable Infrastructure Standard Committee, holds a Professional Engineer license in the state of Missouri, and is a credentialed Envision® Sustainability Professional with the Institute for Sustainable Infrastructure.

MAJ Renée Sanjuán ’09 is an Assistant Professor and the Associate Dean for Policy and Communications (ADPC). As the ADPC, she works on policy for the Dean’s directorate and serves as the Dean’s Strategic Communications Director. Sanjuán also teaches political science in the Department of Social Sciences. She previously served as the Executive Secretary for the West Point Graduate Scholarship Program. She received an M.A. in security studies from Kansas State University and an M.P.A. in urban and social policy from Columbia University. She also serves as the founder of the GSP Alumni Network (WPAOG shared interest group), is a founding board member of the non-profit Fierce Civility, and is a 2016 Presidential Leadership Scholar.

West Point’s Applied Research Model By The Numbers

$19.7M AY21 research funding spent

ACTIVE AGREEMENTS

18

90+ Non-governmental partnership agreements

Governmental partnership agreements

RESEARCH (over the past five years)

3,784 Independent studies

274 Research AIADs Research publications (over the past five years)

9,037 Capstone projects

3,000+

Class of 2022 cadets from the Darkweb Retrieval, Examination and Detection project present their research at Projects Day 2022.

Maps created by and used courtesy of CPT Victoria Gramlich ’13, M.S., Instructor, Department of Geography & Environmental Engineering, United States Military Academy

ACADEMY SCHOLARS PROGRAM: West Point Academic Individual Advanced Development (AIAD) Locations (2018-2022)

Generous support from graduates and friends of West Point

STRENGTHENING THE LONG GRAY LINE

“I would like to ask for your support of the Long Gray Line Fund this year. With new initiatives on the horizon, I hope you will stay engaged and connected no matter how far you are from your Rockbound Highland Home. With your help, we can strengthen the bonds that unite our graduates and their families and that keep the traditions and ideals of West Point intact.”

—The Honorable Robert A. McDonald, Class of 1975 Chairman of the Board of Directors

To donate today, visit us online at WESTPOINTAOG.ORG/LONGGRAYLINEFUND or call: 845.446.1657

Image designed by Leigh Gust, one of our Annual Giving Associates.

Faculty excellence also contributes directly to the Army through applied research and by the return of “West Point’s second graduating class” (the Academy’s rotating military faculty) to the operational force. The development and empowerment of a talented faculty are central to the Academy’s mission to prepare its graduates for the intellectual rigors of 21stcentury battlefield domains.

The USMA faculty is a diverse team. Building that team takes concentrated and deliberate effort. The faculty blend of excellence consists of 15 percent senior military faculty, 14 percent senior civilian faculty, 15 percent junior civilian faculty, and 56 percent rotating military faculty. No matter in which category a faculty member may belong, all are focused on development in five domains: teaching, scholarship, cadet

Academic Excellence Through Faculty Excellence

By LTC Benjamin Wallen ’96, Guest Writer

development, faculty development, and service. West Point prioritizes faculty development to elevate the quality of its instructors by providing access to the latest approaches to teaching and learning. The manner in which the Academy provides those resources brings faculty together from across the enterprise, creating rich learning environments and opportunities for cross-departmental discussions and collaboration. Setting conditions for excellence in teaching begins with arriving faculty education. About 150 new faculty members arrive each year to educate, train, and inspire cadets. Instructors are coached and mentored by Academy and department leadership, leading to their ability to present innovative, engaging instruction. Faculty members are also fully immersed in the cadet experience to gain an appreciation for the many demands placed upon their

West Point faculty take the academic experience to the next level. Faculty excellence elevates the cadet learning experience in and out of the classroom through instruction, research, academic clubs, summer internships, and more.

students. For example, new faculty members will participate in a day of Cadet Summer Training, meet with the Simon Center for the Professional Military Ethic, and meet with the Character Integration Advisory Group.

The Center for Faculty Excellence supports instructors in pursuing excellence in the five developmental domains. To accomplish this, the center builds communities of educators, scholars, and leaders. For example, the Master Teacher Program is a two-year program that provides instructors with a collaborative learning environment to study and explore best teaching practices. For a broader experience, instructors may enroll in the Project Management Professional (PMP) Review course, a 15-lesson course that allows them to work towards their PMP credential with others who are participating from across West Point, the Navy, the Air Force, and other Army posts. These efforts build communities of educators and strengthen bonds among staff and faculty from across the Academy. They also translate to improved, engaging teaching and opportunities for the enrichment of cadets through the excellence shown by faculty.

With the largest concentration of advanced degrees in the Army, USMA strives to be the intellectual engine of the Army’s innovation ecosystem. Supporting these efforts, faculty members regularly cross disciplines when working through problems or engaging with cadets, and they receive recognition across higher education for their research. As instructors pursue excellence in

each domain, their efforts produce additional opportunities for cadets. For example, faculty scholarship efforts have helped cadets pursue independent study research or obtain AIAD internships with Army research laboratories. This past year, numerous faculty members earned significant recognition for their work, impacting academic enrichment opportunities for years to come.

In February, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) awarded West Point and the City University of New York Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy more than $12 million over the next five years to support the first artificial intelligence center to study precision nutrition. Dr. Diana Thomas, Professor of Mathematics, leads the West Point team, comprised of 13 faculty members across four departments. Dr. Thomas was also selected by the NIH to co-chair the entire Nutrition for Precision Health Consortium, which consists of an additional 13 awards in this funding initiative. The goal of Thomas’s study is to implement computational and data science approaches and tools to advance nutrition for precision health. The impact is applied research projects available to faculty and cadets across the Academic Program.

Also, in June, Colonel Diana Loucks, Academy Professor and Director of Advanced Physics in the Department of Physics and Nuclear Engineering, was awarded five years of funding from the National Science Foundation through the Faculty Early Career Development Program. This prestigious award supports

Photo: Christopher Hennen/USMA PAO

USMA faculty and staff members involved in the joint venture between the Academy and CUNY Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy that were awarded an estimated $12 million over five years to establish the worldʼs first artificial intelligence and computational modeling center for precision nutrition and health.

Inspired to Instruct

MAJ Missy

Moorehouse

APGAR Award Recipient Department of Geography and Environmental Engineering

“As an undergrad, I remember how some of my professors inspired me through their knowledge and dedication to their field craft, and I want to be able to similarly encourage my students to pursue their own academic endeavors. I am especially inspired to teach at West Point because our students not only excel as scholars but will become the future leaders of our military and influence others in so many ways.”

COL Aaron Hill ’97 PUSMA, Department of Civil and Mechanical Engineering

“For me, there is nothing more rewarding than investing in people, and West Point’s mission allows me to educate and inspire tomorrow’s leaders of character daily both in and out of the classroom.”

Dr. Scott

Silverstone

Dean’s Award for Career Teaching Excellence Department of Social Sciences

“For the past 21 years, I’ve had the privilege of helping prepare future Army leaders to take on some of the most complex problems in the Army’s history, from counterterrorism/counterinsurgency to great power competition. Our graduates assume an immense burden on behalf of the nation when they leave West Point, so the impact of our faculty, as educators and mentors, can be immense as well.”

early career faculty who have the potential to serve as academic role models in research and education and to lead advances in the mission of their department or organization. The corresponding funding will be applied to West Point’s Arctic space research. The impact that faculty members like Loucks have on cadets is significant and enduring. As Second Lieutenant Chase Lewis ’21 explains: “Conducting space weather research with Colonel Loucks significantly impacted my academic career as a cadet and beyond. Since graduating, I have had the opportunity to work on projects for the EOD community, and I have been able to reach back to Colonel Loucks for expertise about how space weather and the aurora might affect electronics and magnetically sensitive explosives on the ground.”

Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Pfluger ’01 (Promotable), Academy Professor and USMA’s Environmental Program Director, received an Environmental Security Technology Certification Program award for his ongoing research project “Advancing Energy Resilience through Demonstrating, Characterizing, and Modeling Anaerobic Co-digestion of Organic Wastes for Widespread Implementation on DOD Installations,” which involves the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Engineer Research and Development Center’s Risk & Decision Team and professors from multiple USMA academic departments. This research will create a unique opportunity to advance the Army’s energy security and installation resilience efforts. Over three years, the nearly $1 million award will enable USMA faculty and cadets to

combine unique technology and world-class intellectual capital to achieve Army objectives.

Individual examples of excellence—along with the collective pursuit of excellence in teaching, scholarship, service, cadet development, and faculty development—result in consistent top college rankings for USMA in the categories of most accessible professors, best classroom experience, diversity in class, best college library, best counseling and health services, and best engineering programs. These rankings are possible by bringing in the best faculty talent and providing deliberate faculty development across the West Point enterprise. The result is a meaningful, impactful experience for cadets preparing for a career of professional excellence and service to the nation as officers in the U.S. Army. 

LTC Ben Wallen ’96 is an Associate Professor and the Associate Dean for Faculty Development at the United States Military Academy, West Point. Wallen supports faculty in their pursuit of excellence in the five domains of teaching. He also teaches environmental engineering in the Department of Geography and Environmental Engineering and works with the Army West Point Women’s Basketball Team, Student Chapter of the Society of American Military Engineers, Hillel, and Jewish Choir. He earned his B.S. in environmental engineering from West Point, an M.S. in geological engineering from the University of Missouri–Rolla, an M.S. in environmental engineering from the University of Texas–Austin, and his Ph.D. in civil and environmental engineering from Colorado School of Mines.

Photo: John Pellino/USMA PAO

Members of an interdisciplinary environmental research team led by LTC Andrew Pfluger ’01 (front, second from left), an Academy professor in the Department of Geography and Environmental Engineering (GENE), pose to celebrate their recent DOD Environmental Security Technology Certification Program award.

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The Writing Fellows Program: Scholars, Teachers, Leaders

By Dr. Jason Hoppe, Guest Writer

It is a typical afternoon scene in the beloved back parlor of the Academy’s Writing Fellows Program: loads of natural light, three old leather couches, a worn-out typewriter tucked in the corner, walls lined with portraits of distinguished writers across the ages—and cadets from various academic majors gathered in community with one another.

Photo: Erika Norton/WPAOG

Here,on the first floor of Jefferson Hall, community regularly takes the shape of mutual study as cadets go about their own reading or writing in quiet solidarity. Just as often, though, it unfolds as vigorous conversation about the importance of sound writing, as on the day pictured on the opposite page. Regardless of its exact form, “building community, intellectually and professionally, among different academic disciplines as well as different faculty and cadets” has always been central to the Writing Fellows Program, according to Deputy Director Dr. Colleen Eils. Indeed, Second Lieutenant André Pincot ’22 (Chemical Engineering), who was selected for the program as a cadet, describes its focus on “cadet-faculty interaction and exchange” as its “greatest aspect.” The bottom line is similar for Second Lieutenant Clara Bartram ’22, also a former cadet writing fellow and Chemical Engineering major, who says the program offers “the best sense of academia you get at West Point—a community of diverse, intelligent, dedicated people committed to using their skills and abilities to serve others.”

As Bartram suggests, the Writing Fellows Program uniquely blends scholarship and service; it insists on a version of academia that is resolutely multidisciplinary and committed to applied,

impactful learning—to academic action. In recognition of the power and potential of its work, the program was recently identified as an Academy funding need in relation to WPAOG’s Margin of Excellence Program. Founded in 2012 with an inaugural cohort of six, the Writing Fellows Program is now regarded as the cornerstone of the overarching West Point Writing Program (established within the Office of the Dean four years later), with up to 48 cadets selected for enrollment every year. These cadets work with each other, faculty, and their peers in the Corps to elevate writing education and proficiency across the Academy. They come from majors in every department: some are humanists, others are engineers or scientists, still others are social scientists. What binds them together? All will be Army officers, and all recognize that—no matter their academic major or future Army branch—clear, thoughtful, and effective communication will be critical to their success.

Scholars First

All cadet fellows begin the program as yearlings or cows, progressing through a rigorous sequence of courses that combine seminar-based study of language, genre, and the writing process

Photo: Rebecca Rose/WPAOG

“[The program offers] the best sense of academia you get at West Point—a community of diverse, intelligent, dedicated people committed to using their skills and abilities to serve others.”

—2LT Clara Bartram ’22

(Left to right) Cadet Fellows Mazie Jones, Erica Harper, and Tony Marco (all from the Class of 2023) trade stories about supporting writer development during their time at the Academy.

with sustained individual research, faculty mentorship, and work with peers. For Dr. John Sampson, who recently joined the Harvard College Writing Program after a two-year stint with the program as an Assistant Director, these courses are “the closest to a graduate seminar experience that I have seen at the undergraduate level.” It is therefore no surprise, Sampson elaborates, that since 2013 more than 50 cadet fellows have presented scholarship in writing studies at juried conferences. Several have gone even further, working with faculty to publish work in top academic journals; dozens more have authored concise, tailored guides to effective writing that circulate through the Corps and are available, via the program’s website, to students around the world. Regardless of where the scholarship of cadet fellows leads them as individuals, points out Dr. LC Santangelo, it crucially relies on and enriches their greater community. Santangelo, an Assistant Director with the program who arrived in 2021 from Princeton University, characterizes cadet fellows as “not only interested in their own individual goals but deeply invested in each other’s successes. Cadet fellows care for ideas as much as they care for community; in fact, they depend on the latter to develop the former.”

Teachers Always

That dedication to community is perhaps most apparent in the systematic teaching cadet fellows have undertaken, especially since the formation in 2013 of the USMA Writing Center, re-named for William D. Mounger ’48 in 2016. As the main supporting elements of the larger, cross-curricular West Point Writing Program, the

Fellows Program and Mounger Writing Center go hand-in-hand. The intellectual engine represented in the immense efforts of the program—its courses, scholarship, and other enrichment activities, as well as its robust networks of faculty mentors and guest speakers—drives educational practice in the endowed space of the center. It all seems to be paying off: as Dr. Eils observes, the number of one-on-one peer consultations cadet fellows perform annually continues to rise, from a little over 300 in 2013-14 to nearly 1,600 hour-long sessions this past academic year. It’s no wonder that then Cadet Fellow Luke Sanders ’22 (Nuclear Engineering) identified “the opportunity to learn how to help others in their writing” as the most valuable aspect of the program, adding that “the teaching skills I’ve learned and practiced will follow me for the rest of my life.”

Army Leaders

While the U.S. Army has always stressed effective communication, recent initiatives at its highest levels, among them the Command Assessment Programs launched in 2019, testify even more emphatically to the importance of sound reading, writing, and thinking for leaders across its operations. Real world Army experiences underscore this reality, say former cadet fellows and current captains Ian Berry ’17 (French, Spanish) and Aaron Leopold ’14 (Comparative Politics, Foreign Area Studies). Berry, currently with the 75th Ranger Regiment, muses, “I often find my mind returning to Jefferson Hall as I instruct others under my command—writing can be the place where otherwise strong, assertive men and women suddenly lose their commanding voice. But thanks to my time in the program, I’m equipped to help them find it.” For his part, reflecting on a recent deployment to Syria, Leopold states simply, “I have found writing to be my most effective weapons system throughout my career. As a young captain, clearly articulating the operational environment allows senior leaders to precisely allocate assets to deliver lethal and nonlethal effects.” As Berry and Leopold imply, then, the mission of the Writing Fellows Program is ultimately and clearly a subset of the Academy’s own, preparing cadets to find the words for— and to write their way through—the challenges they will face as Army officers.

Dr. Jason Hoppe is Associate Dean and founding Director of the West Point Writing Program (2016) as well as its chief supporting elements, the Writing Fellows Program (2012) and William D. Mounger ’48 Writing Center (2013). Each has been nationally recognized as among the robust and innovative efforts of its kind. The Writing Fellows Program has been identified as an Academy funding need in relation to the Margin of Excellence Program sponsored by the West Point Association of Graduates.

Photo: Rebecca Rose/WPAOG

“I have found writing to be my most effective weapons system throughout my career. As a young captain, clearly articulating the operational environment allows senior leaders to precisely allocate assets to deliver lethal and nonlethal effects.”

—CPT Aaron Leopold ’14

Dr. Jason Hoppe (center), Director of the West Point Writing Program, with this year’s cadet senior leaders in the Writing Fellows Program, CDTs Erica Harper ’23 and Tony Marco ’23.

Gripping Hands

2002

LTC Robert Beale ’02 Selected for the 2022 Nininger Award

The 2022 recipient of the West Point Association of Graduates’ Alexander R. Nininger Award for Valor at Arms is LTC Robert Beale ’02. The award will be presented on October 20 during ceremonies hosted by LTG Steven Gilland ’90, the 61st Superintendent of the U.S. Military Academy. On September 14, 2011, Beale, as a major, demonstrated conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity in connection with military operations against the enemy while serving with the 3d Battalion, 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne) in support of Operation Enduring Freedom, earning the Silver Star.

General Officer Announcements

The following officers were confirmed by the U.S. Senate:

BG Robert L. Barrie Jr. ’90 for an appointment to the rank of major general and assignment as Program Executive Officer, Program Executive Office, Aviation, Redstone Arsenal, AL

BG Trevor J. Bredenkamp ’92 for an appointment to the rank of major general and assignment as Chief, Legislative Liaison, Office of the Secretary of the Army, Washington, DC

BG James P. Isenhower III ’92 for an appointment to the rank of major general and assignment as Commanding General, 1st Armored Division and Fort Bliss, TX

BG Christopher G. Beck ’93 for an appointment to the rank of major general and assignment as Deputy Commanding General, III Corps, Fort Hood, TX

BG Peter N. Benchoff ’93 for an appointment to the rank of major general and assignment as Chief of Staff, United States Army Pacific, Fort Shafter, HI

BG David S. Doyle ’93 for an appointment to the rank of major general and assignment as Chief of Staff, United States Central Command, MacDill Air Force Base, FL

BG Ryan M. Janovic ’93 for an appointment to the rank of major general and assignment as Director of Operations, J-3, United States Cyber Command, Fort Meade, MD

BG Patrick L. Gaydon ’94 for an appointment to the rank of major general and assignment as Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations, Plans and Experiments, G-3/5/7, United States Army Futures Command, Austin, TX

continued on next page

“Grip hands—though it be from the shadows—while we swear as you did of yore, or living or dying, to honor the Corps, and the Corps, and the Corps.” —Bishop Shipman, 1902

General Officer Announcements, continued

The following officers were confirmed by the U.S. Senate:

BG Gavin A. Lawrence ’95 for an appointment to the rank of major general and assignment as Commanding General, Military Surface Deployment and Distribution Command, Scott Air Force Base, IL

BG Paul T. Stanton ’95 for an appointment to the rank of major general and assignment as Commanding General, Cyber Center of Excellence and Fort Gordon, GA

BG Scott M. Naumann ’96 for an appointment to the rank of major general and assignment as Deputy Chief of Staff, G-3/5/7, United States Army Forces Command, Fort Bragg, NC

The Chief of Staff of the Army announces the following officer assignments:

BG (USAR) Jon E. Solem ’90 to Deputy Director, Plans and Strategic Integration, J-5, United States Africa Command, Germany

BG Michael J. Simmering ’93 to Deputy Commanding General (Operations), 1st Armored Division, Fort Bliss, TX

BG John P. Cogbill ’94 to Deputy Director Operations Fires and Effects, J-3, United States Central Command, MacDill Air Force Base, FL

BG David W. Gardner ’94 to Commanding General, Joint Readiness Training Center and Fort Polk, LA

BG Jason E. Kelly ’94 to Commanding General, United States Army Training Center and Fort Jackson, SC

BG Geoffrey A. Norman ’94 to Director, Next Generation Combat Vehicle Cross Functional Team, Warren, MI

BG Christopher D. Schneider ’94 to Program Executive Officer, Soldier, Fort Belvoir, VA

BG Gail E. Atkins ’95 to Commander, Defense Logistics Agency Land and Maritime, Columbus, OH

BG (USAR) Stephen P. Case ’95 to Deputy Commander (Individual Mobilization Augmentee), Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa, Operation Enduring Freedom-Horn of Africa, Djibouti

BG Mark D. Miles ’95 to Director of Command, Control, Communications and Cyber, J-6, United States Indo-Pacific Command, Camp Smith, HI

BG Brandon R. Tegtmeier ’96 to Deputy Commanding General (Support), 82nd Airborne Division, Fort Bragg, NC

For promotion to the rank of brigadier general:

COL (USAR) Noel F. Palmer ’95

He’s “Your Guy”

By Keith J. Hamel, WPAOG staff

Army West Point Play-by-Play Announcer Rich DeMarco

Rich DeMarco, Army West Point’s Associate Athletics Director of Broadcasting and Licensing, has a theory. He believes that there is a special relationship between a radio announcer and a program. “Radio is ‘your guy,’” he says. “A radio announcer who is with a team all season is intimately connected to a specific fan base.” Think of Vin Scully and the Brooklyn-thenLos Angeles Dodgers, a connection that lasted 67 seasons before his 2016 retirement. Eli Gold and the Alabama Crimson Tide, going strong since 1988, is another example. “When I was growing up, my guy was Marty Glickman with the New York Jets,” says DeMarco. “He was one of those classic radio storytellers, and I connected with the team through the emotion

of his broadcasts.” Since 2004, DeMarco has been “the guy” for Army West Point sports fans, and he begins each broadcast with, “To Army fans throughout the Hudson Valley, across the nation, and around the world…,” hailing every graduate who cannot be in attendance for whatever sporting event he is covering and welcoming him or her back home.

Rolls/Call

DeMarco first applied for a broadcasting job at West Point in 2001, but timing was not on his side. “But they told me to keep in touch,” says DeMarco, and he did. As a result, in January 2004, he got a call from the Athletics Department informing him that a Director of Broadcasting position was available and asking if he would be interested in an interview. “Absolutely!”

Above: Rich DeMarco, Army West Point's Associate Athletics Director of Broadcasting and Licensing, sitting at his "desk" in the Hoffman Press Box, from where he calls Army West Point Football games.

DeMarco told them. He got the job—which involved men’s and women’s basketball, football sideline reporting, and the football “Coach’s Show,” with some sales and marketing thrown in— and, with his wife Katy’s support (“You can’t do what I do without a great partner supporting you,” he says), DeMarco has never looked back.

In his 18 years at West Point, DeMarco has transitioned from the Black Knights’ Director of Broadcasting to Director of Multimedia Services and Community Outreach to Assistant Athletics Director for Multimedia Services and Broadcasting. Today, DeMarco’s title includes Broadcasting and Licensing, which puts him in charge of all of Army West Point’s “marks” for their many teams (the usage of trademarks at the retail level), and he manages the creative video unit inside the Athletics Department. While most known as the play-by-play announcer for Army West Point Football and as the host of the team’s weekly “Coach’s Show” during the season, DeMarco also calls games for the Army West Point Men’s Basketball Team. In the past, he has done the same for the Women’s Basketball Team, calling its NCAA Tournament games in both 2006 and 2014. He has also done play-by-play for the Army West Point Baseball Team (broadcasting its NCAA Tournament games in 2004, 2005, 2009, 2012, 2013, and 2018) and the Black Knights Men’s Lacrosse Team (calling NCAA Tournament matches in 2004, 2005, and 2010). Outside of the norm, DeMarco has done broadcasts for the Army West Point Gymnastics Open and for Army West Point Track & Field. “The remaining thing that I’d really love to call is the first NCAA Tournament game for Army West Point Men’s Basketball,” he says. “This would mean calling the team’s first Patriot League Championship, too!”

Given how many games for which he has done play-by-play over the years and for such a wide variety of Army West Point teams, one might think DeMarco would have a difficult time naming his favorite call, but that is not the case: “December 10, 2016— the end of the streak and a win for the ages,” he says. “There are some moments in sports that transcend the game, and you can see the impact it makes to so many people in so many different places—Ahmad Bradshaw’s go-ahead touchdown in the 2016

Army-Navy Game is one of those moments, and it’s my favorite call”: From the Navy 9-yard line…Black Knights knocking on the door…Bradshaw runs right, off tackle…to the five-yard line, cuts back to the goal line…SPINNING TO THE GOAL LINE… TOUCHDOWN ARMY! Prominently displayed in his office, which is teeming with sports memorabilia, DeMarco has a photo of the 2016 Army West Point Football Team celebrating after singing second. “Coach Monken signed this photo for me, and it is my favorite thing to display in my office,” DeMarco says. “The raw emotion of what that touchdown and game meant to so many people is something that will live on forever.”

Before The Broadcast

While DeMarco is known to Army West Point sports fans for his distinctive, dramatic baritone voice, it is really his preparation that makes him legendary. “If someone presents the game time and score, the down and distance, and what yard line the ball is on, then that person is automatically in the 90th percentile of all sports announcers,” he says. “But if a listener who doesn’t know a lot about the teams or the sport can still follow what’s going on, then that play-by-play announcer is one of the good ones; if that announcer is also able to weave in stories, then that is what separates the good ones from the great ones.”

DeMarco’s preparation routine begins as soon as one game ends. For football, his preparation lasts all week and involves creating 15-by-20-inch “boards,” with offense information on one side and defense information on the other. It begins on Sunday with updating the stats for the Black Knights and getting preliminary material for Army West Point’s next opponent, things such as its roster and depth chart. On Monday, DeMarco builds the opposing team with player names, jersey numbers, and field positions. On Tuesday, he adds in their stats, and on Wednesday he compiles notes on the opposing team, which he gathers from looking at box scores and watching highlights of their games. In between prepping his notes, DeMarco starts gathering sound, which includes conducting interviews with players and coaches at practices, and he prepares this for use in the pre-game. He also hosts the “Coach’s Show” on Thursday and records an interview

Photos: Danny Wild; submitted

“My favorite thing to display in my office,” says DeMarco: A copy of the photo showing the Army West Point Football Team singing second after winning the 2016 Army-Navy Game and ending the streak.

Radio crew (DeMarco is second from the right) for the 2020 Army-Navy Game at Michie Stadium, which was the first Army-Navy Game played at Michie in 77 years.

with head coach Jeff Monken that will air during the upcoming pre-game show. On Friday (or Thursday night if it’s a road game), he puts the final touches on his boards and prints them out for use in the game. Given all this prep, it is surprising to learn that DeMarco doesn’t take time during the week to write out what he is going to say during the pre-game show. Instead, he likes to arrive at the stadium early, about four hours before kickoff, to ascertain the mood of the day. “I like to be really prepared for a lot of things, but that is something I like to do the morning of the game,” he says. “That way, what I say comes across as fresh and not canned.”

DeMarco has less prep to do when he calls a men’s basketball game, but there are three times as many games to call, so he spends about equal time on both sports. “Basketball comes down to knowing what players have done in previous games, so I read all the articles available on Patriot League games and watch as many rebroadcasts of games on ESPN+ as I can,” he says. During November and December, he is calling both basketball and football games, so his schedule gets rather hectic. This is also the time when he really needs to take care of his voice. “I used to get hoarse by the end of a broadcast,” DeMarco says, “but over the years I have learned to temper my excitement when calling a game so that I don’t damage ‘my instrument.’”

Speaking of excitement, DeMarco acknowledges that he is biased toward the Black Knights, getting excited when they score

and win and suffering the pain of some of their losses. But while he actively supports the home team, he is always objective in his approach to the opposing team. “Most of my prep during the week is for the opposing team,” he says. “I see Army players every day, so I’m not prepping for them in the same way that I am prepping for their opponent.” DeMarco believes that if a fan listens to a broadcast and the announcer doesn’t know anything about the opposing team, especially not being able to pronounce its players’ names correctly, then that announcer is not up to par. “I owe it to Army fans to know as much as I can about whatever team Army is playing,” DeMarco says. “Everyone knows about their own team but knowing the opponent and what they are going to do in a certain situation is vital, and it’s what separates run-of-the-mill announcers from those of the next tier.”

Man On A Mission—The People, The Place, The Privilege

The mission of the Office of the Directorate of Intercollegiate Athletics, the department in which DeMarco works at the Academy, is “to provide an extraordinary Division I athletic experience that develops leaders of character committed to the values of Duty, Honor, Country.” “I ask myself every day how I’m serving the cadets,” DeMarco says. One of the most

The 15-by-20 inch "offense/defense" information boards DeMarco produces each week and uses during his play-by-play calling for football games.

“Yes, Army teams have great players, but more important is that they have great future officers who will be serving our nation, and this is the story I love to tell.” —Rich DeMarco

Left: Steve Chaloult ’92 (L) and Stan March ’81 (R), former Army Football players, induct DeMarco as an honorary member of the Army Football Club in 2019. Right: In one of his first assignments as a sideline reporter for Army Football, DeMarco interviews Glenn Davis ’47, the 1946 Heisman Trophy winner and “Mr. Outside” on Army’s national championship teams of the 1940s.

recognizable ways he does this is by telling their stories during game broadcasts. “When one of our cadet athletes makes a great play, I want to tell listeners how that player is so much more than a good football or basketball player,” he says. DeMarco will relate stories about cadets as teammates and as companymates, about how they are performing in the classroom during the academic year and what they did on the ranges during summer training, and about where they came from and what family connections they might have. As he puts it, “Yes, Army teams have great players, but more important is that they have great future officers who will be serving our nation, and this is the story I love to tell.” More than anything, DeMarco hopes that fans, particularly graduates, feel connected to the cadets through his broadcast, because he knows how special cadets are. “I bring my 9-year-old twin sons to West Point athletic events all the time, and there are no other athletes that I’d rather have them growing up around than the cadet athletes at West Point,” DeMarco says. “That’s why I am so lucky to be here, to work at a place where my kids get to idolize the best of the best, the next generation of America’s leaders.”

DeMarco also considers himself lucky because of Football Saturdays at West Point. “There is nothing like it in all of sports,” he says. “It’s a magical event, and I’m humble to be part of it.” He says that other schools have elaborate gameday rituals, but when one considers the review on the Parade Field, the Parachute Team jumping in with the game ball, the festivities in Black Knight Alley, the Corps of Cadets in the stands, and all

the other activities that happen, then it is easy to see how West Point—perhaps more than any other school—is embracing and celebrating all that is right and good about college sports. And don’t forget that the game itself is being played at historic Michie Stadium! DeMarco has called games in stadiums that have hosted a Super Bowl, the Olympics, the World Series, the Final Four, and even the Beatles for their last U.S. concert, but none of them compare, in his opinion, to a Football Saturday at Michie Stadium.

Finally, DeMarco considers it a privilege to be calling games for the best fans in the world. “Army fans show tremendous passion across all sports,” he says. “The fan who is attending an Army football game on Saturday will be at a volleyball match on Sunday and cheer just as hard; plus, all Army fans want to be at an Army-Navy star match no matter what the sport is just so they can cheer on Army.”

In 2019, DeMarco was made an honorary member of the Army Football Club. “I consider this to be the ultimate compliment from an alumni fan base,” he says. “They have accepted me as one of themselves.” In short, DeMarco’s theory has been proven correct—he is officially “our guy,” and he will be so for many more years to come. “I can’t envision a scenario in which I would leave West Point,” he says. “I can’t in my mind think of any job offer that would make me want to give up all the great things that I get to do here.” 

Left: The DeMarco family in the radio booth of the Hoffman Press Box at Michie Stadium. Center: DeMarco’s twin sons, Matthew and Reed, with Army West Point Football wide receiver Isaiah Alston ’25. Right: Matthew and Reed with Army West Point Football Head Coach Jeff Monken.

MAILBOX

We regret that, because of limited space, we cannot publish all letters received. Letters may be edited and shortened for space. Submit comments or questions to Editor@wpaog.org, or chat with us on one of our WPAOG social media channels.

FROM: MG (R) Bob St. Onge ’69

We appreciate the wonderful 2022 Summer edition of West Point magazine, especially Keith Hamel’s article “Gone, But Never Forgotten.” Many of those who made the ultimate sacrifice from the classes on which you focused were our fellow cadets, often our cadet leaders, our teammates, friends, and battle buddies. We served with them in combat and honor all of them just as we do those from classes unmentioned, the Classes of ’61, ’69, and ’70. Eighteen members of the Class of 1969 who marched to the sound of the guns died in service to their country in Vietnam and one died later from his wounds. We have honored them formally and informally at every opportunity and continue to do so with increasing fervor. Grip Hands!

FROM: LTC (R) Bill Knowlton Jr. ’70

Upon receipt of the 2022 Summer edition of West Point magazine, I was pleased to see the cover story was on how the Long Gray Line never forgets. However, once I read the article, I was disappointed and dismayed to see that it focused only on some of the classes of the 1960s and how they have remembered their classmates who fell in Vietnam. I cannot speak for the classes before the 60s who also lost classmates in Vietnam, but I can speak for my class, the Class of 1970. We were the last class to have a significant number of classmates (150) serve in Vietnam, about 20 percent of our class. Virtually all of those who served were volunteers. We lost four classmates in Vietnam: Robert “Pop” Brown, Dick Green, Marshall Steinfeld, and Mike Minor. At every reunion over the years, we have remembered our fallen classmates with a roll call and memorial service, always focusing first on those four who fell in Vietnam and others who fell in training or while in harm’s way. Although the number of our fallen comrades is small compared the classes of the 60s, we remember their lives and mourn their loss as much as any of the classes mentioned in the article. We have not forgotten them, and never will.

RESPONSE:

Thank you both for your letters. We knew, as demonstrated by your letters, that those classes not mentioned in the article

have never forgotten their classmates lost in Vietnam. We regret that we were unable to detail all 28 USMA classes (1941, 1943 June, and 1945-70) that lost members in Vietnam, but we would not have been able to give each class the proper treatment on a topic of this magnitude in the limited space available and thus decided to confine the article to the seven sequential classes that lost 20 or more members.

NOTE: The author of Sons of Slum and Gravy, a book mentioned in the “Gone, But Never Forgotten” article, is Bill Mogan ’62 (not “Morgan”). We thank Dave Phillips ’62 for bringing this to our attention.

FROM: Richard E. “Dick” Radez ’67

I write concerning the cover story, “Gone, But Never Forgotten,” in the 2022 Summer issue of West Point magazine. The reason that West Pointers are able to remember their fallen classmates whose names are inscribed on the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, DC is because of four West Pointers: Jack Wheeler and Art Mosley from the Class of 1966, Tom Schull from the Class of 1973, and myself. The four of us were motivated by Duty, Honor, Country. We wanted to bring a sense of closure and peace to the country by memorializing all who died in Vietnam. It took us the better part of three years operating under intense stress and pressure, but we had a duty to fulfill.

RESPONSE:

Thank you for your letter. It is inspiring to learn that West Point graduates from different class years banded together in the name of Duty, Honor, Country to recognize all those who died in Vietnam, especially the 333 graduates from those 28 classes mentioned in the previous “Response.” We recognize you and thank you for the sacrifices you made to ensure that those who paid the ultimate sacrifice are never forgotten. For those who wish to learn more about the contributions these four graduates made to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, there is the April 1983 article “Making Peace” by John March, which appeared in the Harvard Business School Bulletin (ISSN 00178020). We wish we could republish portions of this 17-page article, but copyright issues prevent us from doing so.

ASSOCIATION OF GRADUATE

Authors Bookshelf

A West Point magazine supplement featuring books by West Point graduates and faculty.

The Everlasting Spring: Beyond Olympus

Volume One, Benjamin & Boudica

by Francis Audrain ’68

The Everlasting Spring Beyond Olympus is an epic trilogy in three connected sagas, inspired by actual events, during the tumultuous rise of Western Civilization. In the formative era of the first century, Benjamin & Boudica are the first of three couples whose heroic lives reflected many thousands of others, who made world-changing history by following an impossible dream…and inspiring millions…to love and protect the United States of America.

Available at Amazon/Goodreads.com, Google play, Apple Books, & Barnes & Noble.com

The Everlasting Spring: Beyond Olympus

Volume Two, Colton & Blue Star by Francis

Audrain ’68

Long after the era of Benjamin and Boudica, explorers from Europe took to the sea seeking new resources for their rapidly growing populations. They found a “new world” across the Atlantic Ocean. And it is there that Colton and Blue Star emerge, as Western Civilization continues to spread West in a wild and wonderful land, abundant in opportunity and heartbreaking conflict, that forms a civilized country, ruled by its citizens with equal justice and liberty for all.

Available at Amazon/Goodreads.com, Google play, Apple Books, & Barnes & Noble.com

The Everlasting Spring: Beyond Olympus

Volume Three, Aaron & Alana by Francis Audrain ’68

Following the eras of Benjamin & Boudica and Colton & Blue Star, Aaron and Alana emerge. Both were born in 1941 at the onset of WWII; both are aware of the conflict in Korea, and the beginning of the war in Vietnam, where Aaron is wounded; transported to Hawaii, and soon realizes his wounds and trauma have affected his attitude regarding the Army, his country, and the rest of his life. But his fate is miraculously changed when he meets an Army Nurse and his soul begins to heal.

Available at Amazon/Goodreads.com, Google play, Apple Books, & Barnes & Noble.com

Army Bowl Games

Volume 1: 1890-2010

By Mike Belter ’78

In his third book on Army Football, Mike describes the first five bowl games in Army Football History, with a brief description of the 1984, 1985, 1988, 1996, and 2010 seasons. Also included are the three postseason games played by Army in 1929, 1930, and 1931 plus the difficult and frustrating history of outstanding Army Football Teams who were denied the honor to participate in college football bowl games prior to the 1984 season.

Available at Amazon.com & Smashwords.com

From the Shadows

A Tribute to the 1968 West Point Graduates Who Gave Their Lives in Vietnam

By LTC (R) John Hedley ’68

Imbued with the ideals of the Academy’s motto, “Duty, Honor, Country,” the young officers of ’68 went off to lead soldiers in intense combat, on the ground and in the air. During three years ’68 lost twenty from their ranks. This is the story of their all too short lives, from growing up in post WW II America to their loss in Vietnam. Most died while leading from the front or flying to protect others. This is an American tale of dedication and courage.

Available on Amazon.com & Barnes & Noble.com

Leading With Your Life Equation: How to Be Indestructible, Indispensable & Unstoppable

By Philip Jalufka ’94

With his path to West Point derailed in a horrific auto accident, Philip Jalufka needed to find resolve and purpose to guide his personal and professional future. He graduated the Academy and served in the U.S. Army Aviation Special Operations. Today he leads two significant residential real estate companies. Leading With Your Life Equation offers stories and advice from people who have navigated their lives from humble beginnings, inspiring a national conversation about accountability.

Available at Amazon.com

Warp Speed: Inside the Operation that Beat COVID, the Critics, and the Odds

By Paul Mango ’81

A riveting account from the inside of how a small group of leaders from the military, industry, and government designed the most successful publicprivate partnership since World War II. Operation Warp Speed did not happen by accident. It was the result of inspiring leadership, a deliberate strategy, exacting execution, and exceptional teamwork. The result: hundreds of thousands of American lives, and trillions of dollars of economic output, saved.

Available at Amazon.com

Sonnets From a Floating Life

By Don Moore ’66

Don Moore’s 120 sonnets, written in the classic style of William Shakespeare, is a collection of free-wheeling thoughts exploring many themes and created for the contemporary reader. Moore’s interests in Asian legends, American life and music, mythology, memory, astronomy, and nature are penned in respect for Shakespeare’s craft, using 14-line iambic pentameter rhyming patterns. His love poems in rich verse echo the English bard’s romantic sonnets.

Available at Amazon.com, Virtual Bookworm Publishers and others

learn more about Bookshelf advertising, contact ads@wpaog.org or call 845.446.1646

Serving With Integrity in Viet Nam

By Ray P. Cossette ’70

A non-fiction story based on the combat experiences of a 1970 West Point graduate and his classmates in Vietnam. The publication deals with national issues of the 1970s such as Vietnam demonstrations and the author’s personal response to them. The memoir contains tragedy but in the end shows there is hope for America.

Available at Amazon.com or from the author for $5.00 per copy (including postage). He can be reached at e-mail: rapatco@aol.com

A Cold War Warrior’s Report: a Lifetime of Leadership in Service

By

COL (R) Alden M. Cunningham ’63

As we seem to be entering a second Cold War, it would be useful to see the first Cold War through the life of an Army officer who served on many fronts of that war from Germany to the Pentagon in Washington, DC, from Vietnam to Korea, and from Mexico to Nicaragua. This autobiography captures his life of Leadership in Service both as a senior Army Foreign Area officer defending our nation and as a former officer of Rotary International doing good in the world. Available at Amazon.com and others

Train Your Own Hero: Reach Peak Functioning in One Month or 21 Steps

By Don Greene, Ph.D. ’70

Why do even talented, highly trained, and experienced individuals make unforced errors in consequential situations? Train Your Own Hero solves the puzzle and guides the reader dayby-day, for one-month, leading up to an important live performance, such as an athletic event or business presentation. After the reader follows the book’s recommendations and completes the challenging exercises, they will likely experience peak functioning, without any unforced or unexplained errors.

Available at Amazon.com, Kindle, and TrainYourOwnHero.com

Good Goodbyes: A Mortal's Guide to Life

By Joan Grey ‘80

No matter who we are, where we are from, or what we do, we face one inescapable reality in life—death. Death is our ultimate commonality. It is inescapable, inevitable, and for many, quite frightening. But it doesn't have to be. Good Goodbyes: A Mortal's Guide to Life is a resource guide for The End, providing a holistic approach for a universal problem. Shortly after publication of this book, the author was diagnosed with cancer and passed away on June 1, 2022. A leader and a role model all her life, she lived what she wrote, and this book is an important part of her legacy.

Available at Amazon.com in paperback or on Kindle

The Astronaut’s Wife How Launching My Husband into Outer Space Changed the Way I Live on Earth

By Stacey Morgan, ex’00, wife of Andrew Morgan ’98

With an overwhelming mix of pride, excitement, and terror, Stacey and her children watched the rocket launch for a 9-month mission to the ISS. This is the true story of an astronaut’s wife—a journey full of unexpected twists, unique challenges and surreal opportunities. Join her on this funny and poignant exploration of life.

Available at Amazon.com & Barnes&Noble.com

Elite Souls

By Ray Raymond

GEN (Ret). Martin Dempsey: “An important glimpse into the character of some of America's best soldiers.”

Former West Point Superintendents: LTG (Ret.) Dan Christman: “A compelling read about how twenty first century leadership is taught at West Point.”

David Huntoon: “A gripping story of battlefield heroism and selfless service.”

William Lennox: “A true guide as to what it takes to develop leaders of character.”

Former Dean, BG Dan Kaufman: “A must read for anyone interested in servant leadership.”

Available wherever books are sold

West Point Admiral

By Michael W. Shelton ’67

RADM Shelton is the only graduate ever selected to Navy Flag Officer rank. Former USA Today executive editor Chet Czarniak states West Point Admiral “…chronicles his ascent to admiral with illuminating nuggets, opinions, and lessons learned in leadership in a changing Navy. Part memoir, part historical guide and part primer on the vast resources and systems required to support the military. Shelton opines on a range of topics…” covering the turbulent years, JFK to 9/11 presidencies, shaping the military today.

Available on westpointadmiral.com @ 20% discount with code WPFLAG. Also available at Amazon.com

Iraq and the Politics of Oil: An Insider’s Perspective

By Gary Vogler ’73 Vogler spent 5 months in prewar oil planning at the Pentagon. This was followed with 75 months in Iraq executing oil reconstruction under DOD between 2003 and 2011. During all this time and through 2014, he denied that our government had a hidden oil agenda in Iraq. While researching his book, Gary discovered something of significance: an oil agenda that will surprise most Americans. The book attempts to correct history and set the record straight.

Available at Thayer Hall Bookstore & Amazon.com

Be Thou at Peace

COL Peter T. Russell USA, Retired 1942

Mr. Thomas O. Mahon 1944

Mr. Edward F. Deacon Jr. 1945

Mr. Jesse B. Hearin Jr. 1945

Lt Col Louis L. Martin USAF, Retired 1945

Mr. Lloyd S. Adams Jr. 1946

LTC Harlan G. Koch USA, Retired 1946

Reverend Kevin A. Lynch 1946

Lt Col William F. Studer USAF, Retired 1946

Col John E. Cottongim USAF, Retired 1947

Lt Col William C. Hayden USAF, Retired 1948

Mr. Louis LoConte Jr. 1948

Col Robert M. Pomeroy USAF, Retired 1948

Mr. Louis H. Benzing 1949

Mr. Francis A. Hinchion 1949

Mr. Miers C. Johnson Jr. 1949

Lt Col Robert L. Makinney USAF, Retired 1949

COL Thomas L. Moses USA, Retired 1949

LTC John H. Yepsen USA, Retired 1949

COL John E. DiGrazia Jr. USA, Retired 1950

Brig Gen Richard T. Drury USAF, Retired 1950

COL Richard G. Hoffman USA, Retired 1950

COL James V. Irons USA, Retired 1950

COL Richard H. Lewandowski USA, Retired 1950

LTC George R. Middleton Jr. USA, Retired 1950

GEN Fidel V. Ramos Philippine Army, Retired 1950

Lt Col Ralph A. Ritteman Jr. USAF, Retired 1950

Mr. Joseph F. Shankle 1950

COL Edward C. West USA, Retired 1950

COL Louis G. Michael USA, Retired 1951

LTG Clarence E. McKnight Jr. USA, Retired 1952

Lt Col Gerald J. Naber USAF, Retired 1952

LTC Donald V. Pafford USA, Retired 1952

Mr. James L. Appleton Jr. 1953

LTC Robert A. Carter USA, Retired 1953

Mr. John C. Hall 1953

COL Jack A. Neuberger USA, Retired 1953

COL Wallace W. Noll USA, Retired 1953

Mr. John C. Phillips 1953

COL James S. Sibley USA, Retired 1953

LTC James C. Cooper III USA, Retired 1954

Mr. Billy J. Cory 1954

BG Wendell H. Gilbert USA, Retired 1954

COL James E. Hays USA, Retired 1954

Mr. Andrew J. Maloney Jr. 1954

Col Gerald J. Samos USAF, Retired 1955

Lt Col James E. Seay USAF, Retired 1955

Col Dennis L. Butler USAF, Retired 1956

Deaths reported from June 16, 2022 – September 15, 2022

Lt Col Richard P. Dowell USAF, Retired 1956

LTC Anthony J. Ortner USA, Retired 1956

BG Houston P. Houser III USA, Retired 1957

Mr. John C. Kilpatrick Jr. 1957

COL Jerry C. Scott USA, Retired 1957

LTC Daniel P. Charlton USA, Retired 1958

COL John W. Devens USA, Retired 1958

Col Bradfield F. Eliot USAF, Retired 1958

Lt Col Ernest F. Hasselbrink USAF, Retired 1958

COL Orland K. Hill USA, Retired 1958

LTC John R. Hill Jr. USA, Retired 1958

Mr. Lawrence Lonero 1958

COL Frederick L. Nuffer USA, Retired 1958

LTC William R. Parks USA, Retired 1958

Mr. Cloin G. Robertson 1958

COL Louis B. Rodenberg Jr. USA, Retired 1958

Mr. Ronnie D. Short 1958

Lt Col Larry W. Sutherland USAF, Retired 1958

COL Francis A. Waskowicz USA, Retired 1958

Mr. Douglas N. Campbell 1959

Mr. Stephen Klein 1959

Mr. Joseph T. Moriarty 1959

MAJ William C. Pollock Jr. USA, Retired 1959

MAJ Melecio Z. Santos Jr. USA, Retired 1959

LTC James J. Satterwhite USA, Retired 1959

Mr. William L.R. Stocker 1959

MG James W. Van Loben Sels USA, Retired 1959

COL Phillip L. Blake USA, Retired 1960

COL Eugene M. Brisach USA, Retired 1960

MAJ William C. Chase Jr. USA, Retired 1960

Mr. David L. Hodge 1960

LTC Fredrick A. Johnson USA, Retired 1960

COL John L. Reber USA, Retired 1960

COL Philip A. Walker Jr. USA, Retired 1960

LTC Gary L. Flack USA, Retired 1961

LTC Kenneth H. Geiger USA, Retired 1961

COL Gary R. Lord USA, Retired 1961

Mr. Darwin L. Richards 1961

LTC James A. Scott III USA, Retired 1961

LTC Kenneth R. Dolson USA, Retired 1962

Dr. Seth J. Hudak 1962

COL George J. Telenko Jr. USA, Retired 1962

Brig Gen Donald K. Woodman USAF, Retired 1962

Mr. Raymond L. Jenison 1963

LTC Karl O. Schwartz USA, Retired 1963

LTC David G. Kirkpatrick USA, Retired 1964

Mr. Dennis F. O'Block 1964

LTC Podge M. Reed Jr. USA, Retired 1964

LTC Michael E. Wikan USA, Retired 1964

Mr. James M. Hennen 1965

COL

Past in Review

MG Luis Esteves, Class of 1915: Primer Hispanic Graduado en Ganar Estrellas

By MAJ (R) Jose Martinez , Guest Writer

From September 15 to October 15, the U.S. Army and U.S. Military Academy celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month, recognizing the contributions of American soldiers with ancestry from Spain, Mexico, the Caribbean, and Central and South America. The first international cadets to come to West Point were Hispanic, brothers Luis and Mateo Blanco of Chile, who were brought to the Academy in 1816 by Commodore Horace Porter. Neither the Blanco brothers nor the third international cadet admitted to the Academy, Julian Paez from Colombia, graduated, but USMA’s fourth international cadet, Antonio Barrios, Class of 1889, from Guatemala, did. Since then more than 2,500 cadets of Hispanic origin, both U.S citizens and international cadets, have graduated from West Point, including Major General Luis Esteves, Class of 1915, the first Hispanic graduate to earn stars.

Luis Raúl Esteves Völckers was born in Puerto Rico in 1893. At the time, the island was part of the last remnants of the Kingdom of Spain in the new world. His father, Francisco Esteves, had served the Spanish Army honorably, earning a commendation from the king. However, as war descended on the islands of Cuba and Puerto Rico in 1898, the Esteves family eagerly supported the United States’ involvement in the Caribbean. They saw American troops as liberators against what had become an increasingly oppressive Spanish system that, in their opinion, needed to be replaced.

The Esteves family was known throughout western Puerto Rico for their engineering and architectural competence. As such, Esteves’ mother wanted him to attend an engineering university in the United States to

further his studies. His father had other plans. He encouraged his son to join the American military, in any capacity, as a means to contribute to what would be a “new Puerto Rico.” Since 1899, male residents of the island were allowed to enlist into the “Battalion of Porto Rican Volunteers.” The battalion’s task was to assist in the transition from Spanish rule and maintain local security. Esteves had his sights on grander opportunities.

In early 1910, while reading the local newspaper, Esteves came across an advertisement asking for volunteers to take the entrance exam for the two U.S. service academies, West Point and Annapolis. Excited by the opportunity to serve as more than an enlisted soldier, Esteves made the 20-mile journey to the recruitment office and completed the entrance examination. His proficiency in the English language was not as robust as he had wished, but it was good

Above, Left: 1915 Howitzer picture of Cadet Luis Esteves. Right: BG William W. Bessell Jr. (L), Class of 1920, another Hispanic USMA graduate and then commanding general at the San Juan, Puerto Rico station, congratulates BG Esteves while Esteves was Chief of the Puerto Rico State Guard for receiving the Legion of Merit for outstanding services to the United States government during World War II.

enough to earn him an invitation to both academies. In keeping with the family tradition of serving in the land forces, he chose West Point.

In 1911, Esteves entered USMA along with Dwight D. Eisenhower, Omar Bradley, James Van Fleet, and the rest of “the class the stars fell on.” Due to Esteves’ German and Dutch roots through his maternal line, he was nicknamed “The Count” by his fellow cadets. His time at the Academy was similar to that of his contemporaries except for two incredible twists of fate: tutoring Dwight Eisenhower in Spanish (the two forged a bond through this experience that would last until the end of their days) and commissioning as a non-citizen. At the time, residents of Puerto Rico were not citizens of the United States, which changed in 1917.

As graduation day loomed in 1915, the War Department found itself with a bit of a problem related to commissioning Esteves. In attempting to solve this dilemma, the War Department looked to the country’s past for the answer. During the Revolutionary War, as the need for experienced field commanders increased, foreign officers such as the Marquis de Lafayette and Friedrich

von Steuben were commissioned by Continental Congress as officers for service within the Army. This precedent allowed Esteves, a non-citizen, to be commissioned upon graduation at the rank of second lieutenant.

Esteves’ contributions to American history extend far beyond ensuring that the future president and General of the Army fulfilled his foreign language requirements at the Academy. Under the command of General John J. Pershing, then Lieutenant Esteves served as an infantry platoon commander in the El Paso area of Texas. Pershing’s mission was to defeat the Mexican paramilitary forces responsible for attacking Columbus, New Mexico, and to capture the group’s leader, Pancho Villa. While Villa eluded capture, Esteves distinguished himself by using his native tongue to gain information on adversaries’ movements and secure support from locals. Esteves was so admired by the residents of Polvo, Mexico, that he was elected both judge and mayor of the town during his time there. Esteves’ greatest contribution to the nation, the Army, and the peoples of Puerto Rico was the establishment and organization of the Puerto Rican National Guard. At the end of World War I, Esteves was assigned as an instructor for Puerto Rican officers in training at Camp Las Casas in the town of Santurce. The officers were meant to become the leaders of the “Porto Rico Regiment of Infantry.” Relying on his wartime experience, Esteves petitioned the colonial government for a larger professional military force to protect the island and American interests in the Caribbean. In 1919, the Puerto Rico National Guard was established. That same year, the “Porto Rico Regiment of Infantry” was redesignated as the 65th Infantry Regiment. The unit would gain historic status during the Korean War and would forever be known as “the Borinqueneers.”

The most impressive fact of Esteves’s military career reads like a question from the game Trivial Pursuit: “Who from the ‘class the stars fell on’ was the first to reach the level of general officer?” Estevez was promoted to brigadier general in 1939, two years before Eisenhower, Bradley, and Joseph T. McNarney received their first star and five years before Van Fleet received his. During his time as Adjutant General of the Puerto Rico National Guard, Esteves built up the organization to nine full regiments dispersed throughout the island. Using the training tactics and methods learned as a cadet in West Point, Esteves brought the island’s soldiers on par with their mainland counterparts. When President George W. Bush made his presidential proclamation regarding Hispanic Heritage Month in 2001, he identified Major General Luis R. Esteves, Class of 1915, as one of the most important Hispanic American contributors to American history. Efforts to honor Esteves continue to this day. In November 2021, the Resident Commissioner of Puerto Rico, Representative Jenniffer González-Colón, communicated to then Superintendent of the United States Military Academy, Lieutenant Darryl Williams ’83, the importance of commemorating Esteves and his contributions. As the number of cadets and soldiers of Hispanic heritage increase, it is important to tell the stories of those that laid the foundations that make their service to this nation possible. 

MAJ (R) Jose A. Martinez is a former Spanish Instructor for the Department of Foreign Languages at USMA. He spent 21 of his 28 years of service in Special Operations with a concentration in Latin America. His academic endeavors include the role of Puerto Rico under U.S. control and the Cold War in Latin America. His grandfather, Alfredo Mojica Rodriguez, served under MG Esteves.

Photo: Wikipedia

MG Luis Estevez, Class of 1915, as Puerto Rico National Guard Adjutant General, a position he held until his retirement in June 1957.

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