Harvard may end 40-year ROTC ban

SIGN OF TIMES: Harvard banners hang at the university, which is more now hospitable to officer training.

3.1.10 - The ban’s future appears to hinge on whether President Obama and Congress abolish the military’s “don’t ask/don’t tell” policy toward gays serving in the armed services. If the controversial policy’s days are numbered, then so is the ROTC ban at Harvard - or so the theory goes

Harvard may end 40-year ROTC ban

By Jay Fitzgerald

Harvard University’s decades-old ROTC ban on campus may soon be a thing of the past, some students and faculty members say.

While Harvard announced last week that it’s taking part in a new “mentoring program” for returning veterans trying to establish civilian careers, the buzz on campus is how much longer Harvard’s Vietnam-era ban on ROTC can last.

The ban’s future appears to hinge on whether President Obama and Congress abolish the military’s “don’t ask/don’t tell” policy toward gays serving in the armed services. If the controversial policy’s days are numbered, then so is the ROTC ban at Harvard - or so the theory goes

“The time is coming very quickly when ROTC will be allowed back on campus,” said retired Brig. General Kevin Ryan, a senior fellow at the Belfer Center at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. He said the “attitude has changed” toward the military since ROTC, which stands for Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, was kicked off campus in 1969 amid student protests over the Vietnam War.

Jason Berkenfeld, a Harvard junior and president of the Harvard College Democrats, said opposition to ROTC rests “almost exclusively” on the military’s ban on openly gay soldiers and sailors in the military. He said it would probably be only a matter of time after the ban is nixed when Harvard eliminates its own obstacles for ROTC to return to Harvard.

“The student body will expect nothing less from the administration than full official recognition of ROTC,” Mark Isaacson, president of the Harvard Republican Club, said in an e-mail.

But not everyone thinks there will be a quick resolution to the ROTC issue should “DADT,” as “don’t ask/don’t tell” is often referred to, is repealed.

“It’s not going to be the end,” said Marco Chan, co-chair of Harvard College Queer Students and Allies. “It will still be complicated, because it’s not a simple issue.”

Current opponents of Harvard ROTC will want to see how any new Pentagon policies are implemented over time, he said.

Then there are some faculty members who are still reportedly opposed to a return of ROTC.

But Ruth Wisse, a Harvard literature professor who favors the return of ROTC, said gay-related issues were never at the heart of the dispute - but rather a deep mistrust toward the military among some faculty members. “Nobody knows what will happen,” she said of any future attempts to lift the ban on ROTC.

John Longbrake, a spokesman for Harvard President Drew Faust, said the university has no current plans to alter policies. But he added that “we will, of course, follow any federal policy changes with interest.”

Harvard students who want to participate in ROTC must now do so through MIT’s ROTC Paul Revere Brigade program, down the road in Cambridge.

Faust has gone out of her way to praise Harvard’s handful of ROTC students training at MIT, last year attending a commissioning ceremony with Gen. David H. Petraeus and urging eight graduates to become “soldier-scholars.”

But she’s also been critical of the “DADT” policy and shown no signs of lifting ROTC restrictions at Harvard until Pentagon policies are changed