MRFF Advisory Board Member Brig. Gen. USAF (Ret.) Marty France Op-Ed Admonishes USAFA’s Slide Toward Partisanship and Authoritarianism

Fall Semester, 1972. Nixon was headed for a second term. I was a fourth classman (“squat” or “doolie”) at USAFA. (I would be taking a voluntary discharge within a few months because reasons.) We were doolies and the lowest of the low, so we were required to run on a narrow strip bordering the terrazzo, the large parade/review area surrounded by dorms, as we headed to and from Mitchell (dining) Hall while 3rd, 2nd, and 1st classmen walked in a leisurely manner to and from meals at Mitchell. As we ran, since it was Fall, we had to pause and greet each upperclassman we encountered with, “Good morning/afternoon, sir! Beat [whichever school the football team was playing that week]!” After a week or so of that bullshit, the greetings changed, to: “Good morning/afternoon, sir! Beat McGovern!” I don’t know who started it, but like blue-clad sheep, every squat picked it up, and each week’s game against Colorado, Notre Dame, Army, or Navy was forgotten. The nonsense went on for a few weeks, and no one applied any critical thinking to it because, well, blue-clad sheep. One evening as we ran back to the dorms to study and get ready for the next day, an upperclassman turned to stop the parade of blue-clad morons running from Mitchell. He told us to fall out and remain where we were while he waited for a bunch more idiots to cram behind us. Finally, he angrily declared that as members of the American military, we had no right, while wearing the uniform, to publicly declare an electoral preference. He also said if McGovern won the election, we had an absolute duty to respect him as the commander in chief in the same manner we had his predecessor. He ordered us to stop with the bullshit and greet upperclassmen the traditional way. He also ordered us to circulate his order to every squat in our squadrons because he didn’t want to ever hear that shit again. So we stopped because it was the right thing to do. For years I thought that episode would have been an appropriate subject of study in the USAFA Department of Psychology.

Good story Rob. I think most that have spent time (I hate saying “served,” I got paid for it, not like I saved a child from a burning building, and it just sounds so plastic, so disingenuous), in the military will concede that it is and always has been more substantially right wing than not (I was young and impressionable then).

The hilarious part is that they didn’t consider it might go this bat shit crazy! Who would ever have thought America could become an autocracy? Or that we’d have a president that would invoke the insurrection act, suspend posse comitatus, impose martial law. Because, you know, we’re living in war zones according to the diaper boy.

I’ve said before, I’m betting most (80+%) of flag officers will fall right in line, just like Republicans in Congress, their careers and power more important than little things like honor, integrity, values, and the constitution. I hope I’m wrong but the sirens are going off all around us.

History will record it for certain. A permanent record. Let’s see how they do! I’m shorting the officer corps. I don’t think they have it in them! This isn’t like Desert Shield/Storm, OIF, OEF, invading Greenland, blowing up a few fishing boats in intnl waters, etc. Dropping a few bombs on Iran, Yemen, Somalia, et al. This one takes real courage! Courage to do the right thing.

The days of the integrity represented by that upper classman? I think that train left the station long ago.

If America were a stock, I’d be shorting the hell out of it right now! I think this country is over, a dying empire, drowning, a country flailing, grasping for anything to stay above water, as the world ship passes on by! The bully that cried wolf has fallen in the water. And there’s no one there to help!