ROTC Causes Firestorm in Michigan's Copper Country

I am really torn over whether to write about this next topic since I’ve worked alongside the Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) unit involved in this situation, but their current crop of cadets went WAY over the line.

The firestorm of controversy began last Thursday when a front-page article appeared in the Daily Mining Gazette, the local newspaper for the Copper Country area of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. The article described a program that was put on for a group of local sixth graders at Camp Nesbit, a Forest Service camp that is used by many of the local school districts for outdoor camping experiences. I attended this camp as a sixth grader myself and then as a counselor. According to the Gazette article, “…course activities included physical fitness training such as marching and running, along with military exercises such as grenade tossing and a "buddy crawl" using plastic guns.



Of particular concern was a cadence used in the marching exercise that repeated the phrase "I want to hurt someone. I want to kill someone."

The course was put on by Michigan Tech ROTC cadets who were part of a so-called “leadership training” course. Who was in charge of this disaster? And why was this farce allowed to happen? Where were the teachers and the administration? Where were the ROTC commanders? It sounded like the officer in charge wasn't even around when this happened.

I worked with the Michigan Tech ROTC as a Scouting professional and they helped us with staffing some of our events. The cadets that helped us were totally professional and at least one of their commanding officers were there to make sure that things were done right. I got to know several of the cadets personally and followed their careers with great interest. Two of them are in harm's way in Iraq right now and I know that they would be horrified about this.

I am a supporter of the military and it's a shame to see ROTC cadets tarnish the image of those brave men and women in uniform who have graduated from the ROTC and are fighting and dying to spread democracy to other parts of the world.

The Michigan Tech ROTC has let us all down. They should be barred from participating in any school-related activities short of talking to high schoolers for recruitment purposes. Teaching an eleven year-old to throw a dummy grenade. What a bunch of utter BS!