<p>Hey all,
This is why I asked. Sorry for the length!:</p>
<p>By Bradley Olson
Sun reporter</p>
<p>When it came time for Jake Dove, a senior at the U.S. Naval Academy, to
decide how he would fulfill his required military duty after
graduation,
there was no question about it: Marine Corps all the way.</p>
<p>“In my eyes it’s a perfect community,” said Dove, an Annapolis High
School
graduate. “The idea of being a platoon leader in charge of guys that
have
done two, three tours in Iraq already, when I haven’t been over there -
that’s an awesome responsibility. I’m eager to take it on.”</p>
<p>Despite a war that has entered its fourth year with mounting casualties
and
waning public support, more and more midshipmen at the Annapolis
military
college are volunteering for the Marines when asked to choose how they
will
fulfill the five-year commitment required of all academy graduates.</p>
<p>When the assignments were made official last month for the 992 members
of
the class of 2006, 209 were placed as officers with the Corps - the
most in
the school’s 161-year history. And more would have done so if there
were
enough openings: an additional 45 who sought the Marines were assigned
to
other duty when the allotment was filled.</p>
<p>Naval aviation remains the most popular choice among midshipmen, but a
growing interest in Marine duty - in spite of its dangers - has been
under
way for several years, even as applications to the academy have dropped
sharply in recent years, a development blamed by some on the Iraq war.</p>
<p>Three years ago, 162 slots were set aside for the Marines and the
academy
ended up turning away some applicants. The number of slots was
increased
the next year, to 195, and the Corps drew 207 applicants. Last year the
cap
was set at 207; more midshipmen were turned away.</p>
<p>Dove said the threat of being hurt or killed in Iraq is “always in the
back
of my head, and I’m sure it’s the same for everybody going in the
Marines.”</p>
<p>“It’s a consideration, something you have to prepare yourself for
mentally,” he said. “But this is the way I want to serve my country and
I’m
not going to let anything get in the way of what I’ve always wanted to
do,
which is to lead men in combat.”</p>
<p>In a recent presentation to a civilian oversight board, Vice Adm.
Rodney P.
Rempt, the academy’s superintendent, said midshipmen are increasingly
asking to go to the front lines or “where the action is,” so they can
“prove themselves.”</p>
<p>“There are many more that want to be Marines than we can take,” he said
to
the academy’s Board of Visitors, which includes members of Congress,
retired military officials and educators. “There are many more that
want to
be SEALS than we can take. It’s very heartwarming to see the
determination
of these young people and what they want to do.”</p>
<p>Surveys the academy conducts of midshipmen show that the upturn in
Marine
interest will continue for the classes of 2007, 2008 and 2009, with
more
than 300 current plebes declaring their interest in the Marine Corps,
more
than in surface warfare or submarines.</p>
<p>More than 650 Marines have been killed since the Iraq war began three
years
ago this month, but that has not deterred midshipmen from becoming
Marines.
Academy officials joke that the Marine Corps might have finally
eclipsed
naval aviation or submarines, both of which were popularized by
Hollywood
in Top Gun and The Hunt for Red October.</p>
<p>The appeal of the Marines has stretched beyond the Naval Academy. While
the
Army and its reserve components have struggled to meet recruiting goals
during the Iraq conflict, the Marine Corps has not.</p>
<p>Most academy officials believe interest is high for patriotic reasons -
the
phenomenon began not long after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Others,
including midshipmen, said the enthusiasm could be part of a common
trend
in wartime at the nation’s service academies, where young students have
been eager to bolster their military credentials with combat
experience.</p>
<p>Having a surplus of mids who want to be Marines has been a change from
the
Vietnam era. In 1968, the Marine Corps failed to meet its quota for the
first time in academy history.</p>
<p>In the 2006 class, 349 mids were assigned to naval aviation as pilots
or
navigators; 270 chose to “go SWO,” academy parlance for working on
surface
warships; 88 went to subs; 21 will train for the SEALs - the Navy’s
elite
fighting force. Fifteen went to special operations such as explosives
disposal, 10 will attend medical school and the rest will fill a
variety of
military billets, including intelligence, civil engineering and
information
warfare.</p>
<p>Midshipmen are asked to list a first, second and third choice for their
duty preference. A service board makes the final decision based on the
preferences, order of merit or class standing, academic qualifications,
physical requirements and the needs of each service branch. The
students
learned of their assignments in November, and the selections were made
official last month in an annual ceremony where the mids find out the
specifics of their assignment, such as the ship on which they will
serve.</p>
<p>Sheivon Davis, a 23-year-old sprinter on Navy’s women’s track team and
a
graduate of Baltimore Polytechnic Institute, said she asked for Marine
duty
and was surprised that she wasn’t selected.</p>
<p>“I was clearly qualified, but they turned down a lot of qualified
people,”
said Davis, who will become a junior officer on the USS Elrod in
Norfolk,
Va., after graduation. “I guess it was just God telling me, ‘No,
Sheivon,
you don’t want to be in Iraq with bullets flying past your head.’”</p>
<p>Before 2004, when Rempt responded to the increased interest of
midshipmen
by asking the Navy and Marine Corps leaders to take more Marine billets
from the academy, the Marine Corps had selected about 16 percent of the
graduating class. Now it’s closer to 20 percent, which academy
officials
say better mirrors the proportion of Marine Corps officers in the
leadership of the combined Navy-Marine service branch.</p>
<p>Charles Krulak, a former commandant of the Marine Corps, who originally
pushed for an increase in Marine billets in the late 1990s, said he was
pleased with the change and believed it reflects well on the class of
midshipmen, despite an almost 25 percent decline in applications to the
academy in recent years.</p>
<p>“What I’m happy about is that midshipmen want to walk to the sound of
the
guns,” he said, “whether it’s on the sea, under the sea, in the air or
on
the ground. The people who are coming to the Naval Academy want to
serve,
and they want to be leaders.”</p>
<p>Col. Michael Paulovich, the senior Marine at the academy and director
of
its Humanities and Social Sciences Division, said he doesn’t really
have an
explanation for the surge, except to emphasize what Marines have always
emphasized: fitness, esprit de corps and leadership opportunities for
junior officers:</p>
<p>“That’s the steady message that’s always out there.”</p>
<p>Paulovich said enthusiasm for serving in the Iraq war also might
reflect a
strong “spirit of patriotism” among mids who came to the academy in the
aftermath of Sept. 11.</p>
<p>“I was here 20 years ago, and it was all Top Gun and Red October,” he
said.
“We had to work hard to attract high-quality midshipmen” to the
Marines.</p>
<p>Dove and Joe Mihoces, another senior who will become a Marine, said
their
decision was due in large part to the influence of 1st Lt. Mike Simon,
a
junior officer and 2003 academy graduate whom they befriended and who
recently went to Iraq for a second tour.</p>
<p>The thrill of being in the action in Iraq or in any combat situation is
something he and a lot of people think about, said Dove, 22, but it’s
not
the primary consideration.</p>
<p>“My father was a paratrooper in Vietnam, and talking to him definitely
de-glamorizes what happens out there,” he said of combat situations.
“It’s
something that has to be done, and I’d like to be the one that does it.
I’d
like to be the one that leads Marines in a combat environment.”</p>
<p>Dove and Mihoces will go to the Marine Corps’ Basic School at Quantico,
Va., for six months. After that, Dove could be deployed and Mihoces
will go
to flight school in Pensacola, Fla., to join a smaller community of
Marine
Corps pilots. Although he won’t necessarily be leading troops on the
ground
in Iraq, Mihoces said he is thrilled to be in the Corps.</p>
<p>“You could take the pilot away from me tomorrow and I would still want
to
be a Marine,” he said.</p>