Fred Thompson, former senator of Tennessee and 2008 Republican presidential candidate, has criticized American universities for their lack of military history studies during his ABC News Radio program. He claims that ”political correctness’ has crept into the halls of academia,’ according to a Sept. 21 article in The Chronicle of Higher Education.

As Thompson has acknowledged during the radio program, his stance reflects that of historian Victor Davis Hanson. Hanson says Americans learned to fear war because of the nuclear dangers involved with the Cold War. As a result, the study of war fell behind. He believes America now fails to grasp the current state of warfare.

In Thompson’s May 16 radio address titled ‘Those Who Cannot Remember the Past,’ he makes his stance very clear. He asserts that ‘one area of study that’s almost disappeared from universities today is military history – the history of warfare.’ He reprimands his alma mater, Vanderbilt University, for not currently offering classes that will help a student achieve a strong foundation in history and encourages other college graduates (no matter the affiliation or school) to pressure their universities to change.

‘History that ignores the importance of warfare is not history,’ Thompson said in the address.

You are taught about the Holocaust in elementary school so that history does not repeat itself. You are taught about wars so that they do not become reality again. But in general education, you only explore the tip of the iceberg.

In higher, more specialized education, the student deserves the opportunity to study conflict and strategy. You must know what has succeeded (or failed) in the past to paint a brighter future. Colleges need classes that not only study military history, but also explain how to learn from the past.

After speaking with professor David Bennett, who specializes in military history, I concluded Syracuse University is on the right track.

Bennett reasons that the decline in history courses began after Vietnam, when teaching military warfare seemed like ‘endorsing’ action. Recently, though, Bennett believes that most universities, including SU, continue to increase the number of military history courses they offer. Our university even established a program in counter-terrorism studies, sparking more interest in military history and proving we are headed in a progressive direction.

Jaclyn Bissell is a biweekly columnist for The Daily Orange. She can be reached at jlbissel@syr.edu.

Published on October 25, 2007 at 12:00 pm