Blazers salute the red, white and blue

It happened for senior Jamie Platky when he was a kid who loved G.I. Joes. Junior Denise Sylla remembers the element of discipline from her Catholic education fueling her drive. For junior Chris Zaldivar, it was listening to his dad reminisce about his grandfather's military career. Though their circumstances varied, the outcome was the same: they've all been bitten by the military bug.

This phenomenon isn't limited to the 14 percent of Blair students who, according to an informal Silver Chips survey of 100 students on Sept 6 and 9, are considering a career in military service. Somehow, an institution that defines pain as "weakness leaving the body" has managed to attract its desired 200,000 recruits nearly four months early, making 2002 the most successful season for recruiters in 15 years.

"Go find bin Laden"

Recruiters believe the surge of patriotism that followed Sept 11 may have triggered the swollen numbers of enlistments this year. However, guesses Kevin Moose, a Blair social studies teacher and former Blazer with years of active military experience, the heightened possibility of military intervention may have repelled more potential recruits than it attracted.
On one hand, a desire to fix a broken nation turned into an unprecedented number of phone calls for the military. "We got people in here all the time who saw the travesty and wanted to pick up a rifle and go find bin Laden," says Staff Sergeant Carl Johnson, former Blair Marines recruiter.

But Staff Sergeant John Asslein, public affairs officer for the Air Force recruitment headquarters, believes that very little of the post-9/11 patriotic fervor translated into actual new recruits. He chokes back a laugh as he describes their typical caller: "Generally, what we got were these 70-year-old guys, remembering the good old days and wanting to ‘go get them terrorists.'"

Sept 11 negatively impacted the decision to join the military for some because of a systemic disagreement with the military's actions. Junior Noam Dror, who is seriously considering a career in the Army, says that he won't serve if troops are deployed in Iraq. "Basically," says Dror, "I don't want to work for an institution that's not smart about what it does."

Asegura tu futuro

Ultimately, 9/11 has little to do with Sylla's desire to serve her nation. The way she draws out her vowels when she talks about fighting "machismo ideals" within the Navy shows how passionate she is about changing the military. "As an African American and a woman, I've got two big weights I'm taking with me, but I plan on fighting my way through," she says.

Sylla's commitment would please Asslein, who emphasizes the Air Force's efforts to make the military more representative of the American populace. Right now, the number of women in uniform, for example, is hovering at approximately 200,000 individuals in a system of nearly two million.

Even once enlisted, women experience a different status within the military. "This thing against letting women do the same jobs as men—it's such bull!" Sylla exclaims vehemently, referring to the fact that women are barred from combat in every branch of the military except the Coast Guard.

Although women are significantly underrepresented within the military community, Asslein asserts that the toughest barriers to break down are not gender-based but are cultural and lingual. Amid sky-high promises in English and Spanish, individuals of every shade grin from the recruiting pamphlets decorating the career center shelves, testaments to the military's decidedly demographic-based advertising campaign.

Sophomore Kenia Alvarado is a Latino student with whom the military's recruiting efforts seem to have resonated. "This isn't my country, so it's not really about that," she says frankly. "But I respect it, see, and I need the money for college."

Paid professionals

For Alvarado and dozens like her, Blair's Career Information Coordinator, Sharon Williams, sees the military as ideal. She explains that, between enlistment bonuses and scholarships, the military is one of the most direct and effective ways of getting money for higher education.

As part of a family of nine, Moose saw the Army as a way to make it through college without putting a financial burden on his family. "Out in the real world," says Moose, "the type of hands-on training and general level of expertise you get in the military is unbelievably valuable in getting a job."

It's this aspect of the military, according to Chief Mike Geter, the recruiting officer for the Coast Guard, that's emphasized when training recruiters. "The fact of the matter is that especially when our economy's the way it is, financial arguments can sway a new, young recruit," he explains. "The military is just a way to make a living."

Like no other job

But that, says Moose, is exactly what's wrong with the recruiters' pitch. "The military's like no other job," he says. Advertising that "incentivizes," he feels, obscures this point.

Certainly the Marine Corps recruiting page looks nothing like an ordinary career website. "Once you've walked through fire and survived, nothing else can burn," reads one slogan surrounded by photos of rifle-wielding, exhausted-looking boys with crew cuts.

Such an element of fear and intensity is what training is all about, says Asslein. He explains the mission of Basic Training thus: "It's high stress, and you're supposed to be scared the whole time," he says.

According to the website of the Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors, recruiters are under such intense pressure to meet quotas that unpleasant details often get skipped in their sales pitch, a fact that has led over 15 percent of high schools nationwide to ban military recruiters.

But Camilo Cueto, a 2001 Blair graduate who finished basic training in the Army, says it's the recruiters who explain what it takes to succeed in the military. "He told me that it was going to be the most challenging thing I had ever done, but I knew I'd get skills that would last me," he explains.

And essentially, says Sergeant First Class Brian Ransom, that's what the military is all about. "I've got the character I wanted, I've got the education I wanted, so much to be proud of," he intones, too sincere to be quoting from his recruiter's manual. "You know how you hear about the American dream? I'm living it."