[GretchenM]

Cadets and employees are being told they can't proselytize on campus ...

1st Amendment
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Sounds like the "enlightened" at the Academy need a refresher course in civics. I hope this gets slammed down.

[middie]

What the hell are these ostensible military leaders thinking? We, the officer corps, have absolutely no business in religious indoctrination or advocacy. Every individual is totally free to pursue his own personal religious program but to institutionalize or endorse anything of that nature from any level of command is abject stupidity. AF Hdqs. should put a stop to it at once and come down like a ton of bricks on any officer or NCO engaged in such inappropriate conduct. We arm and fight for our national interests, the mission, and primarily for the guy on our wing, unit or ship. We do not, as a nation, arm or fight for any or a specific Deity.

The Crusades ended 700 years ago and history has demonstrated that an armed force governed by religious zealots and purportedly conducting its action in the name of a Deity will suffer a well deserved defeat. International conflicts are driven by vital national interests and assessments of an adversary's strenghts relative to your own and your allies. When the concept of carrying out a Divine mission enters into the mix rationality and the art of applying military science disappears and, you lose. It's that simple.

I'm not prepared to place the lives of men and women under my command in jeopardy for what some civilian like the current day TV evangelists and religious fanactic consider to be a holy mission. I'll leave the "mission from God" to John Belushi and Dan Akroyd as in The Blues Brothers. I'll agree to stay out of Dr. Dobson's faith of money raising and tape sales business but he, and his colleagues, must stay out of the business of conducting military operations or the underlying decision to enage in conflict.