AMERICAN PRESIDENTS HAVE LOVED WEST POINT SINCE THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR- THE BIRTHPLACE OF LEADER DEVELOPMENT IN THE UNITED STATES

Presidents' Day 2016.  Few institutions or places in our land are as beloved or as heralded as West Point. Even fewer American institutions have such a history dating back to the Revolution. All four Presidents on Mount Rushmore had a significant importance and connection with West Point, as has nearly every one of our 44 American Presidents. On President’s Day 2016, it is important to memorialize the Presidents and their impact on West Point, and West Point’s impact on those Presidents.   West Point has had a profound effect on and our nation and on leader development across the United States.  

General George Washington headquartered his Army at West Point in the dark days of 1778 and called West Point the “key to the Continent.”  Soldiers have been stationed on West Point every day since Washington founded the base, it is proudly the oldest continuously-manned post in the United States.  

Washington’s strategy for the Revolutionary War was largely based on holding West Point, denying the British the use of the Hudson River, and keeping the Colonies from being isolated. The strategy worked, West Point was held (barely), and we gained our American Independence. Washington’s equestrian statue now stands in the most prominent location on the Plain in front of the mess hall, Washington Hall, that also bears his name. Washington is the leftmost President engraved on Mount Rushmore.

After being elected as our first President, Washington, knowing both the beauty and the strategic significance of West Point, then urged Congress to establish a Military Academy at West Point.   The United States desperately needed a professionally trained officer corps as well as its first engineering school.   Washington envisioned the U.S. Military Academy as the first professional leader development university in the United States.    

Congress was just as ineffective then as it is today, and it took two later Presidents to finally succeed in founding the Military Academy at West Point that Washington had envisioned. Thomas Jefferson is credited with being the Founder of West Point after he established it March 16, 1802, and the library on the West Point Plain is named in his honor as Jefferson Library.  Jefferson is the second President from the left engraved on Mount Rushmore, and is the author of the Declaration of Independence, and is credited with founding two universities: West Point (1802) and the University of Virginia (1819).

Thomas Jefferson’s West Point was the first engineering university in the United States and many of the engineering schools that followed were founded by West Point graduates, who were professionally educated engineers. West Point was also the first leadership academy, and has been an instrumental force in defining American exceptionalism in the field of leadership. Most American leadership academies and philosophies that followed across the United States were heavily influenced in some way by West Point and her graduates. Essentially West Point was "ground zero" for leader development in America by becoming the first leadership school ever founded in the U.S.   The leadership taught to West Point graduates would echo across our military and then into the private sector.  

The third President engraved on the far right of Mount Rushmore, President Abraham Lincoln, visited West Point early in the Civil War, June 1862, to consult with ailing General Schofield to discuss the strategy of the Civil War.  The Civil War, on both sides, was led largely by West Point graduates on both sides.  The Union generals Grant, Sherman, Sheridan, Thomas, Buford, Doubleday and many others were West Point graduates who led the two million Union soldiers. The Confederacy and its one million soldiers were led by West Point graduates at all levels, including President Jefferson Davis and Generals Lee, Jackson, Stuart, Johnston, Bragg, Polk and many others were West Point graduates.   895 West Point graduates served in the Civil War and led the majority of battles and 105 were killed in action. Lincoln’s Presidency, for better or worse, was largely defined by West Point graduates.

The 18th President of the United States was a West Point graduate, General Ulysses S. Grant, class of 1843, who was elected in 1868 after leading the Union Army to victory. He served two terms and brought peace and unified a divided nation.  

The fourth President engraved on Mount Rushmore, who sits between Jefferson and Lincoln, i.e. President Teddy Roosevelt.   Roosevelt visited West Point in 1902 to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the founding of the US Military Academy by President Thomas Jefferson.   At that June 1902 ceremony President Roosevelt awarded a Plebe, Cadet Calvin Titus, with the Medal of Honor, for his heroic actions during the Boxer Rebellion in China.  Titus had been an enlisted man prior to entering West Point and he scaled the wall of the city as the first man over the wall. Titus is the only West Point cadet to ever wear the Medal of Honor while he was a Cadet (84 would go on to receive the Medal of Honor after leaving West Point).   When President Teddy Roosevelt awarded the Medal of Honor to Titus, the newly named Cadet First Captain, was none other than Cadet Douglas MacArthur, who himself would later be one of the 84 to receive the Medal of Honor. President Roosevelt would himself  be awarded the Medal of Honor long after his death.   

At that centennial ceremony, President Roosevelt stated “No other educational institution in the land has contributed as many names as West Point has contributed to the honor roll of the nation’s greatest citizens…. And of all the institutions in the country, none is more absolutely American. ”

The second century of West Point’s history was even more impressive and impactful on American history than its first. West Point graduates led our nation at every level, from the White House, to the moon and commanded every major war-  World Wars I (General Pershing) and II (Eisenhower, MacArthur, Stilwell), Korea (MacArthur, Ridgeway, and Clark);  Vietnam (Westmoreland and Abrams) and Desert Storm (Schwarzkopf).   They also led nearly every major government agency in the US, and were elected Governors, Senators, and Congressmen and led many of America’s largest corporations.  

After successfully leading the invasion of Europe and the defeat of Nazi Germany, five-star General of the Army Dwight D. Eisenhower, West Point Class of 1915, was elected President of the United States for two consecutive terms. He ended the Korean War, created the Eisenhower Federal Highway System, and created DARPA and NASA.   His statue stands on the Plain at West Point in front of the Eisenhower Barracks. 

President John F. Kennedy spoke at the West Point graduation of 1962.   JFK drove on the Plain with the top down on his convertible, that convertible would later become infamous, along with the Superintendent Major General William Westmoreland who would later lead the Vietnam War for four bloody years.  

JFK spoke ominously to the classes of 1962, 1963, 1964 and 1965 (all that would bear the burnt of the Vietnam War) of a new type of warfare and is one of the only times he ever uttered the word that would later be synonymous with his own: Assassin.  

JFK presciently stated “This is another type of war, new in its intensity, ancient in its origin--war by guerrillas, subversives, insurgents, assassins, war by ambush instead of by combat; by infiltration, instead of aggression, seeking victory by eroding and exhausting the enemy instead of engaging him. It is a form of warfare uniquely adapted to what has been strangely called "wars of liberation," to undermine the efforts of new and poor countries to maintain the freedom that they have finally achieved. It preys on economic unrest and ethnic conflicts. It requires in those situations where we must counter it, and these are the kinds of challenges that will be before us in the next decade if freedom is to be saved, a whole new kind of strategy, a wholly different kind of force, and therefore a new and wholly different kind of military training…..You are part of a long tradition stretching back to the earliest days of this country’s history.”

The Iranian hostages were released on January 20, 1981, the first day of Ronald Reagan’s Presidency. President Reagan ordered they be flown to Germany and then to West Point to meet their families. They stayed for three nights at the Historic Thayer Hotel and then flew to the White House to meet with President Reagan. President Reagan would be shot two months later in March by John Hinckley, Jr.  Two months after being shot, in May, one of Reagan’s first public appearances would be at the 1981 West Point graduation.  

Reagan told the graduates: “You are part of a great tradition. It's overused, I know, but the term "the long gray line" is descriptive of the tradition of which you are now a part. In that line have been men who turned defeat into victory, who stood in the breach till citizen armies could be raised. For a time West Point was the nation's principal source of professionally trained engineers. The West was explored and mapped by members of the long gray line. A West Point graduate helped design the Panama Canal and the Holland Tunnel. Two were Presidents. Two are presently Cabinet members in this administration. Others have been giants of commerce and industry—Henry du Pont, class of 1833; Robert E. Wood, class of 1900.”  

Reagan continued: “Dwight Eisenhower said, "Even in the event of a complete disarmament there is a role for West Point. Even if we just turned our graduates back into the body politic it would be good. The graduates are trained people who understand their duty and who do it."

Reagan returned in October 1987, four months after his legendary "Tear down this Wall Mr. Gorbachev” speech, to announce the successful Intermediate Nuclear Freeze (INF) agreement. This was one of the most important speeches of his Presidency, and of course he chose West Point as the place to make it.   At that farewell speech to West Point he stated “I feel in my heart a great confidence in the future of our country, for I know that you will defend that future. And it’s true: The Long Gray Line has never failed us. ”

President George H. W. Bush, spoke at the West Point graduation only months after the success of Operation Desert Storm and told the graduates:  “You at West Point have established an example for the rest of the nation.”   

President Bill Clinton spoke at the West Point graduation in 1993 “It is said here at West Point that much of the history you teach was made by the people you taught. That's true and very much to your credit. The work you and your predecessors have carried forward since 1802 is truly that of nation-building, and today your Nation thanks you once again.”  

The start of the third century of West Point, 200 years after President Thomas Jefferson had founded the United States Military Academy, would start during the war in Afghanistan.  President George W. Bush spoke at the West Point graduation in 2002, shortly after 9/11 and the invasion of Afghanistan, declaring a new American policy of pre-emptive strike (that would result in the invasion of Iraq ten months later, with most of the graduates leading at the tip of the spear). Bush spoke to the graduates of the Class of 2002, as well as the underclass cadets from the classes of 2003, 2004 and 2005  Those four classes would go on to bear the brunt of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, with most graduates serving multiple year long tours.  Bush stated:    “Yet the war on terror will not be won on the defensive. We must take the battle to the enemy, disrupt his plans, and confront the worst threats before they emerge.  In the world we have entered, the only path to safety is the path of action. And this nation will act.”  

President Bush went on to say: “Graduates of this Academy have brought creativity and courage to every field of endeavor. West Point produced the chief engineer of the Panama Canal, the mind behind the Manhattan Project, the first American to walk in space. “

President Barack Obama spoke at West Point in 2009, the 4,500 seat amphitheater named after another President and West Point graduate, Eisenhower Hall,  to make one of the most important speeches of his Presidency when he announced "the surge" in Afghanistan.   Speaking before Cadets who would soon graduate to lead troops in combat, several of whom would later make the ultimate sacrifice and many would be grievously wounded, President Obama said “Generations of Americans have built upon the foundation of our forefathers – finding opportunity, fighting injustice, forging a more perfect union. Our achievement would not be possible without the Long Gray Line that has sacrificed for duty, for honor, for country."  95 West Point graduates would make the ultimate sacrifice in those two wars, 93 men and two women, and an estimated 800 would be wounded.   

President Obama returned to speak at the West Point graduation of 2014, where he was gifted the book “West Point Leadership: Profiles of Courage” by the class of 2014 signed by all of the senior leaders of the class of 2014.     

As we reflect on President’s Day 2016, let’s hope that all Americans recognize the importance of West Point to our Presidents, our nation, and why every American should visit West Point and stay at the beautiful Historic Thayer Hotel this year.  West Point and the Historic Thayer Hotel are truly national treasures. The Thayer Hotel is also the home of the Thayer Leader Development Group, where over 20,000 corporate executives have been trained using the principles of leadership taught at West Point.    

Copyright Daniel E. Rice, 2016