Local kid makes good story:
This Sunday, Holland Pratt (photo, left) of Liberty Lake, Washington, will become West Point’s First Captain of Cadets, the Spokane Spokesman-Review reported on August 11, 2021 (story here; see West Point press release here).
First Captains are “responsible for the overall performance of about 4,400 cadets by implementing a class schedule and acting as a liaison between the Corps of Cadets and the academy’s administration,” the newspaper says.
Its story adds, “She will follow in the footsteps of Douglas MacArthur, William Westmoreland and other top American generals who held the same position.” (See complete list of First Captains here.)
Huh. MacArthur was a self-promoting publicity hound who bungled the early stages of the Korean War before being fired by President Truman for insubordination. Westmoreland was a numbskull who promoted the disastrous “search-and-destroy” tactic in Vietnam and lost that war.
Officially known as the United States Military Academy, which is a bit misleading because each service has its own academy, but colloquially known as “West Point” because of its location on the banks of the Hudson River in West Point, New York, the institution is run by the Army and its primary source of career officers destined for its top echelons. It’s effectively an all-expenses-paid college, and is where you want to go — and graduate with distinction — if you hope to be a general someday.
However, it’s not the sole-source of Army generals; some come up through the ROTC, Officer Candidate School, and direct-commission ladders. And not all West Point graduates who make a career of the Army become generals. But the odds of advancement beyond field-grade (major, lieutenant colonel, and colonel) are much better for West Pointers.
Michael Flynn is an example of an ROTC officer who reached 4-star rank; he was an intelligence specialist. In the military, “intelligence” refers to the gathering and analysis of militarily-relevant information about enemies and adversaries, not brains. Flynn has no brains, and couldn’t pass a middle-school civics quiz. He advocates a military coup against our own government.
During the American Civil War, President Lincoln, was bedeviled by incompetent generals, many politically appointed with little in the way of military backgrounds. However, West Point stocked both armies with commanders who became famous generals.
The war elevated a lowly West Point graduated who’d been an indifferent student, and had a lackluster early military career, to the Army’s top rank and then the presidency. Lincoln famously said of the hard-drinking Grant, who was opposed by many in Lincoln’s administration, “I can’t spare this man. He fights!” More to the point, he won his battles, and ultimately cornered and defeated Lee’s army, which ended the war.
It’s hard to tell what will happen to Pratt if she stays in the Army and makes a career of the military. She shows a lot of promise. The Army needs smart, technologically-sophisticated, officers with organizational and leadership skills. Currently, the Army is authorized 140 brigadiers (1-star), 95 major generals (2-star), 48 lieutenant generals (3-star), and 17 generals (4-star), a slight increase over the previous fiscal year (list here).
So, at present, there are 300 general jobs in the Army, and nearly 4,000 colonel jobs. A First Captain’s future job prospects would seem to be pretty good. The young lady from Liberty Lake may be going places.