Flying High
For 60 years, LMU, and Loyola before it, have hosted the Air Force
ROTC unit known as Detachment 040. The symbiosis between them is found
in service - and survival.
By Jeremy Rosenberg
In 1944, the loyola university graduating class consisted of ... one person.
From the wartime roots of that commencement nadir, a mayday call
of sorts went out from university leaders to an organization known for
reaching zeniths - the Air Force.
All-male Loyola, like many other higher education institutions, saw
enrollment plummet during World War II. A student population of 500
prior to the December 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor dipped to 100 just
two years later. When the shooting war ended, though, enrollment
skyrocketed, thanks in part to the GI Bill. By 1948, there were 1,543
students on the bluff. Then came another potential enrollment calamity
- the reinstitution of an armed forces draft in 1948.
Loyola officials set out to insulate the school against another
depopulation. They steered students into the Navy and Army Reserve.
And, in perhaps the boldest maneuver of all, Edward J. Whelan, S.J.,
Loyola University's president, urged the federal government to bring an
ROTC (Reserve Officer Training Corps) unit to Loyola. ROTC had just
come into existence in 1947.
In his proposal, Whelan pledged that "at least 400" students would
enroll in the fledgling ROTC. He also promoted Loyola as having a
100-acre campus, writing that "if these are not sufficient facilities,
[more] could be added."
The pitch succeeded. On June 18, 1948, the recently established
Department of the Air Force issued General Orders No. 25, which
announced Loyola as an ROTC site.
John Keenan '52 remembers those days well. Having enrolled in 1948,
he was a member of the first Loyola class to spend all four years in
ROTC training. The program's existence had a special meaning for him
and his classmates.
"When the Korean War started, we all realized that [without the ROTC
program], we'd be drafted. ... So it was a godsend to my class, because
we were able to finish college and then go in as second lieutenants,"
Keenan says.
Detachment 040
The LMU-based AFROTC unit, the largest in California, is formally
known as "Detachment 040" and colloquially as the "Flying Lions." The
unit was first headquartered in a Quonset hut, and then, for decades,
in the old Alumni Gym. Since 2000, the Flying Lions have been based in
a University Hall suite, which is identified by a curio cabinet filled
with flight gear memorabilia and a sign that reads "Department of
Aerospace Studies."
While aerospace studies has some things in common with LMU
departments, differences abound. Aerospace instructors hold advanced
degrees and are labeled professors and assistant professors, but the
titles are mandated, and the instructors are paid and provided by the
Air Force. Also, there is no aerospace studies major or minor; AS-100
through AS-400 courses, which are considered electives, cover material
such as Air Force history and protocol. The military service also
provides cadet uniforms, equipment and the scholarships that two-thirds
of upperclassmen receive. LMU, in turn, hands over physical space,
credits for coursework, faculty rights and some equipment and expenses.
About 50 schools in the Los Angeles area are affiliated with
Detachment 040, although not all have students enrolled all the time.
At the unit's founding, Whelan had promised 400 students, and
participation was compulsory for all first- and second-year students.
By 1959, a newspaper article about the detachment indicated that 494
students were enrolled. In the past eight years or so, registration
often has been as high as 160. The unit expanded from LMU-only students
in the 1970s, says Donna House, office manager since 1977 and the only
AFROTC staff member who is an LMU employee.
"The expansion occurred because we didn't have the student
population to support the unit. The Air Force was looking at viability,
so we had to get more students. The university wanted to maintain the
unit and has always supported it," House says.
Only one quarter or so of the 120 mostly undergraduates who signed
up in fall 2007 for AFROTC are LMU students. In decades past, of
course, the AFROTC roll would have consisted entirely of men; in fall
2007, though, about a third was female.
Just as LMU's student body has grown more diverse over the decades,
so has the detachment, House says. In the early years, most AFROTC
students were white. In fall 2007, whites accounted for 41 percent of
the cadets, and African Americans, Latinos and Asian/Pacific Islanders
for 59 percent.
Commitment and Service
Twice a week, cadets clad in blue shorts and gray shirts meet in the
gym or elsewhere to do push-ups, sit-ups and other physical training.
Fridays from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. are one of those regular times. Cadets
who enter military service will be commissioned as second lieutenants;
upon joining the branch, they'll likely supervise anywhere from five to
50 people.
Signing up for ROTC does not automatically enter a student into the
armed forces, nor does it immediately activate a commitment to future
active-duty military service. But for sophomores and above, accepting a
scholarship does. Non-scholarship students may take their freshman and
sophomore years to decide if ROTC, and by extension, a military
commission, is what they seek. Between their sophomore and junior
years, cadets attend Field Training - the Air Force's version of basic
training - held at bases around the country. This serves as a more
realistic simulation of military life than the part-time taste AFROTC
offers. "It's kind of a 'try before you buy' program," says Capt.
Charles Washuk, the unit admissions officer.
If the students do opt-in, then, as Washuk says, "whether a cadet
goes on scholarship or not, the end result is always the same: a
four-year active-duty service commitment," with longer terms for pilots
and navigators.
David Murphy '75, a cadet from 1971-75, spent 27 years in the
service and now is director of business development for Air Force space
programs at Boeing. His time in AFROTC was occurred during the Vietnam
War, which polarized the nation.
"Although there was antiwar sentiment, the campus mood was a little
better as far as accepting ROTC. There weren't really big
demonstrations, and nobody was standing around calling us 'baby
killers' or anything," Murphy recalls.
Today's cadets signed up after the 9/11 attacks and the U.S.
invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. People join the program for several
reasons, Washuk says, and every fall he polls new cadets. Among the
fall 2007 group, a career opportunity was the most common motivator.
The desire to serve one's country was second, he says, although it
probably was an even more significant reason immediately after 9/11. In
the past, particularly during the Vietnam War, joining ROTC was a way
for some to avoid combat. But today's cadets understand clearly that
they are almost certain to experience war.
Gusty Holmberg, a senior English major from Sacramento and a highly
decorated vice commander of Detachment 040, says she has been asked
about Iraq for years.
"I figure that by the time I go anywhere, I'll be adequately
trained, and all of my peers will be adequately trained," Holmberg
says. "And I know that I'm going to do more to train myself so I take
care of the people below me."
Dedication and Leadership
On a crisp late-autumn day, with flags blowing from left to right,
members of Detachment 040 gathered on the concrete entryway to
University Hall. It was Parents Day 2007, when families and friends
gathered to watch special drill-team performances by competing groups -
or "flights" - of cadets.
Moments prior, indoors, Col. Douglas Erlenbusch, the detachment
commander, had addressed a standing-room-only crowd of family members.
He spoke of fitness, trust, developing "warriors" and producing better
citizens. He also talked about developing the "whole person," a phrase
familiar to the Lion community. "How do we develop that whole-person
concept?" Erlenbusch asked. "We start off with character development."
That emphasis on character development was in place 60 years ago as
well, according to Keenan. He remembers once being asked by former LMU
President Thomas P. O'Malley about the source of his success in life.
After graduating, Keenan built one of the largest U.S. insurance
agencies, with 675 employees and 10 offices, he says.
"So I said, 'Well, to ROTC. It taught me leadership, and I was a
22-year-old in Korea in charge of a motor pool with 140 guys in it,'"
Keenan recalls. He also remembers, with a laugh, that he added, "Oh
yeah, and a Jesuit education."
Keenan believes one key to his ROTC experience was his instructors'
determination to identify leadership abilities in their students.
"The ROTC instructors were very dedicated, because ... most of them
had been in the European theater, and some had been in the Japanese
theater. They took a lot of interest in us and encouraged us in
leadership. ... I attribute a lot [of my success] to the leadership
training that I received as an ROTC student," he says.
Jeremy Rosenberg is a Los Angeles-based writer. His "Cheating Ourselves" appeared in Vistas (Summer 2007)