Duty First

by Ed Ruggero

  The plebe has a bottle of Windex in one hand, a rag in the other: He sprays the sink and wipes it out, paying particular attention to the chrome faucet. His roommate moves even more quickly, using the flat of his hand to wipe invisible dust off the desk, off the tops of the computers. They straighten the shoes lined up beneath the bed, pull the blankets tight, make sure the towels in the towel rack are folded precisely in half. In between ministrations, they study their computer screens, where they’ve pulled up the front page of the Washington Post. They check their watches every few seconds.

  In a rifle rack by the door, three M-14 rifles are locked with a steel bar and heavy padlock. The back of the door is decorated with an Army Football poster and a card with the heading Risky Business. “The decision to drink is risky business,” the card says. “Leaders must assess risks and take appropriate action.”

  Like other colleges, West Point struggles with alcohol use by students. Because the environment is so tightly controlled, the opportunities to drink are not as numerous. But many cadets, when they finally get a chance to cut loose, do so with a vengeance.

  “When most people think of West Point, they figure it’s very conservative,” Friesema says. “They think: no alcohol, no … immoral activity. But stuff like that goes on. It’s bothersome, but it’s not like I can go around telling people not to act like that.”

  Although he is far from the buttoned-up stereotype of the religious right, Friesema is a self-described conservative and a member of the Officers Christian Fellowship. He spends Sunday mornings teaching Sunday School to the three- and four-year-old children of faculty members.

  “Let’s go,” Friesema says to his roommate. He has “FCDT,” or Fourth Class Development Time. This is the time when team leaders and squad leaders quiz and instruct their plebes. FCDT is strictly limited to avoid abuses.

  “Cadet time is the coin of the realm around here,” a colonel in the Superintendent’s office said. “The most precious commodity. If we add something to the schedule, something else has to go, so we’re always careful about limiting things that might distract from the time they have to do their duties.”

  For the plebes, this means that the upper class cannot interfere with their study time. But cadets are still caught in a tug-of-war between the Commandant (military duties) and the Dean (academic duties). Cadets are always trying to strike a balance.

  Friesema stands in front of his roommate, who checks his uniform. Good crease in the trousers, belt buckle shined and exactly aligned with the shirt placket, name-tag parallel to the shirt-pocket seam, shoes mirror-bright. Thus prepared, he steps out into the hallway, which is decorated with spirit posters for the upcoming Army-Air Force football game. All around, plebes greet sleepy upper class with, “Beat Air Force, sir!”

  Team leader Huston, a yearling, checks Friesema’s uniform, then asks about the continuing struggle between the president and the GOP. (It would be several months before Monica Lewinsky became a household name.) They talk about dirty politics and scandal mongering, about what the president should do. Every few questions, Huston tests Friesema’s command of the military knowledge he’s supposed to be memorizing.

  “What’s the armament on the main battle tank?”

  The plebes are required to speak in complete sentences, without using abbreviations or acronyms, so the answers sound stilted.

  “Sir, the main armament on the mike-one, alpha-one main battle tank is the one-hundred-and-twenty-millimeter cannon.”

  Huston talks about the different characteristics of smoothbore guns versus cannon. Then he asks Friesema to describe the other armaments on the tank, down to the nomenclature and ranges of the hand-held weapons carried by the crew members. Just your standard dorm hallway chat between a college sophomore and freshman. But the little tableau is indicative of how the old plebe system has given way to one that is more like the army.

  During my plebe year, we had to report to the rooms of the yearlings, but the upperclass cadets often did not even get out of bed. We’d let ourselves in quietly and stand at attention in the darkness, backs pressed up against the wall lockers. Then a voice would come from beneath the covers, “Start the Days, beanhead.” It was not at all unusual to recite an entire day’s worth of plebe knowledge without ever seeing a face. On other days, we would prepare for the inspection, studying and memorizing, only to be chased from the room before we had a chance to recite it. This demeaned the plebes and devalued what we were required to learn. How important could it be if the inspector didn’t even wake up?

  The system still requires plebes to master the information. It also requires that the upperclass cadets learn how to conduct an inspection. After they finish talking politics and current events, Huston tells Friesema to recite “The Corps,” which is a kind of second alma mater.

  The company hallways are lined with posters and a few bulletin boards. One poster shows a close-up of a soldier; he is dirty, and his eyes, under the brim of his helmet, have that “thousand-yard stare” of the exhausted.

  “Do your job!” the poster commands. “His fate depends on your skill!”

  Huston gives Friesema a heads-up on what they’ll talk about the next morning. Lately they’ve talked about articles from the front pages of the on-line newspaper. Over the past weeks Friesema has also had to learn about the infantry, armor, Special Forces, background information for next summer’s introduction to the various branches of the Army.

  After development time, Friesema continues the rituals of getting ready for his day. As he cleans he talks about the highlight of his semester thus far: his visit home over the recent Columbus Day weekend. “The people home are so much different from the people here,” Friesema says. At first he thinks it might be the people there who have changed, then says, “It’s probably me who’s changed the most.”

  “I don’t sweat the small stuff anymore,” he says. “It used to be in high school if I got more than one project at a time I’d freak out. Here, getting more than one project at a time is the norm.” He thinks it’s ironic that he’s been desensitized to small stuff precisely because his life is dominated by so many small demands.

  Friesema checks a clipboard by the door, where an inspection log details what the inspector found wrong with the room the previous day. Cadet rooms are inspected daily by someone in the chain of command. He looks up from the notes, then tightens the beds and refolds a blanket at the foot of one of the bunks.

  Friesema’s bookshelf holds the one photo frame he’s allowed. In it are smaller photos: He and a date dressed for the prom. He is thinner in the photo, and wears his tuxedo awkwardly. He and the girl stand before a small tree with a few tiny buds. Another photo shows two little boys, cousins who live on a family farm where Friesema hunts and fishes.

  It was his experience as an outdoorsman that made him think he’d enjoy the field exercises at West Point. “I worked at a landscaping company in high school. My boss and his dad used to lease five hundred acres up in northern Wisconsin. They had this old school bus on the property. They took the seats out and put bunks in. We’d go up with a whole bunch of guys to hunt and fish.”

  He stands at his desk, his long body bent over, one hand on the mouse, scrolling through the on-line newspaper in search of some other bit of knowledge that will help him at formation, when he’s expected to speak intelligently about current events. Through the window behind him, the sky begins to lighten. Taylor Hall, another castle look-alike, takes shape out of the gloom.

  Before they leave for breakfast formation, Friesema and his roommate make one more sweep, blowing dust off desks, picking lint off blankets, making minute adjustments to the shoes and boots lined up under the bed. His roommate tosses a nylon bag full of hockey gear into an overhead locker.

  “That’s the only place they don’t look,” he explains.

  Out in the hallway, an orange sign advertises a study session for an upcoming test in a plebe core course. In cheery script at the top, it says, “You Won’
t Have To Cram!” The company has an academic sergeant and an academic officer, junior and senior cadets, who help set up these kinds of sessions. They assign tutors and keep up with cadets in academic straits. In the hallway, a plebe in full uniform stands at each intersection. These are the “minute callers,” human alarm clocks.

  “Sir! There are two minutes until assembly for breakfast formation!”

  They chant in perfect unison, in exaggerated slowness that sounds, at this hour, like some weird religious ritual.

  “The uniform is: as-for-class under gray jackets! Two minutes, sir!”

  Outside, under a clearing sky, the cadets gather in their hundreds for breakfast formations. Each company is assigned a specific spot on the paved space. The sergeants account for everyone, then come announcements about company activities (“There will be a ‘spirit’ push-up contest, Beat Air Force!”) and the march into the Mess Hall.

  The Cadet Mess is enormous: six cavernous wings, each three stories tall. Five wings are filled with ten-person tables where the four thousand cadets eat family-style meals. Most of the tables are organized by company, though varsity teams and some clubs have their own tables. It is a great coup for a plebe to land on a team table. Plebes can eat “at ease” with their teammates, and there is none of the performing that marks a plebes life on company tables.

  Friesema’s table is in a wing dominated by an enormous mural, a sixty-by-thirty-foot painting of great military leaders from world history. The painting, which includes a cast stretching from Hannibal to Alexander, was a WPA project in the 1930s. Another wing that also dates from the twenties is dominated by a large stained-glass window showing George Washington in blue uniform. Wooden wainscoting lines the walls to a height of ten feet. Above that hang portraits of former Superintendents, the paintings shielded by Plexiglas since a food-fight some years earlier. Higher still, above the portraits, hang the flags of the fifty states. The space is as dramatic as any European castle; it is also, like any castle, dark and cold.

  The plebes remove their jackets and drape them on the chairs. Hats go on a small shelf below. Friesema drops his gear and hurries to a table in one of the wide aisles to retrieve an armful of yogurt cups. Another plebe goes for coffee, but comes back empty-handed. In a cost-cutting move, there are fewer pots of coffee than there are tables; on some mornings they go quickly. The table holds cold cereal and packets of instant oatmeal. There are cartons of milk, a steel pitcher of juice, and a pitcher of water. In the dim light the tray of scrambled eggs brought by the waiter has a surreal color, like a pile of food dye.

  The corps is called to attention by the brigade adjutant, whose command “Take seats!” is followed by the scraping of four thousand chairs on the stone floor.

  The government provides $5.25 per day per cadet for rations. It takes some imaginative planning to feed four thousand–plus teenagers on a five-and-quarter a day. Since 1990, the Cadet Mess has also followed the Surgeon General’s guidelines on fat and calories (less than 30 percent of calories from fat). Within these parameters, the Mess delivers between 3,200 and 3,500 calories per day to the average cadet, a little more in the summer when they are more physically active.

  Attendance at breakfast and lunch is mandatory during the week; dinner is mandatory on Thursday night only. Cadets can attend optional meals (which are free) or buy from one of the many restaurants in the area that are happy to deliver pizza, sandwiches, or Chinese food. Visiting graduates notice that the meals have changed. Gone are the halcyon days of eating fat-laden foods and desserts, the years before every grade-school student in America started tossing around words like “cholesterol” and “arteriosclerosis.”

  The senior who sits at the head of the table is the table commandant. The table next to Friesema’s is the “All Star Table.” The cadet company commander sits at the head. The plebes sitting at the other end are there because they’re the “problem children,” the ones who need extra attention. At this meal two first class cadets are quizzing the plebe sitting at the foot of the table, who has been skipping class. Attending class is a military duty; cutting class not an option.

  “He just wants to get thrown out,” a second class cadet says as he spoons eggs onto his plate. “He should just resign.”

  The platters of food make their way to the end of the table, though no one is eating yet. When everyone has been served, one of the plebes holds the platter above his shoulder and announces, “Sir there are two and a butt servings of eggs remaining on the table.”

  He puts the eggs down, and his classmate at the foot of the table says, “Sir, the fourth class cadets at this table have completed their duties.”

  The table comm looks up and says, “Eat.”

  The Mess Hall is a more civil place than it was twenty years ago, when maniacal upperclass cadets might spend an entire meal yelling at plebes for infractions real and imagined. Despite the complaints of old grads about the end of discipline, the Cadet Mess hasn’t turned into Pizza Hut. When an upperclass cadet addresses a plebe, the plebe must put down his or her fork and look up. No eating until the upperclass cadet signals the conversation is over. Plebes no longer sit at rigid attention—which made it difficult to swallow—but they eat in silence, heads down and eyes on their plates. The table manners of the upperclass cadets vary from table to table; the standard is set by the table comm.

  A few minutes into the meal and the cadet adjutant is back on the public address system. “Attention to orders!”

  The four thousand cadets immediately stop eating during announcements of upcoming sporting events, lectures, drill periods. When the adjutant announces an Army victory in any sport, every cadet makes a fist and strikes the tabletop. There is a thunderclap Boom,!; flatware jumps to the floor all over the Mess.

  At the end of the meal, the plebes at Friesema’s table stand, put their jackets on, remove their hats from beneath their chairs and, in unison, shout “Beat Air Force, sir!” before they scuttle into the press of gray headed for the door.

  Friesema moves like a broken field-runner, dodging waiters and greeting legions of upperclass cadets with, “Good morning, sir!” or “Beat Air Force, ma’am!” Plebes are immediately identifiable because of the way they move, and often because of what they’re doing. These blue-collar workers of barracks life must deliver laundry and messages, clean common areas, and generally provide much of the muscle power that keeps things moving. They are the privates in this military organization. They also get to exercise some leadership, as they are put in charge of other plebes to perform certain duties.

  “Each week one plebe in the platoon is cadet-in-charge of duties. My team leader gets in trouble if I don’t get my duties done right,” Friesema says.

  This is also a change from a time when plebes were blamed for, or at least hazed for, any failure. Now the chain of command is held responsible. This is a move not just to make cadet life more like the Army; it is part of the training of the upperclass cadets. They are responsible for what their subordinates do or fail to do.

  “When my roommate, the football player, gets uptight, he starts yelling at people,” Friesema says.

  “When it was my turn to make sure laundry was delivered [to upperclass rooms], I found out how to do it, had [the other plebes] come to my room, and told them where laundry goes and sent them off”

  Major Rob Olson is fond of saying that leading peers is one of the toughest challenges, because there is no authority from position or rank. Plebes will work for a classmate because they know their time in charge is coming, and because they respect the person put in charge.

  “My roommate had the other plebes getting up at zero five hundred when they had until 6:30 to do a few minutes’ worth of duties,” Friesema says, shaking his head in disbelief.

  The long hallways in Thayer Hall are full of cadets wearing the class uniform of long-sleeved gray shirt, black tie, gray trousers with black stripe. Name-tags go on the right pocket. Most wear bulky sports watches.

 
The classrooms are nearly identical: nineteen or twenty desks arranged in a horseshoe, an instructor desk and lectern, a TV monitor. There are no windows; the four walls are lined with high, freshly washed blackboards. (Each room has a bucket of water and a sponge, which the instructors use to wash the boards after each lesson.)

  When Lieutenant Colonel Joe Myers, Friesema’s math “P” (for professor), enters the room, the cadet in the first desk calls the group to attention, salutes, and reports any absences. Class begins exactly on time; every class starts the same way. This class happens to be all men.

  Myers, a fortyish man with a small smile, begins by encouraging the plebes to bring their parents to the department open house during upcoming Plebe Parent Weekend.

  “Your folks want to see what it is you do with your time,” he explains.

  At the visitors’ desk is a black binder with a copy of the course syllabus. Friesema is in an advanced math class. On the board in the center of the room is a single sentence in Myers’s neat hand, “Bacteria reproduce at the rate of thirty per hundred per second.”

  “What are some other uses for a continuous function?” Myers asks.

  One cadet suggests the compounding of money. Myers talks fast, and the cadets take notes; inside of five minutes the front board is covered with equations. Every few seconds the P looks out at the cadets. In the horseshoe, everyone has a front-row seat, and Myers can spot a lost look in an instant.

  “Are there any questions on the homework problems?” he asks.

  Several cadets raise their hands, and the class works through the problems together.

  Math instruction at West Point still bears the marks of the system instituted by Superintendent Sylvanus Thayer in the early days of the nineteenth century. Thayer, the “father of the Military Academy,” decreed that each cadet would be graded every day. A key element of this system was the recitation, in which a cadet would be called upon to stand and explain some problem and its solution to the class, according to a very specific choreography.