In The Gamble, his 2009 book on the Iraq War, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Thomas Ricks described Jack Keane, a retired four-star general, as “crackerjack smart and extremely articulate, often in a blunt way. Most importantly … he is an independent and clear thinker.”

Keane began his military career at Fordham as a cadet in the University’s ROTC program. He graduated in 1966 with a bachelor’s degree in accounting and went on to serve as a platoon leader and company commander during the Vietnam War, where he was decorated for valor. A career paratrooper, he rose to command the 101st Airborne Division and the 18th Airborne Corps before he was named vice chief of staff of the Army in 1999.

Since retiring from the military in 2003, Keane has been an influential adviser, often testifying before Congress on matters of foreign policy and national security. In late 2006 and in 2007, he was a key architect of the surge strategy that changed the way the U.S. fought the war in Iraq. He is a trustee fellow at Fordham; a member of the board of directors of General Dynamics, an aerospace and defense company; and chairman of the board of the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank that monitors global conflicts. He’s also a senior national security analyst on Fox News.

Keane spoke with FORDHAM magazine about service, leadership, and whether or not his loyalties will be divided on Sept. 1, when Fordham football opens its 2017 season with a game against Army at West Point.

What inspired you to join the Army?
I joined the ROTC program essentially because the country was at war and we knew that we would likely be joining it. In the mind of myself and my friends, it made sense to do that as officers, although none of us had ever had a family member who was an officer. Then, as part of the ROTC program, I joined the Pershing Rifles [national military society] because they seemed more confident and accomplished than the other participants in ROTC.

We took basic marksmanship training, and we would go to Camp Smith and practice patrolling techniques and other tactics under the supervision of active-duty officers. That gave me some exposure to what I thought the Army would be like. By the time I graduated, I came to recognize that I had an aptitude for it. And I liked the idea of serving the country.

I saw an interview you did a few years ago with Bill Kristol. You told him about a conversation you had with a Jesuit around the time you were graduating from Fordham. Who was that Jesuit and what did you two talk about?
I think it was Father [Thomas] Doyle, [then an assistant professor of philosophy], but I’m not sure. He asked me what I was planning to do, and I said, “I’m going to go in the Army.” He said, “No, I mean, after the Army.” I said, “Well, I’m thinking about maybe making a career out of it if I’m capable and if I like it to the degree that I think I will.” He said, “Why would you do that? You have so much more to offer.”

I said, “Well, Father, have you ever been associated with the Army? Were you a chaplain?” He said no. I said, “Well, I’ve spent a lot of time around it and people who serve in it, and I don’t think it’s necessarily what you think it is. I think there’s an incredible amount of opportunity for growth and development as a human being. I think I’ll have the freedom of thought and the opportunity to be very challenged, and I think that will lead to a growth experience for me.”

That turned out to be the case.

The way you describe the Army, in terms of opportunities for growth within a strict organizational structure, could also be applied to the Jesuits, I would think. You went to Catholic schools before Fordham, but was Fordham your first encounter with the Jesuits?
I told my new Army friends that after 16 years of Catholic education, the transition to the Army was very smooth! I think of Fordham and the Jesuits as a transformational experience. The rigor of the Jesuit methodology was evident in all classes. What they were least interested in is regurgitation of information. What they’re most interested in is critical thinking based on analysis and some rigorous method of interpretation using reasoning.

That was challenging because it was completely different than my Catholic high school. I thought college was just going to be high school on steroids. At Fordham, it was quite something else. The whole learning process was about your own growth and development as a human being—not just intellectually but also morally and emotionally. I don’t think I would have been as successful as a military officer if my path didn’t go through Fordham University.

Would you talk about your approach to leadership and how it has evolved since your days as a platoon leader? Are there certain qualities that you feel all effective leaders share?
First of all, there are very few natural-born gifted leaders. Most leaders learn from experience. If you’re in the United States military and you start out as a second lieutenant platoon leader with 40 people, your life from that moment on is a leadership laboratory. You have plenty of opportunity to learn and also to observe leaders who are very effective.

When you really get down to it, what you’re doing is motivating and inspiring others to reach their full potential and to do that collectively as an organization. Whether it’s a small team or a large team, the opportunity to learn and to grow is really quite extraordinary.

Some of that for me was in combat, which is such an extraordinary human experience. Everything that you are as a person—your character, your intellect, your moral and physical courage—is brought to bear under significant stress. People’s lives are dependent on you. You’re not only there to protect the civilian population and protect your own soldiers; you’ve been given the authority to take lives. The moral underpinning for something like that is really quite significant. I think having had 16 years of Catholic education and participating at Fordham, where I took four years of theology and four years of philosophy, which were my favorite courses, by the way, really provided me with the wherewithal not only to cope with combat but to perform to a high standard.

With regard to leadership, anybody can make a list of attributes leaders have to have—integrity, judgment, moral underpinning, et cetera. But there is one attribute that’s always stood out for me, and that’s perseverance. You have to persevere to accomplish the mission. Whether that’s in a stressful situation like combat or in other environments, perseverance really can be very defining because there are constant impediments and obstacles. You see people, not just in the military but in all walks of life, who because of those obstacles and impediments accept something less. They could continue to drive on. Most of the time, it’s more about mental toughness than it is about physical toughness.

Two years ago, Fordham ROTC established the General Jack Keane Outstanding Leader Award, to be given each year to a graduating cadet. What does that award mean to you, and what advice do you give newly commissioned officers?
I was honored to give out the first General Jack Keane Award [at the University Church in 2015]. And I was quite humbled by it, to be frank, when I got my head around the fact that they will always give this award to somebody who is outstanding as a cadet and likely more outstanding than I was.

I’ve always told my officers and my generals that we’re in leadership positions because we know how to lead effective organizations; we get results. But our legacy is not how well we run these organizations, because there’s another guy or gal standing behind us who could run it even better. The real legacy is the growth and development of the people in these organizations. If you focus on their growth and development, and if you have programs that support that, the organization will take care of itself. The organization will actually blossom because the people in it are so committed to it and have a very high degree of satisfaction. That is your legacy.

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?
It came from a sergeant major. I was a major at the time. I was very intense, working very hard, and I was a little frustrated with my boss, my battalion commander, who wasn’t paying attention to all the things I thought he should be paying attention to. The sergeant major closed my office door and said to me, “Major, I know you’ve got some things that are bothering you. I want you to know just one thing: You’re responsible for your own morale.” He looked at me and said, “You got it, sir?” I said, “I got it, sergeant major, thank you very much.”

I never forgot that. It was sound advice.

Fordham football is playing Army at West Point on September first. Who will you be rooting for?
I’m going to miss the game, unfortunately, but good Lord, I want to beat those guys. When I go to West Point for the game, I usually talk to the corps of cadets about the U.S. global security challenges: the Middle East, Russia, the problems with Al Qaeda and ISIS, et cetera. After I spoke a couple of years ago, the first question I got was from a cadet. He said, “General, so we understand you went to Fordham University. You spent almost 40 years in the Army, and you spent only four years at Fordham, so I’m assuming you’re rooting for Army.”

He was just having fun with me, but I looked at him. I said, “Are you kidding me? You know damn well who I’m rooting for tomorrow, OK? I’m rooting for my alma mater.”

So yes, I want both teams to play well, certainly, but I definitely want us to win.

Interview conducted, edited, and condensed by Ryan Stellabotte.

Related Story: “My 9/11: A Personal Reflection by General Jack Keane, Former Vice Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army”

An Iraq War veteran helps prepare fellow military vets for civilian leadership

Soon after graduating from Fordham with a degree in Latin American studies and sociology, Iraq War veteran Jayson Browder traveled to Turkey as a Fulbright Scholar.

Now he’s in Washington, D.C., heading up Veterans in Global Leadership, a nonprofit he founded in 2015 that, among other things, prepares student veterans to compete for prestigious scholarships and fellowships, and offers networking events and one-on-one mentoring.

“We want to reframe the idea of what a vet-in-transition is,” Browder once said of returning veterans. “There’s this idea out there that vets are broke, need to be fixed—that they need, need, need. Vets don’t feel that’s the case. We think we’re a natural resource to be tapped into.”

In 2017, Veterans for Global Leadership alumni garnered two Fulbrights, a Truman, and two Boren Fellowships for study in Jordan, among other awards.

Raised by his grandparents, Browder grew up in rural South Carolina and earned an associate’s degree while enlisted in the U.S. Air Force. He transferred to Fordham in 2011, and his postgraduate pursuits have included an appointment as a U.S. Presidential Management Fellow at the White House.

He believes the world needs what veterans have to offer.

“We find ourselves in a leadership crisis moment,” Browder says, “with a lot of big-time problems that Americans need to solve—from climate change to a host of national security issues. I believe that veterans are people who have courage, who have shown a sense of service, and who are risk-takers. Veterans like to solve problems.”

—David McKay Wilson

Read more “20 in Their 20s” profiles.

What one would probably not imagine is Gonzalez shouting orders into the face of a boot camp recruit. But that’s what Gonzalez does: She makes Marines.

“I haven’t been screaming at recruits for over two years now, but if I put my uniform on, the adrenaline comes back and I’m a different person,” said Gonzalez.

Gonzalez put training young recruits on hold to attend the School of Professional and Continuing Studies with the NROTC. She majored in communication and media studies with a focus on film. On completing her coursework she was commissioned second lieutenant at a ceremony held at Fordham’s Rose Hill campus on Jan. 6 and officially graduated on Feb. 1.

Gonzalez’s 18 years of service in the U.S. Marines, the most male dominated branch of the military, is enough to impress, but the fact that she’s advanced to lieutenant while raising five children takes her accomplishments to another level. Yet she redirects credit to her husband and her parents, both of whom she says made it all possible.

“My family has been with me every step of the way, each time I reenlisted—and it’s not like I came from a huge military family,” she said.

Gonzalez enlisted straight out of high school in 1999. Four years later, when her first child was just 10 months old, she was deployed to Iraq.

At the same time, her husband Patricio Gonzalez, also a Marine, was deployed to Bahrain. Her parents stepped in to take care of their daughter in her home state of Washington.

After her husband left the military in 2005 and following her deployment, the family continued to grow. Their daughter, Skye, is now 14, and there are four boys: Emmanuel, 12, Samuel, 10, and twins Noah and Devin, 7.

All the while, Gonzalez continued to advance her career in the military, which included taking classes online as part of the Marine Corps Enlisted Commissioning Educational Program. She said that her husband, who is from New York, researched veteran friendly colleges and found Fordham. She began classes online while she continued to train recruits in South Carolina.

“I was drilling my recruits, doing homework, taking care of my kids, and coming back the next day to do it all over again,” she said.

The family eventually settled in Bayside, Queens near her husband’s family. She started taking classes on campus at Lincoln Center, where she developed a passion for film.

“I was never analytical about film,” she said. “Taking classes really helped me look at things from different sides of the spectrum. In the military I have to be open-minded and see things from all angles.”

She said that her favorite classes focused on ethics and moral struggles as they related to media and film. But while there were practical aspects to studying film, at the end of the day she just “enjoyed the subject.”

“I didn’t want it to be a job to come to school; I wanted to take it beyond that.”

Gonzalez said that, although she could retire in two years, she plans to stay another 13, bringing her to 30 years of military service.

“It’s a long time, but the military has been very good to me,” she said. “I would have never had the opportunity to come to Fordham without it.”

I was in the Pentagon on 9/11 and lost 85 teammates from the Army Headquarters (among the 125 people killed in the Pentagon and the 59 passengers who died on Flight 77), including a dear friend, Lt. Gen. Timothy J. Maude, a three-star general. My secretary lost five friends she had known for more than 20 years. We sent a general officer to every funeral. Terry, my wife, and I attended scores of funerals. Most were buried in Arlington, all together at a site selected in view of the Pentagon.

On that fateful day, I was in my office when one of my staff rushed in to turn on the TV and advise me something terrible had happened in New York City. I saw that a plane had hit the World Trade Center (WTC). I am a born and raised New Yorker. I noticed it was a blue-sky day and you could not hit the WTC by accident. I knew in 1993 terrorists had tried to bomb the WTC and bring it down from an underground parking garage. I knew instinctively it had to be a terrorist attack and said as much. I ordered the Army Operations Center (AOC) to be brought up to full manning (which was fortuitous because many who occupied it came from the blast area where the plane would eventually hit the Pentagon). The Pentagon is five stories high and five stories below ground level. It houses on a normal day about 25,000 people, most of them civilians. Up until the time the Sears Tower was built in Chicago, it was the largest office building in the U.S. The AOC was on the lowest floor.

We watched the second plane hit the WTC. My operations officer, a two-star general, called me to confirm that the AOC was fully manned. He also advised me that he was monitoring FAA communications. All planes were being grounded, he said, but a plane that took off from Washington, D.C., had turned around in the vicinity of Ohio and approached D.C. from the south along I-95 before turning east, short of the city, and then south again. We know now that the terrorist flying that plane likely believed he was too high. The general and I were discussing procedures for evacuating buildings in D.C. when the plane hit us. My office shook violently and eventually began to fill with smoke. I asked the general if he felt the impact. He said no (he was five stories down under the ground floor). I told him we were just hit and advised him to tell the U.S. Army around the world what happened and that, given the status of the AOC, which was unharmed, we would still maintain command and control of the Army. I told my immediate staff to call home and to evacuate. I kept my executive officer, a colonel, and my aide, a major, with me. I gave them my shirts from my office bathroom, and we soaked them in water and wrapped them around our nose and mouth and headed toward the blast site.

We were about a hundred yards away when the smoke became thicker. People were running from the blast area, and we were ensuring that everyone was getting out. At some point, my executive officer tapped my shoulder and said: “Sir, I think we need to leave this to others and go to the AOC and take command of the Army.” Of course I knew immediately that he was right, and we joined my staff in the AOC. As other officers joined us who were outside the building, we noticed that their shirts were full of blood; some had used their ties as tourniquets to assist the wounded.

We heard the report that five planes inbound to the U.S. were unaccounted for and that fighter aircraft were mustered to engage them. Vice President Cheney had given permission to shoot them down if necessary. I can remember thinking, what must be going through the mind of the pilots knowing they would kill hundreds of innocent people to save thousands. Fortunately, the pilots made visual contact with the airplanes and eventually radio contact, and all five planes were safe. The AOC has very large screens, floor to ceiling, where we monitored activities. The Secretary of the Army was taken by helicopter to our classified alternate site. He did not want to go, but he had no choice.

That night, before I visited the wounded in the hospitals in D.C. and Virginia at about 11 p.m., I told my officers that the Pentagon and the WTC represented the first battle of a new war. “The days of treating terrorists as criminals and bringing them in to the justice system are over. Today’s attack is an act of war, as all terrorist attacks are. The Army will bear the brunt of this fight, and we intend to go find them and we will kill and destroy them by the thousands.” We took one step toward the enemy that night by putting a work plan together to support CENTCOM, who we knew would be in charge of the war. I ordered the 82nd Airborne from Fort Bragg to secure the Pentagon. They were there when people came to work.

We visited five hospitals, seeing all the wounded. The worst had horrific burns. We heard stories of extraordinary heroism. We saw the first responders, many who never left, even though another shift had come on. They told me that because it was the Pentagon, so many of the wounded were initially treated by military people who are trained to treat injuries. In many cases, the bleeding had been stopped, and the wounded were being treated for shock when they arrived. The first responders indicated that lives were saved as a result. Some of the wounded would stay in the hospital for weeks.

The next day, we knew we had a number of people killed because they were unaccounted for. The Army team in the Pentagon showed up for work, on time, mostly civilians. I was so proud of them as I traveled the building to provide reassurance. They knew we were at war and they were a part of something much larger than self. I also knew as I spoke to survivors that many were hurting mentally and emotionally. I ordered the Army surgeon to bring doctors and counselors over to the building to help our folks cope. I also told the Army chief historian to document what took place, it’s part of our history now, and also to record the heroism that took place. When appropriate, I said, we would recognize those involved.

I visited the crash site on 9/12 with the chief engineer, and what I saw was quite remarkable. The upper floors at the plane’s point of entry had collapsed due to the blast and heat from the fire. The Pentagon is actually five independent rings separated by an alley between each ring. The plane entered at the ground floor, knocking down outside lampposts on the approach, and penetrated three of the five rings, with the nose of the aircraft penetrating the inner wall of the third ring. I was looking at what appeared to be a blackened multistory parking garage. I asked, “Where are all the desks, the computers, the walls, the plane?” He said all was consumed in the fire of the jet fuel, likely 2,000-degree heat. He showed me the strut of the plane which held the front tires, and it was in the alley between the third and fourth wing. The whole fuselage had entered the building but nothing was left. I realized that our dead teammates and the remains of the passengers were all around us and had been consumed by the fire.

We ordered the Old Guard, 3rd Infantry from Fort Myer, to the site. They are infantry soldiers. They would come with body bags, and when the fire department recovery teams spotted remains, we asked that all work stop. Everyone on site would stand in place. A four-man team of soldiers would move to the remains and recover them to a tent set up in the parking lot where a chaplain prayed over them with a two-man honor guard at attention. After honors, we turned the remains over to the FBI. They were later returned to us and flown by CH47 helicopter to Dover, Delaware, for identification by their families. We were determined to properly honor our dead as we would on any battlefield.

The engineer indicated that we were standing in the first renovated wedge of the Pentagon, which had not been fully reoccupied as all the new furniture had not arrived. Normally 5,000 people would have been working in that part of the building; at the time the plane hit, however, he estimated that only 2,000 people were there. Moreover, when the building was built during World War II, due to the iron shortage, no rebars were used in the cement beams holding up the floors. As part of the renovation, rebars were inserted. As such, the only part of the Pentagon that had iron rebars in the beams was the area where the plane hit, and that part was less than half occupied. He said the rebars held for 45 minutes, allowing people on the upper floors time to get out. If the plane had hit any other wedge containing approximately 5,000 people, the building would have collapsed immediately, and the casualties would have been on the same scale as the WTC or greater.

A few weeks later, we had the most extraordinary award ceremony I ever participated in. We had to create a new medal for civilians wounded in action because they are not authorized to receive the Purple Heart. The Secretary of the Army and I decorated many people that day for heroism and for their wounds, as they represented everyone who was part of the Army team. They were young and old, men and women, soldiers and civilians, officers and enlisted, black and white. Some were in great physical condition; some were not. It reminded me once again that heroism does not have a gender, a race, a religion, a size, or shape. Anyone willing to give up their life for another, acting instantaneously, has all to do with heart and character. This is about true honor. I was so proud to be among them at the largest and most unique award ceremony of my career.

A few days later, I visited Ground Zero as a senior military leader from New York City representing the Department of Defense. The fire chief in charge of the recovery walked me over the WTC complex of smoldering ruins. It was a macabre and overwhelming experience, as we had all witnessed on TV. I attended the mayor’s evening brief on a pier along the Hudson River. I was impressed; it was as organized as any military operations center. The people were steady, firm, and determined. I offered the mayor the assistance of his military, which had been already offered to him on the phone. As I left, with sirens blasting to take me back to my aircraft, there were hundreds of New Yorkers along the West Side Highway cheering and waving American flags. I was proud of my city, its leaders, and its people. I knew we would never be the same again.

—General Jack Keane, a four-star general, completed more than 37 years of public service in December 2003, culminating in his appointment as acting chief of staff and vice chief of staff of the U.S. Army. General Keane is a 1966 graduate of Fordham’s Gabelli School of Business.

Many of these men and women have completed multiple tours of duty during the long conflicts, and although their reasons for serving are myriad, they share some singular character traits.

“They are not about war, they are about selfless service,” Gen. Jack Keane, GSB ’66, a retired four-star general and a former vice chief of staff of the U.S. Army, once told a Fordham alumni audience. “In my judgment, they do it for a simple yet profound sense of duty, and they do it for one another. We can never take that for granted, and we at Fordham never will.”

Indeed, the University recognizes the altruism of these men and women and continues serving them by providing access to higher education when they return home.

Their paths to and from Fordham are different. Like Keane, scores of them began their military careers at the University, as part of Fordham’s ROTC program. Still more are now coming to Fordham to continue their education. We are proud to highlight some of their stories.

An Immigrant’s Journey

Kevin Flores was born in El Salvador in 1988, during the country’s brutal civil war, a decadelong conflict marked by extreme violence.

“My relatives tell stories about how the majority of Salvadorans did not willingly choose sides to support,” he says, “but were forced to do so by the guerillas or the government through fear and intimidation.”

When he was just 3 years old, he and his family fled the war-torn nation for a better life in the United States. He recalls his grandmother weeping and praying for their safety, as he and his parents got into a truck headed to Guatemala. He says they traveled in trucks, train cars, and on foot through Mexico and eventually into the United States, where they settled in Springdale, Arkansas.

They were later granted amnesty by the U.S. government.

“Because of these experiences, the elders in my family made sure that from a young age, I understood the privilege of living in the U.S.,” Flores says.

When he turned 18, he enlisted in the Marines. It was his way to give back to the nation he says has given him and his family so much.

After serving in Iraq for seven months in 2007, he began 38 months of training for the Marine Embassy Guard. The special assignment took him around the world. He served at the U.S. Embassy in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and then in Islamabad, Pakistan. In 2011, he was selected to serve a two-week stint as part of President Obama’s security detail during the president’s trip to Central and South America. The president’s last stop on the tour would be in El Salvador.

Flores says he was humbled by his luck and the circumstances of his homecoming.

“In the back of my mind, I knew that in no other country would this be possible: to arrive undocumented and to come back 20 years later, not only documented but as an American citizen with a top-secret clearance working for the president of the United States.”

The woman who cleared him for entry, a complete stranger, saw from his documents that he was born in El Salvador, Flores says. She looked at him and said, “I’m proud of you.”

Another highlight came at the very end of the tour, Flores says, when President Obama thanked him and the other members of his security detail for their service to the nation.

At the end of the trip, he returned to duty in Islamabad, which is where he was on May 2, 2011, when the president announced that Osama bin Laden had been killed at a compound in Abbottabad, about a two-hour drive from the embassy.

Flores returned to Arkansas the following year and, a few months after getting home, left to attend Fordham. He says part of what drew him to Fordham’s School of Professional and Continuing Studies is the University’s reputation as a vet-friendly school—and its commitment to full participation in the Yellow Ribbon Program, covering the tuition costs that aren’t covered under the Post-9/11 GI Bill.

He expects to graduate next spring with a B.A. in international political economics. This semester, however, he’s in Washington, D.C., working as an intern with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.

Flores applied for the position earlier this year and, since September, has been working with New York Sen. Charles Schumer on policy and legislation. Last year, he worked for New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand in her constituent services office in Manhattan, where he dealt with immigration issues.

Flores says he’s drawn to helping immigrants like himself, particularly at a time when tens of thousands of vulnerable Central American children are fleeing violence in their home countries for the United States. He sees it as a way to continue serving his country.

This fall, he’s studying to take the LSAT, with the hopes of going to law school next year. He’s interested in practicing immigration law.

A Cosmopolitan Patriot

Like Flores, former U.S. Army Sgt. Erik Haass, FCLC ’98, wasn’t born in the United States, but it has become his home.

His father was a Norwegian diplomat, and the family moved often when Haass was young. He was born in Norway and lived in Indonesia and France before the family came to the United States, settling first in Washington, D.C., before moving to New York, when Haass was 18. He found the pace of the city exciting and, attracted by the prospect of getting a Jesuit education, enrolled at Fordham College at Lincoln Center.

At Fordham, Haass majored in history and economics. He joined the Army ROTC program and the Pershing Rifles, a military honor society.

While most cadets in the ROTC program hope to be commissioned as officers when they graduate from college, that wasn’t a possibility for Haass because he was not yet an American citizen. He stayed with the program nonetheless and, after graduating in 1998, went to work for fellow Fordham ROTC alumnus Vincent Cannaliato, FCRH ’63, at Commodore Capital, a small investment banking firm in midtown.

In 2002, while working for Cannaliato, a retired Army captain who served in Vietnam, Haass got his Green Card. He enlisted in the Army the very same day and was deployed to Iraq in May 2003. While serving in Iraq, he applied for U.S. citizenship, which he received in 2005, before his first deployment to Afghanistan.

During that deployment, Haass was part of a quick reaction force called in to support a special forces unit fighting the Taliban in an abandoned village. He says the battle began quickly and reminded him of the vivid, intense fighting in the opening scene of the World War II film Saving Private Ryan. Haass’ squad leader was fatally injured, and Haass himself was shot in his left hand and right leg while retrieving his fallen comrade. He later received a Bronze Star Medal for his actions.

While recuperating from his injuries in Germany, Haass met up with several Fordham ROTC and Pershing Rifles alumni who’d heard he’d been wounded and wanted to pay him a visit.

Lt. Col. Jean-Marc Pierre, FCRH ’92, a military strategist at the Pentagon and acting president of the Pershing Rifles Company D-8 Alumni Association, was among those who visited Haass. He admires Haass’ perseverance and his patriotism. “He was not an American when he joined the military, could never get commissioned … [and]after 9/11 gave up his job on Wall Street to enlist as a private,” Pierre says, calling Haass “a certified Fordham University war hero.”

During Haass’ third deployment, to Afghanistan, he fought in the Battle of Wanat, which President Obama called “one of the most fierce of this entire war.” On July 13, 2008, an estimated 200 Taliban insurgents attacked American and Afghan troops at a remote outpost. Nine U.S. soldiers were killed.

“By that time, I was seasoned,” Haass says, “but it was a level of intensity I had never seen before.”

This past July, Haass was at the White House, where President Obama awarded Sgt. Ryan Pitts the Medal of Honor for his actions during that battle. Pitts had invited his fellow soldiers, including Haass, to the attend ceremony.

Haass credits the bravery and skill of his unit with getting them through the battle.

“We were very experienced, our instincts and reflexes were honed, and I’m grateful for that,” he says. “If you’ve got to live through something like that, at least it’s with people you thoroughly trust.”

During six years on active duty, Haass earned two Purple Hearts and two Bronze Star Medals, among other awards.

In 2009, after returning to the States, he enrolled at the University of Notre Dame, where he earned an M.B.A. On his first day on campus, he met his future wife, Rebecca. They now have a 16-month-old son, Robert, and live in Chicago, where Haass works for the accounting and consulting firm KPMG.

Although he was born in Norway and his work continues to take him around the world, Haass says he’s always “felt comfortable” as an American.

“Anyone from any background can be American,” he says. “I’ve always loved America, its diversity and the sense of freedom and opportunity I feel.

“I am always happy and feel very lucky when I return home to my adopted country.”

Human Rights Advocate

Danielle Scalione, FCRH ’07, a former Army captain, joined the Army ROTC program during her sophomore year. She grew close with the ROTC cadre at Fordham, especially during her junior year, when cadets prepare for the Leader Development and Assessment Course, a five-week summer program that tests what cadets have learned and prepares them to enter the military. A cadet’s performance in the course is a big factor in whether or not she’ll get assigned to her chosen branch in the Army.

Scalione’s hard work paid off. She landed in the top 10 percent of the Army’s National Order of Merit List, ensuring her placement in the branch of her choosing: military intelligence.

She was deployed to Afghanistan for the first time in March 2008 and worked with an aviation brigade. During her second deployment to the country, in 2010, she served with an infantry brigade, which gave her more exposure to the lives of Afghan citizens. She was particularly struck by the Taliban’s subjugation of women in Afghanistan, and remembers that many women who traveled outside their homes were required to be chaperoned by male relatives.

“Their lives are completely and totally different than anything you and I have ever experienced,” she says. “I appreciate all the freedoms that women before me have fought for and have provided me, and I just feel like we should try to do the same for other people.”

Scalione’s experiences in Afghanistan reinforced her determination to pursue a law degree after completing her military service. Soon after she returned to the United States, she enrolled at George Washington University School of Law.

She’s interested in national security and international human rights law, fields where she feels her experiences as a military intelligence officer will serve her well. Before she graduates next spring, however, she’ll have another big moment to celebrate: In February, she and her fiancé (whom she met through an Army buddy) will be getting married in Washington, D.C.

Helping Vets Move Forward

More than 400 veterans currently attend Fordham University, and many of them are reaping the benefits of Fordham’s continued participation in the Yellow Ribbon Program.

Fordham’s status as a Yellow Ribbon School and its robust veteran community are part of what attracted Patrick Hackett and Chris Maloney to the University.

Hackett, a senior majoring in economics at Fordham’s School of Professional and Continuing Studies, initially attended Charleston Southern University, where he played baseball for two years before realizing he needed a change. He spoke with his family, including an uncle in the Marine Corps, and decided to enlist in the Marines. He completed two deployments to Afghanistan, in 2011 and 2012.

Maloney, who’s pursuing his M.B.A. at Fordham’s Graduate School of Business Administration, enlisted in the Marine Corps and became a pilot after earning his undergraduate degree from the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis. He was deployed to Iraq in 2008, then to Afghanistan three times in as many years, starting in 2010.

Both men said the military provided direction in their lives. And both contacted Fordham during their final deployments.

They met at the University last fall, during a veterans’ orientation session. Now they’re serving as co-presidents of the Fordham Veterans Association, an umbrella group comprised of student veterans on all three campuses and in each of the University’s undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools. They work closely with Fordham administrators to assist incoming student veterans.

Isabelle Frank, Ph.D., dean of Fordham’s School of Professional and Continuing Studies and co-chair of the Fordham Veterans Initiative, hopes the collaboration will provide a one-stop shop for veterans, affording them greater support and social mobility as they transition out of the military, back to civilian life, and into the workforce.

“The GI Bill was crucial after World War II in transforming society and helping to create a strong middle class,” she says. “Reaching out to the millions of men and women who have served … many of them in order to get these kinds of benefits, because they can’t afford them otherwise … is a crucial part of [our]mission.”

This year, Frank says, Michael Abrams began serving as a part-time veterans coordinator at Fordham, working with several work-study students out of an office on the Lincoln Center campus to act as a liaison between the University’s veterans administrators and the student veterans group. He also teaches a seminar on career transition leadership that’s designed to prepare student veterans for careers in the private sector.

Hackett and Maloney, meanwhile, are working hard to make sure their fellow student veterans get involved and get the resources they need to succeed, whether that’s help navigating academia or teaming up with partner organizations to find internship opportunities and help kick-start careers.

“We’re going to treat [the Fordham Veterans Association]like the same family that you had when you were in the military,” Hackett says he tells his fellow student vets. “If you need something, come through us. You have help. That’s what these veterans groups are really for, to continue serving.”

In September, Hackett and Maloney delivered a presentation for incoming students to introduce them to the services Fordham, its veterans’ community, and its alumni network have to offer. As they streamline operations and plan events for the academic year, Maloney says they’re working under an unofficial motto.

“No rank, no ribbons, no self-serving vets,” he says. “Let’s all work together and move forward.”

—Annmarie Fertoli, FCRH ’06, is an associate producer at WNYC.

And indeed, the members of Students for the Education and Rehabilitation of Veterans (SERV), a student group that he started in July, have hit the ground running.

Although it’s less than a year old, the group has 15 members who are veterans, and another 20 who are just interested in issues that veterans face in the legal realm.

Davis knows these issues well, as he is a retired Marine Corps captain. He flew helicopters for eight years before retiring on temporary disability. He knew he wanted to study law in New York City, and says that Fordham was hands-down the most veteran-friendly university in the area.

Working with a friend at New York University, Davis established SERV both there and at Fordham, to help veterans enrolled at the schools adjust to academic and civilian life.

“It’s a bit surreal, going from the military into the abstract world of law school. There are some skills that kind of go stale while you’re in the military, like typing. I had people do that for me, so after the first two or three years, I didn’t do much typing at all,” he said. “[At college], it’s a three-hour marathon of typing, so you have to learn how to put your thoughts down and organize them.”

Additionally, the group has taken on with gusto the role of assisting veterans of all stripes deal with administrative issues, including discharge upgrade cases. A veteran discharged with a less-than-honorable designation can lose pension benefits. Davis notes, however, that many veterans given such a designation suffer from traumatic brain injuries or suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder and not enough has been done for them. Both of those afflictions can change a soldier’s personality, affect behavior, and lead to a non-pensionable discharge.

Veterans are well positioned to take care of these issues, says Davis, because they understand the discharge procedures.

“They can see where the procedural flaws were, and also where the substantive flaws were in the case. It actually puts them in a better position to judge than a New York attorney, because they’re so familiar with military law, and they’ve had a bit of legal training there,” he said.

“When you combine those two, it makes a potent offense for upgrading these discharge decisions.”

Veterans also thrive at Fordham, he noted, because whereas students bring a healthy dose of idealism to their studies, veterans bring pragmatism to the table.

“In the end, it is a beneficial relationship that tempers both extremes. Hopefully, it results in producing more well-rounded barristers,” he said.

VISIT www.fordham.edu/academics/veterans_initiative/