ROTC: Flag incident stems from miscommunication

Editor,

As part of the UNM community, the ROTC departments share responsibility for raising and lowering flags at Scholes Hall. This month, it is the Army ROTC department's turn in the rotation. On Friday morning, Army ROTC students raised the U.S. flag and the New Mexico state flag. The third flagpole, which usually carries the University flag, was left empty and unlocked. This was planned to allow students from the Mexican Student Association to raise the Mexican flag later in the day. At the end of the day, the Army ROTC students returned to lower the flags. Due to a misunderstanding, the students did not lower the Mexican flag or lock the flagpole. They believed that the Mexican Student Association students would return to retrieve the flag that they had raised earlier in the day.

As a result, the Mexican flag remained flying at Scholes Hall. On Monday morning, the Army ROTC students were again scheduled to raise the flags at Scholes Hall. As occasionally occurs with any organization, a communication error occurred, and Army ROTC students failed to raise the flags. This mistake resulted in only the Mexican flag flying over Scholes Hall.

At some point that morning, a misguided student decided to remove the Mexican flag from Scholes Hall. According to reports, he then desecrated the flag and delivered it to the Air Force ROTC building.

There are very few organizations where diversity is welcomed, celebrated or as important to the organizational culture as the U.S. military. In today's operating environment, service members also fully recognize the importance of their allies and the need for cultural awareness. Today's military members are often called to work with coalition partners and among various cultures while operating throughout the world. For our unwitting part in this deplorable event, I would like to apologize on behalf of my students, the Army ROTC department and myself. However, our part was due to an act of omission and not one of malicious intent. The Army ROTC students have taken steps to improve communication with other student organizations and within their own ranks to reduce the chance of such an event occurring in future.

Lt. Col. Erik Sevigny

Army ROTC