Army, Air Force officers commissioned
PROVO — “Take a deep breath for just a second, pause, pat yourself on the back. Enjoy it, because you’re about to go from the top of the pack to the bottom of the heap.”
Retired Col. Kenneth Alford, an associate professor of church history and doctrine at BYU, said that to the eight newest second lieutenants in the U.S. Army at a commissioning ceremony Thursday morning. It could easily have been spoken to the thousands of BYU graduates who put on navy blue caps and gowns and walked across the stage of the Marriott Center Thursday afternoon.
Both the Army and Air ROTC divisions held commissioning ceremonies; the Air Force commissioned 14 second lieutenants at the Varsity Theatre. At the Army’s ceremony, each cadet sat on the end of the row, family and friends filling in the rest of the rows. Alford spoke, then each cadet came up on stage, stood between the U.S. flag and the U.S. Army flag, raised his, or in one case her, right hand and swore to support and defend the Constitution.
Lt. Col. Ted Leblow, the commanding officer at BYU’s division, swore in most of the officers; Capt. Philip Williams swore in two. Retired Lt. Col. Quinn Nixon swore in his son, 2nd Lt. Daniel A. Nixon. Wives, mothers, fathers, a brother and a sister participated in pinning the officers.
Next came the first salute, when an enlisted officer saluted the commissioned officer. In almost every case, the enlisted officer was older, more experienced and had more bars on his chest. But he raised his right arm to the salute and smiled at the ranking officer in front of him. 2nd Lt. Mary Jo Ford, who will be in the Army Nurse Corps, received her first salute from her father, retired Master Sgt. David Ford; 2nd Lts. Vernon Wall and David Buck, both infantrymen, also saluted their fathers.
Alford, who retired in 2008 after almost 30 years in the Army, and who received his commission at a BYU ROTC ceremony decades ago, gave the soldiers 10 suggestions for their lives in the Army.
1. Ask questions. They are the lowest-ranking officers in the Army, he said, so take advantage of that and ask as many dumb questions now as you can.
2. Balance your life. He cautioned that family and personal time needs to be a priority, or they will not have any of either.
3. Make your career a great experience for your entire family. Army families move around often, and that can be hard. He told them to treat every new assignment like they’ll be there forever.
“Do things that are permanent,” he said. “Plant trees that will last longer than you’re there.”
4. Complete all the education you can. The Army has many educational opportunities; take advantage of those as well as any civil opportunities that arise.
5. Figure out what you want to do, then let the Army help you do it.
6. Be your own assignment manager. He advised them to plan ahead and know where they wanted to go, then pass those desires on. Maybe they’d get to those places, maybe they wouldn’t. But the odds went up if their personnel officer knew they wanted to go.
7. Set the example. This is true for them both as officers and as LDS soldiers, he said.
“Those that have gone before you have set a standard, and more is expected of us,” Alford said.
8. Exercise righteous dominion. They should not have to choose between following the Ten Commandments and doing their military duty. Be good officers, he told them.
9. Leave it better than you found it. It doesn’t matter, Alford said, what the assignment looked like when you got it. Just make it better, and don’t worry who gets the credit.
10. Live worthy of the companionship of the Holy Ghost. He gave examples of LDS commanders in Iraq who had prayed for counsel in how to approach their command. They could not afford not having that gift, he said.
“Having the Spirit of the Lord with you is of incalculable value,” he said.
Retired Maj. Gen. James G. Andrus spoke at the Air Force commissioning program, and Col. Brent A. Johnson administered the oath of office to his commissionees.
Army Commissions
David A. Buck
Todd R. Christensen
Mary Jo Ford
Daniel A. Nixon
Jarom R. Ricks
Ryan C. Smith
Nathan C. Thompson
Vernon S. Wall
Air Force Commissions
Nathan J. Bundy
Paul M. Carpenter
Greg E. Carter
Denis S. Clayson
Braden K. Eagar
Adam W. Harper
Mitchell S. Heath
Roger S. Higgs
Benjamin A. Larsen
Deven A. Johnson
Robert A. McClain
Patrick C. Murray
Kevin J. Nufer
Julianne M. Thompson
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