Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 111 Part 2.djvu/665

 PUBLIC LAW 105-85—NOV. 18, 1997 111 STAT. 1745 Defense and the military services have traditionally maintained special relationships with the colleges, including the policy to grant active duty service in the Army to graduates of the colleges who desire such service and who are recommended for such service by their ROTC professors of military science. (4) Each of the senior military colleges has demonstrated an ability to adapt its systems and operations to chsinging conditions in, and requirements of, the Armed Forces without compromising the quality of leaders produced and without interruption of the close relationship between the colleges and the Department of Defense. (c) SENSE OF CONGRESS.—In light of the findings in subsection lo use 2iiia (b), it is the sense of Congress that— ^°^^- (1) the proposed initiative of the Secretary of the Army to end the commitment to active duty service for all graduates of senior military colleges who desire such service and who are recommended for such service by their ROTC professors of military science is short-sighted and contrary to the longterm interests of the Army; (2) as they have in the past, the senior military colleges can and will continue to accommodate to changing military requirements to ensure that future graduates entering military service continue to be officers of superb quality who are quickly assimilated by the Armed Forces and fully prepared to make significant contributions to the Armed Forces through extended military careers; and (3) decisions of the Secretary of Defense or the Secretary of a military department that fundamentally and unilaterally change the long-standing relationship of the Armed Forces with the senior military colleges are not in the best interests of the Department of Defense or the Armed Forces and are patently unfair to students who made decisions to enroll in the senior military colleges on the basis of existing Department and Armed Forces policy. (d) CONTINUATION OF SUPPORT FOR SENIOR MILITARY COLLEGES. — Section 2111a of title 10, United States Code, is amended— (1) by redesignating subsection (d) as subsection (f); and (2) by inserting after subsection (c) the following new subsections: "(d) TERMINATION OR REDUCTION OF PROGRAM PROHIBITED. — The Secretary of Defense and the Secretaries of the military departments may not take or authorize any action to terminate or reduce a unit of the Senior Reserve Officers' Training Corps at a senior military college unless the termination or reduction is specifically requested by the college. "(e) ASSIGNMENT TO ACTIVE DUTY.— (1) The Secretary of the Army shall ensure that a graduate of a senior military college who desires to serve as a commissioned officer on active duty upon graduation from the college, who is medically and physically qualified for active duty, and who is recommended for such duty by the professor of military science at the college, shall be assigned to active duty. This paragraph shall apply to a member of the program at a senior military college who graduates from the college after March 31, 1997. "(2) Nothing in this section shall be construed to prohibit the Secretary of the Army from requiring a member of the program

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