Joachim Maitre: Veteran Of International Military Matters

Left, right, left, right and all around the world. He has worked and been educated in Nigeria, Vietnam and Canada during some crucial times in American history and is now the director and founder of BU’s Center for Defense Journalism and the director of the Division of Military Education, supervising BU’s Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC).

Dr. Joachim Maitre’s extensive international experiences have heavily influenced his current opinions about world affairs. Maitre decided to become a teacher after graduating from Bonn University in 1960 with a degree in Literature, Geography and Physical Education. He then traveled to Africa to work at the University of Nigeria.

He first began developing international perspective while teaching and reporting for Die Welt in Nigeria, where he first witnessed American intervention in developing nations.

“I was teaching at the University when the first Peace Corps came to Africa,” Maitre said. “They were primarily Americans, and they learned the hard way that they were in a different environment with different sensibilities.”

American foreign interventions have not changed much since then, Maitre said. He said the United States still maintains its leading position in international affairs and is never quick to share its power.

“We are not very good players internationally,” he said.

Maitre recalled an incident where an American soldier in a United Nations peacekeeping force refused to wear the U.N. patch on his uniform and was discharged.

“Americans did not disagree with him,” Maitre said. “Whenever we are involved in a situation like that, we have to lead.”

Maitre said the current disagreement between America and Great Britain over Taliban members being held in Guantanamo Bay is one example of American conflict with other countries. Britain wants the captives labeled Prisoners of War under the Geneva Convention, while America considers them terrorists.

“It’s a very drastic clash,” Maitre said.

He said the Guantanamo Bay disagreement can be compared to the ongoing conflict between the United States and Europe over the death penalty. Several alleged criminals have not been extradited to America because they would be charged with the death penalty, which is banned in most Western European countries.

Despite policy differences with other nations, Maitre predicts that America will continue to act on the world stage.

“We will be tempted to meddle a lot more as a policeman, especially when Western Europe doesn’t act quickly,” Maitre said.

Currently, Americans are debating whether or not the United States should invade Iraq, a move Maitre opposes.

“Since 1991, there has been a widespread feeling that we didn’t go all the way in Iraq,” Maitre said. “You don’t go to war on a guilty feeling. Iraq is not a threat to its neighbors.”

Maitre said he knows Saddam Hussein supports terrorism and may have chemical and/or biological weapons, but Maitre is still reluctant to support invasion.

“It would be very difficult to take him down,” Maitre said. “You also have to worry about force protection — you wouldn’t be able to lose only a few soldiers.”

“The U.S. population has always accepted losses,” he said. “The current situation is unnatural.”

Maitre warned that Iraq is not the only country that may challenge American power.

“We now have to think about threats from elsewhere, like Pakistan and the Philippines,” Maitre said. “If there’s trouble anywhere else in the world, as a nation we have to agree on the shape of future forces. What should they look like? Will they perform the right function? We have 7,000 tanks from our investment in the Cold War that we rightly didn’t send to Afghanistan — should we now be concerned with transport aircraft? The political debate on this has not yet started.”

Maitre said American intervention is necessary in assisting and leading struggling countries. Although the United States assisted Afghanistan in overthrowing the Taliban, Maitre said the ailing country still requires more aid from America to help them become independent. Afghanistan is a country that needs to be Americanized in some aspects, Maitre said.

“Afghanistan is not done; it will take another year at least,” Maitre said. “The ideal system would be to go to Afghanistan now and build a free press, which is necessary for information on the outside world.”

In 1987, Maitre served as director of BU’s Afghan Media Project, which sent professors to Afghanistan to teach Afghan mujahidin basic journalism skills.

“American journalism is worth spreading,” Maitre said. Though Maitre said American journalism should be taught internationally, he said he does not think it is safe to send inexperienced American journalists to foreign countries. Reporting on war and the military is dangerous, Maitre said, referring to Daniel Pearl, the Wall Street Journal reporter who was allegedly kidnapped by an Islamic sect in Pakistan on Jan. 23.

“He’s just a toy for political players now,” Maitre said. “They don’t recognize that he’s just a journalist; they think he’s a CIA agent. It’s a tricky position. I wouldn’t recommend men and women to start reporting in places like that now.”

However, Maitre is no stranger to combat journalism. While he was teaching and stringing in Nigeria, Maitre saw the independence uprisings in the Congo, but he said he never felt threatened.

Maitre also spent three years reporting in Vietnam during the Vietnam War for the German newspaper Die Welt. Maitre said his fellow reporters quickly became fed up with the filtered, inconsistent and dishonest information they received from the U.S. government concerning military progress.

“As the war went on, their journalism changed,” Maitre said. “At the end, there was a much greater cynicism. They felt they had been lied to, and I agreed with them.”

Unlike most American journalists, though, Maitre was rotated in and out of Vietnam, instead of remaining there for long periods of time.

On one of his longer stays in 1971, Maitre reported on one of the most overlooked topics of the war — South Vietnam’s military.

“South Vietnam had the fifth largest air force in the world at the time, and it wasn’t covered,” Maitre said. “The U.S. was overpowering. It was an American war.”

Military journalism has “certain weaknesses” now, according to Maitre.

“There’s an apparent lack of basic training now,” Maitre said. “If you approach an officer and don’t know his rank, you lose his respect.”

Maitre said he goes over rank and insignia in his Reporting Military Affairs class. The class only has 11 students, and has had as few as eight.

“Newspapers are not interested in the field of military journalism,” Maitre acknowledged. “It’s a difficult job. You’re dependent on the [military], you don’t know what’s going to happen next, you have to be inventive, and you always have to be careful.”

However, recklessness can have its advantages, Maitre admitted. One of his students begged Maitre to send him on the Afghan Media Project, but Maitre refused. The student went anyway.

“He showed guts, and he got a great story,” Maitre said. “If you have the opportunit — for example, you notice a bunch of soldiers training in the Philippines — you should take it. Being in the right spot at the right time can make your career.”

According to Maitre, American culture dominates the world as much as its military, sometimes with backlash.

“Western Europe is [now] heavily Americanized,” Maitre said. “The German language is very affected. American is a lot easier to learn.”

“We are a very powerful country, and we speak often about our achievements,” Maitre said. “McDonalds dominates the atmosphere, along with other American products and cultural products like movies. It has a provocative effect to those who cannot compete.”

Maitre, who began teaching at BU in 1983, currently teaches several BU courses: Intercultural Communication, Reporting Military Affairs, Aspects of Defense Planning and Technology, and Defense Policies of Nations. He became Director of BU’s ROTC programs– Army, Navy and Air Force — in the early ’90s.

ROTC provides BU students with military training and awards most of its participants full academic scholarships but requires that students serve in the U.S. military for a set number of years after graduation.

While Maitre directs the entire ROTC, the individual programs are run by separate coordinaters.

“They’re fairly independent running the programs,” Maitre said. “It works out well that way.”

ROTC, which was removed from BU in the late ’60s due to student protest over U.S. involvement in Vietnam, was reinstated by former President and current Chancellor John Silber in the early ’70s. The program has run smoothly since then, according to Maitre.

“I think the presence of the uniform on campus is very beneficial to BU,” Maitre said. “I know many new students are pleasantly surprised to see so many uniforms here. “I do not know of a single incident of protest against the programs.”

BU’s ROTC is now quite prominent on campus, Maitre said.

“Walk down Bay State Road; our units are on prime property,” he said. “That’s not the case with many universities, where the ROTC is hidden away in a basement somewhere. The monument to BU students’ sacrifices outside the Army unit — that has never been mentioned as disturbing to the University.”

In contrast, Harvard University never reinstated its ROTC program after it was removed in the late ’60s. Although new President Lawrence Summers has talked about bringing the program back, Maitre said he doesn’t think the program will return.

“The faculty isn’t pushing for it, the Army’s not keen on forcing it, and the demand for officers is not overpowering,” he said. “It would be almost a triumph if they were reinstated, though — a feat of victory after being discriminated against.”

Despite ROTC’s acceptance on campus, Maitre said the program doesn’t get as many new recruits as he would like.

Around 300 students are in BU’s ROTC program. While many are male, female recruits have been increasing.

“We would like to have BU students join up during the semester, but that seems to be the exception rather than the rule,” he said. “Most BU students are not interested in a military career. Some find financially, it’s quite attractive, but most students are the type that doesn’t dream about the military.”

If recruits drop out, it is usually due to the physical demands of the program, according to Maitre.

“Students do not like to get up early for some parts of the program,” Maitre said. “A regular student takes four classes plus [ROTC] — you need more effort and discipline to make it through one semester, let alone eight semesters.”

As director of ROTC, Maitre has been a proponent of the Academic Study Hall program for ROTC students. All first semester freshmen and students that drop below a certain GPA have to participate in the study hall four hours a week.

“It’s an unsolved problem,” Maitre said. “The military curriculum is often not taken seriously by professors, so this is the only way to encourage otherwise.”

Maitre said he is proud of improving ROTC’s yearly pass and review parade, where cadets and midshipmen march in front of parents and administrators.

“During pass and review, everyone appears very professional. We bring in outside officers as well,” Maitre said. “It really gives the feeling of being fully integrated into the military and is an attraction for Boston too.”