Army major visits alma mater to tell military story

U.S. Army Maj. Luke Calhoun graduated from Chattanooga Christian School before its current students were born.

But the soldier commanded the teens’ attention Friday as he talked about his three tours in Iraq and lessons learned.

The visit to his hometown was part business, part personal. The major is stationed in Fort Leavenworth, Kan., working through a 10-month military leadership course.

A section of the program requires soldiers to speak publicly and interact with local media. During his leave over Labor Day weekend, he decided to revisit Chattanooga Christian, meet with some of his old teachers and talk with students.

At the school, he challenged the teens to look at stories in books, newspapers and on TV critically, asking “Where are they coming from?” and “Does it make sense?”

“Because some Sunnis attacked Americans in Iraq, do all Sunnis hate Americans?” he asked the class.

That’s not the case, the intelligence officer explained, and all groups have fringe elements. The majority of any cultural, religious, ethnic or political group wants security, jobs and education, not violence or conflict, he said.

Gary Lindley, a history teacher at the school who taught Calhoun when he was a student, said the major gave students a chance to “see a grownup that was ‘in my spot.’”

The major’s visit coincided nicely with the day’s lesson plan in Lindley’s ancient history class — Mesopotamia, the ancient precursor of Iraq.

The major said part of the media component of the leadership training is focused on following Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s recent firing. The former commander of operations in Afghanistan, McChrystal was fired by President Barack Obama after a Rolling Stone article exposed tensions that the general and his staff had with Obama’s handling of the war in Afghanistan.

That incident has placed a greater focus on media relations for midlevel officers, but Calhoun said he sees media interaction as an opportunity to “tell the Army’s story.”

Generations have passed since the World War II generation saw large numbers of Americans fight in the military and return to their communities to tell that story about that culture, he said. Now a small percentage of Americans is serving in the military and many citizens and media professionals have little or no interaction with the Armed Forces, he said.

“When an insurgent blows up a roadside bomb, he’s not just trying to kill Americans, he’s telling a story to the American people,” Calhoun said Friday in a separate interview. “He’s trying to sway American public opinion.”

The goal of military intelligence and military leaders interacting with media and the public is to show how the government’s work is helping those who need it, Calhoun said.

“The military, as a whole, has a good story to tell,” he said.