"complaints of widespread proselytizing..."

One more for the "And they say there's no cultural war" files.

Proselytizing is a crime? Only in an atheist theocracy (is "atheocracy" a word?).

Rank hath its privileges and also its drawbacks.

Preaching to the lower ranks should be a shooting offense.

Even a Christian ought to be able to figure out why.

The military academies, believing there to be no atheists in foxholes, have had a tradition of encouraging religious observance since forever. Evangelization by fellow cadets should not be an issue, as you do not surrender your First Amendment rights when you enter the Academy.

The Jewish graduates of all 3 academies of my acquaintance, including my father(USMA '49), experienced minor anti-semitism but nothing worse than they had seen elsewhere. Certain hatreds are facts of life. And certainly no one insisted that they become Christian in order to advance or get better duty or whatever. My cousin, Avi, who was Jewish chaplain at West Point for 20 years, told me that he never had a cadet complain to him about untoward behavior from non-Jewish classmates or faculty, and that he was never treated with anything other than the highest of respect and cooperation.

The use of one's rank to enforce religious conformity should of course be court martialable.

Bart's comment is quite consistent with my own Marine Corps experience. The AF Acadamy story is simply not credible. We had a lot of rather devout chaps at Quantico, but they never went out of line. My contact with AF types would make me expect them to less so--pilots, don't you know?