Obama Salutes Devotion to Duty
at Coast Guard Commencement
(May 21, 2011) |
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|  WASHINGTON,
May 18, 2011 – The smallest U.S. military service has vast
responsibilities in protecting thousands of miles of coast,
securing hundreds of ports and patrolling millions of miles
of ocean, President Barack Obama said today.
The
president addressed 228 graduating cadets and 1,500 military
personnel and their families during a commencement speech at
the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in New London, Conn.
Obama praised the cadets' commitment and dedication to
service.
“I've seen your devotion to duty all along
the Gulf Coast when the Coast Guard, including members of
this class, worked day and night tirelessly as you led the
largest environmental cleanup in our nation's history,” the
president said.
“In you we see the same spirit that
has made your service ‘always ready' for more than two
centuries, invoking the English translation of the Coast
Guard's Latin motto, “Semper Paratus.”
“In you we see
the readiness that has made the Coast Guard one of our
nation's first responders, leading the evacuation of Lower
Manhattan on 9/11 and often being the very first Americans
on the scene, from the earthquake in Haiti to the oil spill
in the Gulf,” Obama said.
Coast Guardsmen pulled
stranded Americans from the rooftops during Hurricane
Katrina, the president added, saved desperate migrants
clinging to rafts in the Caribbean and even today rescue
Americans from the surging Mississippi River.
The
Coast Guard Academy, founded in 1876, is the smallest of
five federal service academies, with 1,030 cadets enrolled.
Like the other academies, it is highly selective and charges
no tuition. The academy's curriculum emphasizes leadership,
physical fitness and professional development.
With
the impending retirement of the academy's superintendent,
Coast Guard Rear Adm. J. Scott Burhoe, Obama noted that the
incoming superintendent, Coast Guard Rear Adm. Sandra L.
Stosz, “will become the first woman to lead one of our
nation's military academies.”
This is a tribute to
the admiral, the president said, but also “to the
opportunities that the Coast Guard affords women of talent
and commitment, including the class of 2011, which has one
of the largest numbers of women cadets in the history of
this academy.”
He commended the class of 2011 on
earning the highest grade-point average of any class in the
academy's history and noted the academy's acceptance of a
range of international applicants.
“This academy
welcomes cadets from all over the world, including two
dedicated young men in your class from the Marshall Islands
and Romania,” he said. Obama also acknowledged President
Jurelang Zedkaia of the Marshall Islands and King George
Tupou from Tonga, who were in the audience.
“They are
two of America's closest partners among the Pacific island
nations,” Obama said. “Their citizens serve bravely
alongside our forces, including in Afghanistan, and we are
very, very grateful.”
Obama told the cadets that the
nation, for its “enormous investment” in transforming them
into leaders, has great expectations.
“Here at home,
we need you to stop those smugglers and protect our oceans
and prevent terrorists from slipping deadly weapons into our
ports,” he said.
In congratulating the Class of 2011,
Obama told the cadets that if they stay true to the
academy's lessons, he is confident that “future historians
will look back on this moment and say that when we faced the
tests of our time, ... we passed our country, safer and
stronger, to the next generation.” | |
By Cheryl Pellerin
American Forces Press Service
Copyright 2011
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