The Vice President Kamala Harris was the first woman to give a commencement address at West Point. She praised the graduating cadets for their sacrifice in serving the country but also noted that they were entering an “unsettled” world because of Russian aggression as well as the growing threats from China.
Harris said that the world had changed dramatically. She addressed 950 graduating Cadets. She spoke of the pandemic which claimed millions of lives, and the tumultuous shifts in the world politics in Europe and Asia.
She said: “It’s clear that you are graduating into a world of increasing instability, where long-standing values are at risk.”
The vice president condemned Russia’s invasion in Ukraine, which was the first major ground conflict in Europe since World War II, as the U.S. ended its longest war in Afghanistan’s history.
She warned cadets that China is rapidly modernizing its military, and flexing its muscles to control parts of the high-seas. This was ostensibly in reference to the brewing dispute over the South China Sea.
Harris did not mention the skirmishes that are taking place in Washington between the White House, the Republican Congress and the White House to try to avoid a debt crisis.
Harris made the comment in her speech at an institution which has been slow to diversify its ranks over the past four decades, since the first female cadet class graduated.
Approximately one-quarter of students are now women. Fewer than a dozen Black women graduate each year, including Harris. However, the number is increasing. Women were admitted to the academy in 1976, and its first female graduate was in 1980.
