The commander of a guided missile cruiser will become the Naval Academy's second in command next month in a move that keeps the school in the hands of academy-trained Navy officers for at least another year.
Capt. Gary Roughead, 45, was endorsed as commandant of midshipmen by Adm. Charles R. Larson, the academy's superintendent, who will retire next year and has told aides that he intends to hand-pick the school's next leaders. Roughead was Larson's executive assistant when the admiral was chief of the U.S. Pacific Command in Hawaii from 1991 to 1994.
Larson said he was looking forward to Roughead's arrival, but the appointment prompted grumbling from an influential retired Marine general who said the Marines should have more top appointments at the academy.
"There has to be an understanding that the Marine Corps wants to be a major player in the development of young naval officers," said Thomas V. Draude, a retired Marine brigadier general and close friend of the Marine Corps commandant, Gen. Charles C. Krulak.
"I hope there is not a signal sent that the Marines' desire is being ignored or thwarted."
Roughead, a 1973 academy graduate, will replace Capt. William T. R. "Randy" Bogle, a charismatic helicopter pilot. Larson brought in Bogle in August 1994 to inspire the brigade after several scandals.
Bogle curtailed midshipmen's privileges within months of his arrival. The goal was to foster "leadership by presence" among the senior midshipmen by keeping them on campus to teach younger students. Through a mix of military machismo and individual attention, Bogle managed to sell the unpopular moves to the brigade.
"We talk about leading from the front," Bogle, a 1968 academy graduate, said during a May interview. "You need to be able to show people where they need to go."
The commandant of midshipman -- the equivalent of a civilian university's dean of students -- is considered a prestigious Navy position with daily responsibility for 4,000 officers-in-training. It is also a coveted steppingstone; Adm. Joseph W. Prueher, commandant in the late 1980s, is now chief of U.S. forces in the Pacific.
But in endorsing a commandant from the Navy, Larson has put off a Marine Corps request for more influence.
One of every four naval officers is a Marine.
