By 娜塔莎·伯特兰、海莉·布里茨基
32分钟前
发布于 2026年2月13日，美国东部时间下午5:25
美国国防部部长彼得·赫格斯瑟正发起一场针对被其称为”对美军存在偏见”且”与外国对手建立不良合作关系”的学校的运动。作为该行动的一部分，军官们可能很快会发现全美数十所顶尖高校突然无法获得学费补助资格。
由于学费补助和国防部资助项目资格的不确定性，已申请或被这些学校录取的现役军人感到困惑和担忧。官员们也表示，这相当于试图从军队中清除思想多样性。
赫格斯瑟上周签署的一份备忘录中宣布了这一政策，称从2026-2027学年开始，五角大楼将终止与哈佛大学的合作关系，并停止为现役军人提供该校所有研究生层次的专业军事教育、奖学金和证书项目。
据知情人士透露，赫格斯瑟命令各军种”评估常春藤盟校及其他类似削弱批判性思维并与对手有重大关联的高校中所有现役军人的现有研究生项目，比较其与公立大学和军事硕士项目的成本效益及战略教育价值，确定是否继续资助”。
该指导意见的宽泛表述在各军种中引发混乱和担忧，他们已开始编制可能受影响的中高风险院校名单，意味着五角大楼将不再为这些学校的军人提供任何教育资助。
陆军为申请法学院的士兵编制的初步风险学校名单（经CNN审阅）将以下学校列为”中高风险”，可能面临禁令：美国大学、波士顿学院、波士顿大学、布朗大学、卡内基梅隆大学、凯斯西储大学、哥伦比亚大学、威廉玛丽学院、康奈尔大学、杜克大学、埃默里大学、佛罗里达理工学院、福特汉姆大学、乔治敦大学、乔治华盛顿大学、哈佛大学、夏威夷太平洋大学、约翰霍普金斯大学、伦敦政治经济学院、麻省理工学院、东北大学、西北大学、纽约大学、佩珀代因大学、普林斯顿大学、斯坦福大学、塔夫茨大学、迈阿密大学、宾夕法尼亚大学、南加州大学、范德堡大学、维克森林大学、圣路易斯华盛顿大学和耶鲁大学。
熟悉赫格斯瑟指导意见的消息人士告诉CNN，这意味着”最优秀军官和士官的研究生项目几乎肯定会受到影响”。该消息人士和一位军方官员补充称，这在各军种中造成了极大不确定性，尤其是在申请高级民用教育（包括顶尖法学院、医学院和核工程项目）时。
美国国防部发言人未直接回应CNN的置评请求，而是将问题转介给各军种。陆军也未回应置评请求。
五角大楼的几位高级政治任命官员，包括赫格斯瑟本人，均毕业于常春藤盟校或其他顶尖大学。赫格斯瑟毕业于普林斯顿和哈佛大学；国防部副部长史蒂夫·范伯格毕业于普林斯顿大学；陆军部长丹·德里斯科尔从耶鲁大学获得法学学位；海军部长约翰·费伦拥有哈佛商学院MBA学位，并在伦敦政治经济学院完成了经济学与国际关系综合课程。
这一指导意见最早于上周赫格斯瑟在社交媒体发布的视频中公开提及，他抨击哈佛大学和其他美国大学存在”普遍的机构偏见”，称它们”不再符合其作为言论自由、开放探究和美国价值观堡垒的创始原则”。
“两周内，我们所有部门——陆军、海军和空军——将评估常春藤盟校及其他民用大学的现役军人研究生项目。”赫格斯瑟在视频中说。
教育项目和机会是军队招募和保留人才的关键工具，通常以服役年限换取学费补助。研究生项目被认为是提升美军人员学术能力的重要途径，既能培养军中精英，也为他们退伍后的职业发展奠定基础。
符合资格的院校通常由相关专业协会认证。例如，美国律师协会认证的法学院通常会被陆军列为支付学费的对象。武装部队健康职业奖学金计划为医科、牙科、护理和心理学学生提供学费补助，作为每年服役的回报。军医项目通常要求学校获得美国医学协会或美国骨科医师协会的认证。
该备忘录的模糊表述还引发了对学费补助可能受影响的担忧，现役军人可利用业余时间参加与日常工作无关的研究生或证书项目，如工商管理或市场营销课程。
但军方与多所大学有着广泛合作，例如太空部队2023年宣布与约翰霍普金斯大学合作，而该校已被陆军列入风险院校名单。
军方官员表示，该指导意见相当于禁止军官接受顶级教育，称这是五角大楼”试图从军队中清除智力、思想多样性和批判性思维”。
知情人士表示：”我们希望军官和士官能够批判性思考并挑战固有观念——无论你是否同意自由派或保守派观点，这些机构都是进行此类教育的理想场所。这种做法既小心翼翼（通过措辞制造恐慌，阻止人们参与讨论），又目光短浅，引发了广泛困惑。”
自去年上任以来，赫格斯瑟一直专注于重塑军队文化，包括将国防部更名为”战争部”、禁止跨性别者服役、评估女性是否应参与战斗岗位等重大政策转变。
去年，他还签署备忘录命令所有军事学院识别并移除图书馆中涉及种族、性别意识形态和其他”分裂性概念”的书籍，这些内容被认为”与国防部核心使命不符”。
赫格斯瑟对哈佛大学及其他顶尖大学的最新”战争”，与唐纳德·特朗普总统去年发起的类似行动形成呼应——后者威胁削减联邦资金、研究经费和学生签证，除非这些精英大学解散多元化、公平与包容项目，打击校园亲巴勒斯坦学生抗议和反犹主义。
Pentagon may bar tuition aid for top universities in Hegseth’s crackdown on ‘biased’ schools
By Natasha Bertrand, Haley Britzky
32 min ago
PUBLISHED Feb 13, 2026, 5:25 PM ET
Military officers could soon find dozens of top colleges and universities across the United States abruptly off limits for tuition assistance as part of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s campaign against schools he describes as being biased against the US military and sponsoring “troublesome partnerships with foreign adversaries.”
The uncertainty about tuition assistance and eligible programs for Defense Department funding has led to confusion and concern amongst service members who have already applied or been accepted to these schools. Officials also said they were concerned it amounted to an attempt to purge diversity of thought from the military.
The policy was rolled out in a memo signed by Hegseth last week saying that beginning with the 2026-2027 school year, the Pentagon would be severing its relationship with Harvard University and discontinuing all graduate-level professional military education, fellowships and certificate programs there for active-duty service members.
Hegseth ordered the military services to “evaluate all existing graduate programs for active-duty members at Ivy League universities and any other universities that similarly diminish critical thinking and have significant adversary involvement, and determine whether they deliver cost-effective, strategic education for future senior leaders when compared to public universities and military masters programs,” according to a source familiar with the memo.
The guidance’s broad terminology has injected confusion and concern into the military branches, who have begun to compile lists of colleges and universities that may have a moderate to high risk of being impacted, meaning the Pentagon wouldn’t fund any service members’ higher education there.
A preliminary list of at-risk schools compiled by the Army for troops enrolling in law school and reviewed by CNN characterizes the following schools as being at “moderate to high risk” of being banned: American University, Boston College, Boston University, Brown University, Carnegie Mellon, Case Western University, Columbia University, College of William and Mary, Cornell University, Duke, Emory, Florida Institute of Technology, Fordham, Georgetown, George Washington University, Harvard, Hawaii Pacific University, Johns Hopkins University, the London School of Economics and Political Science, MIT, Northeastern University, Northwestern University, New York University, Pepperdine, Princeton, Stanford, Tufts, University of Miami, University of Pennsylvania, University of Southern California, Vanderbilt, Wake Forest, Washington University in St Louis, and Yale.
A source familiar with Hegseth’s guidance told CNN that the implication is that “graduate programs for highest performing officers and non-commissioned officers are almost certainly at risk.” This source and a military official added that it has created extensive uncertainty within the services about how to proceed with applying for advanced civil schooling, including top law programs, medical programs, and nuclear engineering programs.
The Office of the Secretary of Defense referred CNN to the services for comment. The Army did not respond to a request for comment.
Several top political appointees at the Pentagon, including Hegseth himself, are graduates of Ivy League schools or other top universities. Hegseth attended Princeton and Harvard; Deputy Defense Secretary Steve Feinberg attended Princeton; Army Secretary Dan Driscoll obtained his law degree from Yale; Navy Secretary John Phelan holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and completed a general course degree in economics and international relations at the London School of Economics
The guidance was first mentioned publicly in a video Hegseth posted on social media last week, in which he bashed Harvard and other American universities that have “pervasive institutional bias” saying they “no longer live up to their founding principles, as bastions of free speech, open inquiry, and committed to the American values that make our country great.”
“In two weeks time, components of all of our departments — Army, Navy, and Air Force — will evaluate all existing graduate programs for active duty service members at all Ivy League universities, and other civilian universities,” Hegseth said.
Educational programs and opportunities are a key recruiting and retention tool for the military services, often exchanging mandatory years in uniform for tuition assistance to top schools in the country. Graduate programs have been lauded as a way to academically sharpen US military personnel, keeping the best and brightest in uniform, while also allowing them to invest in their futures after they’ve left military service.
Eligible schools are often those accredited by the major associations for those specialties. For qualifying service members who wish to go to law school, for example, schools are typically considered eligible for the Army to pay for them if they are accredited by the American Bar Association. The Armed Forces Health Professions Scholarship Program covers tuition for medical, dental, nursing, and psychology students in return for one year of active-duty service for each year of support. For medical programs, the military typically requires that the school is accredited by the American Medical Association or American Osteopathic Association.
The vagueness of the memo has also raised concern that tuition assistance could be impacted, which active-duty service members can use for other graduate or certification programs in their off-duty time that are not necessarily related to their day-to-day jobs. Service members can enroll in business administration courses, for example, or communication and marketing.
But the military also has extensive partnerships with various universities and colleges for professional military education opportunities. The Space Force, for example, announced in 2023 a partnership with Johns Hopkins, which was included on the Army’s tentative list of universities that are considered at risk.
The military official said the guidance was akin to prohibiting officers from obtaining a top tier education, and said it amounted to the Pentagon “attempting to purge intellect, diversity of thinking, and critical thought from the military.”
“The overall concern is that we want military officers and non-commissioned officers to have the ability to critically think and challenge ideas … and some of these institutions are great places to do that whether you agree with liberal or conservative thought or not,” said the source familiar with the matter. “It seems both very delicate — oh these words and ideas scare me, so I’ll preclude people from engaging — but also short-sighted and is generating confusion.”
Hegseth has been intensely focused on reshaping the culture of the military since taking office last year, which has involved everything from adding a secondary title for the Department of Defense as the “Department of War” to policy shifts that have deeply impacted servicemembers, like a ban on transgender troops and an evaluation of whether women should service in combat roles.
Last year, he also ordered all military academies to identify and remove books from their libraries that deal with issues such as race, gender ideology, and other “divisive concepts” that are now considered “incompatible with the department’s core mission,” according to a memo he signed at the time.
Hegseth’s latest war on Harvard and other top universities has also mirrored one waged by President Donald Trump, who over the last year has targeted federal funding, research grants, and student visas at elite universities across the country — beginning with Harvard— unless they comply with his demands to dismantle Diversity, Equity and Inclusion programs and crackdown on pro-Palestine student protesters and antisemitism on campuses.
