Why did US President Thomas Jefferson found West Point?

Answer 1

Thomas Jefferson was the most unlikely father of the American professional army. He was fearful of creating a standing army that might threaten the civil government, but the needs of the country demanded a well trained military officer corps. There was a need for American engineers for the military. We were depending on foreign engineers at the time. West Point would be our first engineering school. Also Jefferson was losing his battle to avoid a national military; he favored State organized militia. After the Naval War on the Barbary pirates, and seeing the potential of war with Britain in Canada, Jefferson saw that a national, professional military was unavoidable and he felt that if there was going to be a permanent military officer corps that it must be trained not as a European style elite class outside and separate from the government, but as an instrument of the republic, in a sense as a "people's army". The requirement that cadets must be approved into the corps by their congressman is an example of Jefferson's measures to make sure the military was always answerable to the civil government.

West Point, New York is the location of the US Military Academy.