So how does a father make military decisions that may directly put his son in harm’s way? For that matter, how can a father send his son to war, as McCain’s grandfather did with his son, who served in World War II, and as McCain’s father did with John, who volunteered to fight in Vietnam? The question is more relevant now, as McCain continues to support the war in Iraq while one son—and perhaps eventually both—face deployment there. “It’s very difficult,” McCain says, “but at the same time, those antecedents of mine were sending other people’s sons into war, so they never let it affect their decisions. I’m sure it affected their emotions. But I’m also sure it never affected their decision-making process. As for me, I would worry and pray just like my father did, but I would know there is no other course of action. It’s patently unfair to say ‘I’ll send other people’s sons and daughters into harm’s way, but not my own.’ It’s fraught with emotion, but at the end of the day, you have to do what’s right and best for everyone’s sons and daughters, not just your own.”
There have been other families of prominence in the United States military: Arthur MacArthur and his son Douglas, and the Nimitzes, who had more than one generation in the Navy. But few American families, if any, have established such an unbroken chain of tradition as the McCains. However, such an august legacy can be crushing too. McCain went through what Swindle calls “his period of rebel-without-a-cause, where everything is thought of in an irreverent fashion. Military life wears heavily on families. Still, always in the background, there is, This is who you are. You are a McCain.”
McCain himself admits it all. “I felt pressure to succeed, and I was combative, rebellious, and unruly.” (To this day, McCain believes he ranks among the top 10 graduates with the most demerits in the history of the academy.) “I had this inner resistance to following in the footsteps of my father and my grandfather, because it seemed to be too laid out for me. I’m sure some analyst would have a field day explaining the behavior at the Naval Academy.” Or maybe it was as simple as this: Growing up, McCain always wanted to attend Princeton University, not the Naval Academy. “His dream was to go to Princeton,” Cindy McCain says, “and that was never an issue. That was never something he was even allowed to focus on, because he was never going to go anywhere but the Naval Academy.”
Eventually, of course, McCain graduated, married his first wife, Carol, had his first daughter, Sidney, and adopted Carol’s two sons from a previous marriage, Doug and Andy. He chose to become a fighter pilot to differentiate himself from his father, who was a submarine commander, and his grandfather, who was a carrier commander. But if McCain’s life track was to become an admiral, all of those expectations were dashed when he was shot down. When he returned from Vietnam, he could no longer pass his flight physical because of the substantial injuries he had sustained (after he was shot down and broke both arms, he would never again be able to raise his arms above his shoulders), which meant he could no longer fly. This essentially precluded him from any advancement to the top ranks of the Navy.
So the Navy made him its liaison to the United States Senate. His marriage to Carol eventually unraveled, and he married Cindy Hensley in Phoenix in 1980. He retired from the Navy a year later with the rank of captain. “I don’t know that John’s becoming an admiral was even spoken about, but I think it was expected,” Cindy McCain says. “When he retired from the Navy as a captain, there was a kind of unspoken gasp from his family. They couldn’t believe it.”
As he had his own family with Cindy—besides their two sons, they have two daughters, Meghan and Bridget—McCain took his unrequited military ambition and channeled it into political aspirations. If he could not be an admiral, he could be a congressman (which he became in 1982) or a senator (which he became in 1986) or perhaps even president. In his own way, then, McCain has taken the relentless drive of his family and raised it to an even higher level. If he felt pressure following in the footsteps of his father and his grandfather, you can only imagine how his sons must feel.
“They are quite big footsteps to fill,” Cindy McCain says. From their actions so far, however, her sons are willing to try. “When Jack applied to the Naval Academy, it was the only school he applied to. In this day and age, that is unheard of. But it was the only place he wanted to go.”
