War College probes Walsh plagiarism claim

The U.S. Army War College said Thursday that it would investigate plagiarism allegations against Sen. John Walsh (D-Mont.), according to NBC Montana.

The college said in a statement to media outlets that it had been informed Wednesday night about the plagiarism claims against Walsh and looked into convening an academic review board (ARB).

“We decided today to convene an ARB, and have communicated that to Sen. Walsh who will have the opportunity to submit material for the board’s consideration,” Army War College spokeswoman Carol Kerr said in the statement.  

{mosads}The board will conduct a legal review of the matter, she added, which will then be reviewed by the dean, who can recommend whether to disenroll the student or revoke his or her graduation status. The deputy commandant makes the decision. 

“We hold our students responsible for academic integrity. Then and now, we trust them to uphold high standards of academic integrity unless there is reason to believe otherwise,” Kerr said.  

The decision by the college to investigate the claims further came a day after The New York Times reported Walsh had plagiarized parts of his master’s thesis before he graduated from the college in 2007.

Walsh told The Associated Press that he had post-traumatic stress disorder at the time, which he had developed while serving in Iraq. 

The original report said Walsh had copied sections verbatim from a paper from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a 2009 book called The Case for Democracy: The Power of Freedom to Overcome Tyranny and Terror and a paper from a Harvard research institute. 

Walsh was appointed to his Senate seat in February after former Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) resigned to become the U.S. ambassador to China.

He faces Rep. Steve Daines (R-Mont.) in his election bid this November.