Just after entering the White House, First Lady Michelle Obama
said that she and her husband never knew any people in the military
before coming to Washington. This is surprising because during the
Senate years, in a time concurrent with two active wars, the
Obama’s had ample opportunity to bring at least one military member
into their home life. Nor can it be because it is too difficult to
find and associate with members of the military in Chicago, since
it is located only 30 miles from U.S. Naval Station Great Lakes,
the largest recruiting training station in the Navy. Or perhaps
they could have met one at one of the numerous Illinois National
Guard deployment sendoffs or at a visit to Scott Air Force Base,
the base responsible for mobility, airlift, and logistical command
and control for the U.S. military and the home of both the joint
U.S. Transportation Command and the U.S. Air Force Air Mobility
Command. Constituencies are great, especially the ones you don’t
have to meet.
Spend time in virtually any place in this country,
particularly outside of urban centers, and American families will
either know someone in the military or will themselves be a part of
the military community. As a general proposition, not knowing any
military families is fine. It becomes problematic, however, when
you are a public official in charge of the military and boldly
pronounce how things should be in the Armed Services. The recent
ruling by the Federal District Court declaring Don’t Ask, Don’t
Tell unconstitutional illustrates the disconnect perfectly. The
court declared there was “no compelling government interest” to
have a policy where homosexuals can serve but must do so privately
and without telling or showing anyone.
Intellectual essayists and pundits alike all profess from
a high perch that the current military policy on homosexuality in
the military is out of date and must be changed. Any protestations
from the military merely reinforce their insulated view of the
people who make up our Armed Forces, namely that they are
uninformed and bigoted. Of course, the brain trust doesn’t
understand that the military is one of the truest
cross‐sections of America in terms of
families, hometowns, and communities, and that they are not a
they. For most, they are us. The pundits
are they — they who have not served. They are those who
don’t even consort with “military types.”
Cultural elites notwithstanding, homosexuality and its
integration into society are anything but certain right now.
Indeed, in our towns and communities, America is in the midst of a
giant cage match over homosexuality’s legal and cultural future.
There is no need to rehash the arguments for this piece, but
suffice it to say while there is an “elite” consensus there is
certainly no American consensus. Yet, policy makers want to force
homosexuality into the Armed Forces. Politicians, activist groups,
and concerned citizens casually profess that it will be “fine” and
the military must just adjust to today’s cultural reality and allow
gays to serve openly. Let’s look at what this will actually
mean for the U.S. Military.
Currently, the military holds annual training on
everything imaginable, much of which is a result of political
dustups after incidents. Such training must occur in every unit and
command worldwide and is based on an instruction that undoubtedly
took hours to produce and even more hours to be approved from layer
after layer of military and political bosses. Not surprisingly,
there is a Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell training instruction that explains
the rules as they currently exist in the services. With any major
change in the policy, unlike the minor modifications of last
spring, new training must be held and an entire command must be
shepherded into a room for the new guidance — in every command, in
every service, worldwide. So if the ban is lifted we know there
will be more training. But training on what?
One type of expected training is on homosexual lifestyle
accommodation, this, in fundamental opposition to not only standing
military guidance but also widely held cultural views. As soon as
there is a beating of an openly gay man on a ship then what must a
commander to do? Unquestionably, a commander would send the
attackers to a Courts Martial for trial under the Uniformed Code of
Military Justice. Punishment, however, will not suffice. He will
need to hold additional sensitivity training and merely telling the
crew to leave all gay crew members alone will of course not do. The
situation will inevitably demand that the Commander “educate” the
crew on homosexuality. He will have to teach them, probably with
Power Point, what homosexuality is and that it is an accepted and
equal lifestyle in the military. Further, since openness is the
official policy, he will in essence have to vigorously
defend homosexuality. Beyond an official position of lack
of tolerance for any derogatory activity towards homosexuals, he
will have to express empathy, genuine or conjured, about how
oppressed homosexuals are within the military. He will have to
request that his team embrace them and make them feel at home in
their choice regardless of what it is doing to morale or team
cohesion. Starting to see the problems?
To those who currently tolerate homosexuals but retain
their God‐given right to reject
homosexuality as a practiced lifestyle — could you do the above as
a leader? Even for your country? It is one thing for the military
to ask its members to accept homosexuals, but another for the
military to ask its members to accept and live with homosexuality,
the homosexual lifestyle. Last, it will demand a third step: senior
officers and non‐commissioned officers
will have to, under the color of Military Law, proactively endorse
and eventually foster homosexuality. You will undoubtedly lose
great leaders: men of discipline with strong values — unshakable
belief in right and wrong — the type who devote their lives to
protecting you. Many will not cave in to this political
demand.
Flash forward five years. Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell has been
lifted, and a commission has been called by Congress about why
there are not enough homosexuals in senior leadership positions.
Will there be pressure, subtle or overt, to make a homosexual in
charge of a ship? Within five years, what if there is still not a
homosexual Captain in the U.S. Navy who is in the top eleven out of
over 1,000 Navy Captains to command an Aircraft Carrier — a weapon
system of unparalleled capacity possessing the ability to
single-handedly wipe out dozens of nations at a time. Will the
political pressure on flag officer leadership force a homosexual
into command, regardless of ability? If so, will his sailors
respect and follow? The consequences are realistic and dire.
Currently a homosexual can gain such a command by merit alone, but
for the cultural crusaders who fundamentally believe gays must be
open no matter what the cost, competence is not a compelling
military interest.
Historically, the military is afforded wide latitude to
manage conditions to ensure military readiness. Ensuring that our
military can prosecute a war at full capacity and defend our nation
and its way of life is indeed the most “compelling government
interest” there is. Most Americans understand that the military
environment is necessarily different from the civilian one. They
recognize that discipline and troop morale are paramount
necessities for an effective fighting force. Increasingly, however,
policy makers don’t understand these intricacies and the unintended
consequences of their imposed will — and why should they? Like the
Obama’s, they have zero or near zero experience in or even around
the military. One thing is for certain, only the military is
capable of properly judging how morale and readiness will survive a
lifting of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.
Since we are in the middle of two wars and many leaders
are on their fifth and sixth tours with countless daily pressures
in battle, let’s not let the courts or politicians force the
military into anything. Instead we should allow the military
evaluation process to play out and let the real experts give us
their recommendation.
