Serving Our Country

March 15, 2007

There are currently some 65,000 gay and lesbian Americans serving in the U.S. Armed Forces, many of them deployed in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan. As they fight and die for their country, they were told this week by the nation's highest-ranking military officer, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Peter Pace, that their relationships are immoral, the intolerable equivalent of adultery. These remarks, clearly out of step with American public opinion, were cheered from the usual quarters. Cultural right leader Senator Sam Brownback (R-KS) issued a statement "applauding" Pace "for maintaining a personal commitment to moral principles." But it also prompted outrage from Americans who understand that this outdated “Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy does not reflect our values or enhance our security. Take action to repeal the ban here.

Gay servicemen and women have no impact on unit cohesion. The idea "that straight soldiers dislike gays so much that unit cohesion would suffer if known gays were allowed to serve" is crumbling. A December 2006 Zogby poll of U.S. soldiers found that nearly three in four troops (73 percent) say “they are personally comfortable in the presence of gays and lesbians.” A 2004 poll found a majority of junior enlisted servicemembers believe gays and lesbians should be allowed to serve openly in the military, up from 16 percent in 1992. "Last year I held a number of meetings with gay soldiers and marines," former Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. John Shalikashvili wrote in a recent New York Times op-ed. "These conversations showed me just how much the military has changed, and that gays and lesbians can be accepted by their peers." Shalikashvili noted that 24 foreign nations, "including Israel, Britain and other allies in the fight against terrorism, let gays serve openly, with none reporting morale or recruitment problems."
Many of the 2008 presidential candidates have been absent from this debate. Senator John McCain (R-AZ) and former Governor Mitt Romney (R-MA), who are aggressively courting the cultural right, have reaffirmed their support for banning openly gay Americans from military service. Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani has shifted right from his previous statements, saying yesterday, "We're at war and now isn't the time to question our military's admissions policy." Even Senators Hillary Clinton (D-NY) and Barack Obama (D-IL), who both oppose "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" and have otherwise taken strong stands on gay rights issues, refused at first to say that they disagreed that homosexuality is "immoral." Thankfully, both senators later told reporters that they disagree with Pace's claim. For his part, former Senator John Edwards (D-NC) said, "I don't share that view," when asked about Pace's comments. But perhaps the most powerful statement came from Senator John Warner (R-VA), a respected leader on military issues and former Armed Services Committee chairman, who said he "respectfully but strongly" disagrees that homosexuality is immoral.
The United States has a long history of gay and lesbian heroes in the military. In his op-ed, former Senator Alan Simpson (R-WY) noted the contributions of British mathematician Alan Turing, who "led the effort to crack the Nazis’ communication code" during World War II. "He mastered the complex German enciphering machine, helping to save the world, and his work laid the basis for modern computer science," Simpson wrote. "Does it matter that Turing was gay? ... Would Pace call Turing 'immoral'?" In fact, "plenty of people did call Turing ‘immoral’ at the time, and he killed himself with a cyanide apple a year after being convicted of ‘gross indecency’ after it was discovered he was in a homosexual relationship. Following that conviction he was ordered to undergo hormone therapy or go to prison.” Retired Marine Staff Sargeant Eric Alva, a gay man and the first American soldier to be seriously wounded in Iraq, said, "This policy -- and General Pace’s bigotry -- is outdated, unnecessary and counter to the same American values our soldiers are giving their lives for each and every day.”