Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Other Militaries & DADT

The “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” policy has been reversed by Congress, thus fulfilling what the president thinks is absolutely necessary in order to have a properly engineered military sex-wise or gender-wise or preference-wise or something-in-between-wise, never mind the advice by the top field commanders as well as a huge segment of actual combat personnel that this is a bad idea.

One of the prime reasons given for this change is that the countries of Olde Europe have long since recognized the need to similarly reconfigure their militaries and done the “right” thing. In and of itself, this is contrary to a sensible argument in that this country is also following the lead of Olde Europe in most everything else even as Olde Europe is desperately trying on its slippery slope to rescue itself from the things this country is emulating, such as health-care.

There are countries of significant military capabilities (and threat) that desire no part of homosexuals in the military. This is from the BBC of 13 March 2003: Russia is to introduce new regulations which will ban homosexuals, drug addicts and alcoholics from serving in the armed forces. The new rules - published in the official Rossiyskaya Gazeta - say people "who have problems with their identity and sexual preferences" can only be drafted during war times. The ban - taking effect on 1 July - also extends to those who regularly use illegal drugs and alcohol. Officials say the changes are aimed at tightening health requirements for conscripts - even though they come at a time when the Russian military is believed to be struggling to fill its ranks.

This is from the Atlantic Council of the United States in an article of September 2006 by Colonel Jeffrey Holachek: According to Russian MoD statistics, since 2002 the reported number of newly registered HIV-positive service members has begun to decrease steadily. It would appear that the Russian military was plagued by homosexually transmitted AIDS, decided to correct the problem in the most effective way (banning homosexuals from service) with the results being obvious. This should have been a lesson for the U.S. Congress, but it is a lesson too late for the learning.

This is from the Palm Center, a research organization, of May 2002: Military officials said that the policy governing gay soldiers in Taiwan does not refer specifically to homosexuality but to "sexual orientation impairment," which traditionally has been interpreted to include homosexuals. In 1994, the defense ministry stopped treating homosexuality as an illness, but that same year, the military agreed to exempt men from conscription if psychiatrists concluded they were homosexual, according to a China Post report. This speaks for itself and involves a country in which military readiness is of tremendous importance, especially in light of China’s constant threat to take it over.

This is from Pink News…Europe’s largest Gay News Service of 17 November 2008: The government of South Korea has asked the constitutional court to confirm the ban on gays serving in the country’s Armed Forces. Servicemen face a year in jail for homosexual acts. In August a military court asked for a review of the constitutionality of the ban. “The military has a unique characteristics,” a defence ministry spokesman told AFP. “It has to maintain good combat capability. It requires a sound group life. It works for the public interest rather than personal happiness.” In other words, South Korea, in a constant state of threat from the North, as recently exhibited graphically in the media with the North’s bombardment of South Korean territory and sinking of a South Korean Navy vessel, intends for no social engineering to disrupt its military readiness and capability.

In the recent DADT hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee, the matters of military readiness and unit cohesion, especially during a time of combat such as in Iraq and Afghanistan, top field commanders (general officers) in the Army, Air Force and Marines insisted that DADT should not be disturbed. The Congress hasn’t listened to them but has listened to Defense Secretary Gates and Joint Chiefs Chairman Admiral Mullen, who serve at the pleasure of the president and likely wouldn’t be in their positions if they disagreed with him. Gates will be gone in January, so would never have had to wrestle with the inevitable problems perpetrated by the Congressional mindlessness.

A handful of homosexuals are in the military but remain there because they do not exhibit it. What they do in private and away from duty is their business. Others get drunk, some visit prostitutes…nothing new about that. The notion that homosexuals are forced to lie, a premier argument of the homosexuals, has no weight because they are not asked, in the first place. The objective of the militant homosexual groups is the approval of their behavior as normal, something so off-the-wall as to be ridiculous. They know this, so they do the next best thing, which is to flaunt it, a sort of in-your-face approach, something akin to spite or revenge. The water will hit the wheel when the first service-member-homosexuals show up in the lurid “Gay Pride Parades,” with the proper insignia, making sure that every onlooker understands them to be an example of the military, when nothing could be farther from the truth.

This piece has remarked the problem with respect to health reasons. One can only wonder what the outcome will be socially when the homosexuals flaunt their condition…and that will happen.

And so it goes.
Jim Clark

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