CORRUPTION VS. COHESION:

Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Don’t Change (MERRILL A. McPEAK, 3/05/10, NY Times)

I was one of the service chiefs when the “don’t ask, don’t tell” compromise was reached in 1993. Until then, every person coming into the military was asked questions directed at establishing sexual orientation, and admitted homosexuals were automatically rejected. Thus the “don’t ask” part of the rule actually means gays no longer have to lie.

In return, the services insisted that homosexuals serving in uniform stay closeted. No doubt this is what bothers Admiral Mullen, as it obliges homosexuals to “live a lie,” if not actually tell one. But this part of the formula was not about individuals. It aimed to protect the institutional integrity of the services, which have no higher responsibility than to organize, train and equip formations that are effective on the battlefield. Seventeen years ago, the chiefs — all four of us, plus the chairman and vice chairman — concluded that allowing open homosexuality in the ranks would probably damage the cohesiveness of our combat units. [...]

Armies have to care about what succeeds in war. Sometimes they win or lose because of material factors, because one side has the greater numbers or better equipment. But armies are sure to lose if they pay no attention to the ideas that succeed in battle. Unit cohesion is one such idea. We know, or ought to, that warriors are inspired by male bonding, by comradeship, by the knowledge that they survive only through relying on each other. To undermine cohesion is to endanger everyone.

I know some will see these ingredients of the military lifestyle as a sort of absurd, tough-guy game played by overgrown boys. But to prepare warriors for a life of hardship, the military must remain a kind of adventure, apart from the civilian world and full of strange customs. To be a fighter pilot or a paratrooper or a submariner is to join a self-contained, resolutely idealistic society, largely unnoticed and surprisingly uncorrupted by the world at large.

I do not see how permitting open homosexuality in these communities enhances their prospects of success in battle. Indeed, I believe repealing “don’t ask, don’t tell” will weaken the warrior culture at a time when we have a fight on our hands.