The Democratic Party is held hostage by its liberal base and desperately needs to repeal DADT to placate them before the new Congress convenes in January.
How else could the Democrats ignore the conclusion of a Pentagon report that indicates that almost 40% of combat Marines (and 25% of combat Army) may leave the armed forces if Congress overturns the don’t ask, don’t tell policy — and then only seven days later — have all of its Senate Democrats (with the one exception of Senator Manchin of West Virginia) vote in support of overturning that policy.
In a recent interview on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart, former Chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff General Hugh Shelton expressed his concern that overturning DADT would “break the infantry elements” of our armed forces.
With their recent failure to get cloture of debate and an up-or-down vote on overturning DADT, and their announced intention to bring DADT back up for a vote as a standalone bill during the remaining days of the lame duck session, Senate Democrats not only ignored the implications of the Pentagon’s own survey data about combat troops leaving the service, they also blithely ignored the testimony of the chiefs of the Army, Air Force, and Marines that overturning DADT would threaten military effectiveness and the disruption of combat operations in a time of war.
Liberals seem to forget that the United States since 1973 has an all volunteer force. And while Congress can almost certainly prevent personnel from leaving the service immediately, it cannot coerce people to stay in the military beyond their service commitment and Congress cannot at present coerce people to join the military.
Whether or not the Democrats agree with the beliefs and attitudes of significant numbers of Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine and Special Forces – massive numbers of whom have signaled that they might leave military service if homosexuals are permitted to serve openly among them, the Democratic Party cannot legislatively reset the beliefs and attitudes of these servicemen with a vote.
Instead, these military personnel, mostly in combat arms, will simply vote with their feet and leave the service as they have indicated they will in the Pentagon survey. It’s a voluntary force: would the Democrats prefer to reimpose the draft?
And those groups from which the military generally draws large numbers of new recruits every year are almost certainly not going to provide as many new members of the military forces as they have in the past.
Consider the impact these departures could have on the Marines. As of October 31, 2010, there are 202,779 Marines. If up to 40% of this number decided to leave the Marine Corps in the near term as a result of the Congress overturning DADT, it would mean a loss of 81,111 Marines, many of whom are experienced combat veterans.
The Marine Corps only recruited 28,000 new Marines last year, and thus would be required to almost triple its annual recruitment goal just to stay at its current strength.
The comparable numbers for the Army are 569,186 as of October 31, 2010. If up to 25% left the service, it would mean a loss of 142,296 Army personnel, in a service that recruited 74,577 last year. The Army would have to double its recruitment goal to stay at current strength.
The Pentagon survey reveals that it’s not just the liberal Democratic Party that has strong beliefs and attitudes about the world. The problem for America is that the imposition of the Democratic Party’s beliefs and attitudes about the world points to an unremitting hollowing out of our military and an America dangerously undefended.
And if the hollowing out of the military begins to manifest itself in earnest after an overturning of DADT, the Democratic Party, and the country, may be faced with only one effective answer to maintain effective numbers of military personnel: the resumption of the military draft.
Coercion is always the answer of a political class that can’t admit it’s wrong.
http://bigpeace.com/pschweizer/2010/12/14/dadt-will-open-gays-in-the-military-bring-back-the-draft/
