Woke policies in the military are worse than politicization
[Note by Gene Kizer, Jr. - Our military used to be the greatest colorblind meritocracy in the history of the world but increasing numbers of articles in publications like Military Times and Army Times are warning that politics and Wokeness are seriously degrading our military. The current recruiting crisis is an obvious result and the only solutions being offered are recruiting gimmicks like ribbons, and drastically lowering standards.
In an article entitled "Politicization contributing to Americans' low trust in the military," Military Times Pentagon bureau chief Meghann Myers writes that 62% of the respondents to the 2021 Reagan National Defense Survey believe the reason for decreased confidence in the U.S. military is because of "Military Leadership Becoming Overly Politicized."1
Elizabeth Warren's naming commission is a perfect example of politicization and Wokeness hurting our military. Its mandate, to change or destroy all DOD assets that pay tribute to Southern valor, includes the barbaric act of demolishing the 109 year old, internationally acclaimed Confederate monument to the reconciliation of North and South in Arlington National Cemetery.
That monument was sculpted in Rome, Italy and is the grave marker for its Jewish creator, Moses Jacob Ezekiel, who was a VMI Confederate soldier and is buried, with two other Confederate soldiers and one Confederate sailor, around its base.
There are over 500 other graves of Confederate military personnel with some family arranged beautifully as befitting our nation's most sacred burial ground, in concentric circles emanating out from the monument.
The monument itself was the brainchild of Union soldier and president, William McKinley, after Southerners fought alongside Northerners in the Spanish American war.
McKinley said:
. . . every soldier's grave made during our unfortunate civil war is a tribute to American valor . . . And the time has now come . . . when in the spirit of fraternity we should share in the care of the graves of the Confederate soldiers . . . The cordial feeling now happily existing between the North and South prompts this gracious act and if it needed further justification it is found in the gallant loyalty to the Union and the flag so conspicuously shown in this year just passed by the sons and grandsons of those heroic dead.
President William Howard Taft gave a rousing speech at the UDC ceremony the evening the cornerstone was laid.
President Theodore Roosevelt sent the first floral arrangement "beginning a tradition continued by nearly every U.S. president" including Barack Obama.
President Woodrow Wilson gave the dedication address June 4, 1914, and veterans, North and South, spoke lovingly about the reconciliation of our country.
But the political naming commission has slated this magnificent work of art for demolition and Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, has signed off on it.
This kind of extreme divisiveness is causing permanent damage to our military and country.
How can it not?
Over 44% of the United States military is recruited in the South, where military service is revered.2
Oceans of Southern blood have been spilled for our great country but thanks to Elizabeth Warren and Republicans led by Jim Inhofe on the Senate Armed Services Committee when they had control, Southerners must now accept insult and disrespect to their ancestors and the South, or they are persona non grata in the U.S. military.
It is a sick, unhealthy situation because Southerners such as Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, Nathan Bedford Forrest and Raphael Semmes are among the greatest, most honorable warriors in the history of the world yet are also persona non grata in the Woke military. West Point removing its many tributes to Robert E. Lee makes clear its commitment to Wokeness, not military values. The naming commission's recommendations to remove Lee from West Point degrade and dishonor West Point.
This is unprecedented divisiveness that has no benefit whatsoever except to allow a characterless, ignorant individual like Elizabeth Warren to pretend she has "superior" virtue.
Mike Pompeo, former secretary of state under President Trump, talks about Woke policies in the military that force service personnel to accept that America is horribly racist, but the same applies to Southerners who now go from revering military service because their ancestors were great American warriors, to being forced to accept the lie that their ancestors were vile traitors:
'How can we ask young men and women who have decided to risk their lives for America, even die for America, to affirm that our country is inherently racist?' . . . 'How can we ask them to view their brothers and sisters in arms through the narrow prisms of race or gender? The clear and obvious answer is that we cannot - not without putting their lives at risk on the battlefield. A woke military is a weak military.'3
Pompeo also said in a Fox New article last summer:
Under the Biden administration, warfighting doctrines are being replaced - even at the training level - with doctrines of diversity, equity and inclusion.4
In fairness to the naming commission, it came about because of Warren's legislation. It did not organically arise.
But the naming commission is 100% Woke and political. Its standards of history are not scholarly, peer-reviewed, openly debated history. They are Presentist and based on the goofy leftist cultural standards of today. That is not how you understand the truths of history. That is how you insert filthy politics into history and the military, and use the military for leftist political advantage.
There is not a single thing in the naming commission's final report to Congress that can not be challenged and easily refuted. The federal government has no business falsifying history for the political advantage of the party in power. Our military should be apolitical as it was when we won two World Wars and were the greatest colorblind meritocracy in history.
The $100 million dollars it will cost to implement the naming commission's recommendations are a MASSIVE waste of money.
For example, they want to change the name of the USNS Maury, an oceanographic survey ship, because Matthew Fontaine Maury fought for the South after serving 36 years in the U.S. Navy. Like Robert E. Lee, Maury wasn't going to fight against Virginia and his own family.
Matthew F. Maury was a brilliant man known today as the "Father of Modern Oceanography" and also the "Scientist of the Seas." He had a large body of work and "revolutionized our understanding of oceanography, meteorology, and marine navigation."5
How can you have a better name for an oceanographic survey ship than one named after the Father of Modern Oceanography? No name can be better than the current USNS Maury.6
Same with the USS Chancellorsville, named after a brilliant Confederate victory when Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia with 60,298 men defeated Joseph Hooker and the Army of the Potomac with 133,868. Chancellorsville represents a bold military commander dividing his army at times and maneuvering against enormous odds to win during fierce fighting from April 30 to May 6, 1863.
What better name for a great ship than the USS Chancellorsville!
As President McKinley said, all of this is a tribute to American valor just like all the graves from our "unfortunate civil war" symbolize American valor. Both sides had great respect for each other at the end of the war. It is only small people like Elizabeth Warren who use the honor and blood of better people for her own selfish political advantage.
Veterans are disgusted with this Wokeness, and Congress better start listening.
Many veterans will no longer encourage anybody, much less sons and daughters, to join the military:
When Marine Corps Reserve Col. Matthew F. Amidon, director of veterans and military families at the George W. Bush Institute, wrote a commentary urging veterans to help during the recruiting crisis by recommending military service to their kids and other young people, Military Times was inundated with hundreds of emails from veterans saying they would do no such thing.
Their reasons varied, but most said wokeness is to blame. They accused the military of becoming so "political," or such a "social experiment," that even proud veterans wouldn't recommend service.
'I'll be blunt. I wouldn't encourage anyone to join today's armed forces and I discouraged both of my sons from considering serving,' wrote Peter Demas, who described himself as a third-generation veteran. 'America's military leaders have sold out the Services for their own advancement and reflect all the poorest qualities of civilian 'leadership' from whom they accepted thirty pieces of silver; instead of being the nation's repository of integrity and moral courage, they have become more political than the political animals they grovel before.'7
The very fabric of our nation and military is being torn apart by this racist Woke garbage such as the falsification of Southern history by a political naming commission using Presentist standards, which are a total fraud.
Elizabeth Warren knows nothing about Southern history.
She is like those legions of liberals in academia who look down on the military and think Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and all the others who are willing to die for our country, are not as good as they are, and certainly not as smart.
'With a woke military, whose most senior officer is concerned about 'white rage,' searching for a tattle tale process to discover and discharge white 'extremists,' blaming it on toxic masculinity, discharging real warriors for not getting vaccinated, having a two-day standdown to discuss white extremism, the promotion and expansion of women in combat, lowering physical fitness standards to accommodate naturally weaker women, recruiting with social justice and diversity ads, stating we need more female and minority pilots, promotions based on the color of one's skin or genitalia, lowering recruiting standards, blaming the military for 247 years of institutional racism, is not the military I was in for 26 years,' wrote Dale Papworth, who said he was a retired Marine Corps lieutenant colonel.8
Myers writes: "Reader feedback suggests that a military and veteran population that has traditionally leaned conservative is no longer supportive of an institution they find unrecognizable."
'My 19-year-old has expressed in no uncertain terms that he does not want to serve in the U.S. military in any capacity,' wrote Adam, who asked to be identified by his first name only. 'The politicization of our [government] institutions is creeping into the services now, and that is also having an effect. They may as well put out a sign that conservative or right of center Americans are not welcome. They just keep making it worse with their messaging. Boys want to be challenged and go on adventures, not be schooled on pronouns or the sins of their skin color. Girls want to beat boys and prove themselves.'9
The Washington Times reports that "50% of Americans cite 'woke practices' as a key reason for their decreased confidence in the military."10 Woke policies such as "the teaching of critical race theory, a disproportionate focus on diversity and inclusivity training, gender identity, even the Pentagon's recent fight to demand mandatory COVID-19 vaccination for all those in the ranks" are huge problems.11
Republicans cited:
a host of examples, ranging from the teaching of critical race theory at some military institutions to last spring's military-wide "stand-down" during which all service members were ordered to spend a day discussing hateful ideologies, bigotry, discrimination and related issues.
Sen. Rick Scott, Republican from Florida, said "our military has become the woke military, not the lethal military." Scott is a Navy veteran.12
Austin's campaign to root out extremism undoubtedly caused more harm than good.
It "turned up just a minuscule number of cases, and critics say the focus on social issues takes away from the overriding priority of molding an effective fighting force to defend the country."13
Also:
Beyond the specifics of critical race theory, or American taxpayers paying for gender-reassignment surgeries for service members, critics say the Biden administration has implemented a top-down agenda that emphasizes diversity over virtually everything else, including lethality.14
In another Military Times article, "Is the military too 'woke' to recruit?", more disgust:
One possibility that is increasingly resonating with veterans is that the military is too "woke." Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., for example, is among a group of Republican senators who have repeatedly blamed recruiting problems on the Biden administration for trying to build a "woke Army."15
Thomas Spoehr, director of the Center for National Defense at The Heritage Foundation, writes that wokeness is the "chief worry of grizzled American veterans today."16
'The largest threat they see by far to our current military is the weakening of its fabric by radical progressive (or 'woke') policies being imposed, not by a rising generation of slackers, but by the very leaders charged with ensuring their readiness,' he wrote. 'Wokeness in the military is being imposed by elected and appointed leaders in the White House, Congress, and the Pentagon who have little understanding of the purpose, character, traditions, and requirements of the institution they are trying to change.'
The Military Times article quotes Spoehr:
'Is anyone surprised that potential recruits - many of whom come from rural or poor areas of the country - don't want to spend their time being lectured about white privilege?'17
Myers writes:
In reality, service members spend hundreds of hours a year on mandatory training, covering everything from operational safety to financial responsibility and suicide and sexual assault prevention, with a tiny fraction of that focusing on diversity, equity and inclusion education.
But what seems to incense people is that the issue of racial disparity is discussed at all, not that it's truly cutting into time spent on training.18 (bold emphasis added)
Austin's standdown impugning the honor of military personnel as he looks for extremism that does not exist proves his unfitness to lead. Anybody who would sign off on destroying a 109 year old monument surrounded by 500 graves in Arlington National Cemetery - a monument symbolizing the reunification of the United States of America - is dangerously out of touch.
Myers goes on:
'Instead of training and preparing for combat, today's military is too busy worrying about teaching proper pronouns, how to incorporate men who think they're women and women who think they're men into the barracks and showers,' wrote Ron Eslick, describing himself as a 1970s-era Navy submariner. [Joint Chiefs Chairman] General Milley and Sec Def Austin are a disgrace to the uniform I once wore. They are nothing less than lap dogs to the current administration. What a shame that our country has now become a second rate threat in today's world.'19
Republicans better step up because Biden, Warren and their ilk are tearing apart the very fabric of our country and now our military. No wonder we are so divided.
We are a great country with equal opportunity for all. That's where the emphasis should always be, on opportunity and merit, not special privileges for democrat voters.
The only thing that can work in a multicultural democracy is an unwavering colorblind standard based on merit, a colorblind meritocracy, and equal opportunity for all.
Republicans should defund all of the divisive, extremist recommendations of the naming commission immediately. They don't have to state that they are supporting the Confederacy. All they have to say is that they are disgusted by the idea of destroying historic monuments in Arlington National Cemetery for idiotic woke reasons, and wasting $100 million dollars we don't have changing street names and patches since we are in a multi-trillion-dollar budget deficit.
An article in The Federalist "Reduce Federal Spending by Cutting Back Anywhere and Everywhere: A Guide for Bladder Shy, Financially Illiterate Republicans" states:
the only way to get started on reducing spending, let alone balancing the budget, is to get started on reducing spending. Start somewhere. Anywhere. Take Sen. Rand Paul's actual government waste audit and spin the wheel. Wherever the arrow lands, whether it's the nearly $2 billion for 'maintaining 77,000 empty Federal buildings,' or the $200,000 for the Pentagon's 'Starbucks espresso machines,' get a 10 percent cut. Or 5 percent. Anything.20
I have a better idea.
Start cutting wasteful spending with the $100 million dollars it will take to implement the worthless Woke recommendations of the naming commission.
You will improve military recruiting at the same time and help stop the ruination of our military.
Southerners, inspired by the unmatched valor of their Confederate ancestors when outnumbered four to one and outgunned 200 to one, will make up the recruiting shortfall and give you better troops in the process, like Audie Murphy, Alvin York and so many others in our country's history.
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Scroll down for several important links.
If you are descended from any of the Confederate heroes buried in Arlington National Cemetery, please contact us.
PLEASE CONTRIBUTE to our Arlington National Cemetery Memorial Litigation Defense Fund so we can make sure that Woke ignorance DIES at Arlington National Cemetery.]
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Links to Important Resources
Hot off the press! Here is a link to the new 385 page PDF from Defend Arlington that flips pages as you read. It contains all the great scholarly white papers gathered up by Defend Arlington to make sure that Woke ignorance DIES at Arlington National Cemetery.
Defend Arlington's 385 Page Book of White Papers
Here is a link to Defend Arlington's donation page that states:
CHIP IN FOR THE ARLINGTON NATIONAL CEMETERY MEMORIAL LITIGATION DEFENSE FUND
Please Donate Money -- THANK YOU!
Here is a link to an informative nine minute video, "The Arlington Confederate Monument," produced by the Abbeville Institute.
The Arlington Confederate Monument
Here is a link to the outstanding scholarly PDF white papers written for Defend Arlington. You can download them all with one click. Please share them far and wide, especially the letter from Defend Arlington's attorney, Karen C. Bennett, to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin.
PDF White Papers from Defend Arlington
Here is link to an excellent video refuting point by point a historically false Prager University video by Ty Seidule, who is on the naming commission. This one is produced by Bode Lang and entitled "The Civil War Was Not for Slavery."
Click Here for Bode Lang's excellent video
Here is a link to an excellent video of a Georgia lady calling out Elizabeth Warren and her Massachusetts hypocrisy.
Click Here for Georgia Lady Teaching Elizabeth Warren a Lesson