Honorable President Obama - Landmark Law

The Honorable President Obama signed a landmark law on 22 December, 2010 repealing the ban on gay men and women serving openly in the military. The new law ends the 17-year-old "don't ask, don't tell" policy that forced gays to hide their sexual orientation or face dismissal. More than 13,500 people were discharged under the policy. Its repeal comes as the American public has become more tolerant on such issues as gay marriage and gay rights in general. Today's Army is spread so thin due to fighting two wars and with the standards that have been lowered to support the two wars. Also with all the internal issues that the Army is dealing with for example Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI), Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Suicide and drug and alcohol issues that are rampant through the ranks the issue of allowing homosexual individuals to serve openly in the military elicits highly emotional and charged responses from many individuals. Some argue that gay individuals have always--and will always--be part of the military in the same way that they are present in all walks of life, but that having openly gay military personnel would be detrimental to morale and discipline in the military. This research considers the effect of having openly gay individuals serving in the military, and specifically addresses the issue that allowing gays to serve would result in good order and discipline.

One of the most ardent supporters of "don't ask / don't tell" was President Clinton's chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 1993 to 1997, John Shalikashvili. In early 2007, he reversed that position to one of permitting openly gay individuals to serve without constraints. He cites not only a shift in American attitudes toward homosexuality, but also 24 nations--including Israel and Britain--that allow openly gay service members and who do not report downturns in morale or efficacy (Shalikashvili, 2007).

In the years since the "don't ask / don't tell" strategy, attitudes toward gays in the military have shifted among the American public. Less than half of the public at large favored having openly gay individuals serve in the military in 1993; that increased to 62 percent in 2001 and 75 percent in 2008. The increased acceptance has come from across the political and age spectrum, with majorities of Republicans, Democrats, Independents, and veterans supporting allowing gay individuals to serve (Dropp & Cohen, 2008).

Increasingly, critics of the "don't ask / don't tell" policy maintain that those who oppose having gays in the military are simply perpetuating the same arguments and discrimination that was used to keep races separate in the military for years, or to keep women from serving in many military positions. These critics of the policy hold that allowing gays to serve will be a positive influence by attracting high-quality individuals who otherwise would not be allowed to serve. Critics also point to the situation where