One could hear jaws dropping across America when John Kelly — Marine General and Trump’s Chief of Staff — made his reprehensible comments about the Civil War yesterday.
My social medium of choice is Twitter, and I’ve seen a steady stream of comments along the lines of “This is a GENERAL?”, “This guy was a MARINE?!”, and the like. I will admit that, based on what I had seen and known of the man prior to his appointment, I had hoped that he would provide a stabilizing influence on the chaos of rancid ideology that is the Trump Administration...but I wasn’t particularly surprised to see that my hope had been misplaced.
This didn’t surprise me because, in all but the most extreme cases, our military institutions are designed to actively avoid learning such things about its people.
Let me explain...
In order to maintain civilian control over the military, we have (over the years) put various political safeguards in place. Most folks are aware of the prohibition on partisan political activity while in uniform or when “speaking as a service member”, but there are others. One of those is a prohibition on partisan political activity within the chain of command. A commander is not supposed to inquire after the politics of those serving under him, and partisan politics are seen as detrimental to unit cohesion.
As far as the overall chain of command is concerned, the ONLY sanctioned partisan political activity is voting, and even that is handled in a nonpartisan fashion. Every unit of any size has a Voting Assistance Officer, who is tasked with the responsibility of ensuring that every soldier who wishes to vote is empowered to do so; they provide the necessary forms, alert their unit to impending deadlines (e.g. “If you’re from Kentucky and want to vote in November, you have to put your absentee ballot application in the mail by Friday — see me if you need anything.”), can collect/submit voter registrations, etc...and are absolutely nonpartisan (if they know what’s good for them).
On the surface, this makes sense (a nonpartisan military is generally a Good Thing), and you’ll notice that, despite the fact that any military base is chock-full of 18- to 21-year-olds and military families, you don’t see military bases/units sponsoring “Young Democrat Clubs” or “Young Republican Clubs”. You may see such things in the surrounding area (i.e. “off post”), but they aren’t sponsored or supported by the chain of command. Again, that’s a Good Thing in my book.
There is, however, a downside to this approach, in that it allows persons with controversial and/or reprehensible political beliefs to remain, and in some cases flourish, in the military. Put it this way...if your chain of command doesn’t really know about your politics, then it doesn’t affect your career in the same fashion one sees all too often in the civilian world. It’s often said that the military is closer to a true meritocracy than are many civilian institutions, but partisan politics aren’t part of the equation for the military.
In fact, it usually takes something HUGE to get personal perspectives like these out in the open within the military, particularly within the officer ranks. A few examples:
- My father was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant shortly after Truman had issued his Executive Order directing the desegregation of the armed forces. Dad often spoke about how Truman’s action “stripped a layer away” and revealed what many of his fellow officers and NCOs “really were”.
- The admission of women into the service academies (West Point, Annapolis, Colorado Springs) “stripped away a layer” as well, this time on the question of sexism.
- During the Clinton years, “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” reverberated through chains of command.
- The question of sexism raised its head again when women were recently allowed to pursue military careers in combat arms.
In the absence of something as significant as the examples I listed, it’s almost trivial to keep one’s personal politics/beliefs hidden while serving in the military; in fact, it’s beneficial to one’s career to present the most apolitical image possible. Consider the infiltration of the military in recent years by white supremacists and would-be “militiamen”; since their chain of command isn’t going to interrogate them on their personal politics/beliefs, it’s easy for them to fly ‘under the radar’ as long as they “just do their job” and don’t do/say something stupid in public. (The recent racial incident at the Air Force Academy would be an example of being stupid in public — and you saw how quickly (and strongly) that was slapped down.)
So, remember that persons throughout the military, including flag officers, have just as broad a range of political opinion as does any other group of its size (for better AND for worse), but you should also keep in mind that it’s highly unlikely that they’ve ever had to reveal those opinions during their military service.
Don’t let the uniform blind you to what may be underneath it — they’re just like the rest of us.