The left rarely talks about affirmative action anymore. That terminology earned disrepute over the decades. I was quite accurately discredited by common sense conservatives and libertarians as reverse discrimination because it tried to rectify past injustices by creating current injustices. If black people were once passed over for promotion, then white people would be today, the argument ran.
So the left has moved on to “equity.” Sounds like equality, doesn’t it? Except it’s anything but especially since there is arguably no need to sort out any historical wrongs in 2022. It is affirmative action for the new millennium and identity politics at its worst.
Even worse, the Biden administration has decided to introduce equity throughout its government departments. Previous governments have talked about equity but the plans never really went past that. This time, your woke president is going to force everybody to take equity very seriously and implement action plans.
Diversity, equity and inclusion in the military are necessities for the United States, Bishop Garrison, the senior advisor to the secretary of defense for human capital and diversity, equity and inclusion said.
"While the Department has historically focused on increasing equity within the DOD community, the collective actions described in this plan represent a shift in the Department’s approach and focus to better ensure that we leverage our capabilities to create opportunities for all Americans," the Department of Defense wrote in its report.
It may not be a terribly big deal at the Department of the Environment but it’s a very big deal at the Department of Defense (DoD) where people in command have to be appointed on the basis of merit, not because of gender or race or political loyalty.
Equity in the military amounts to a purge of the military and if you’re wondering if that has happened in the past, it sure as hell has and the results were disastrous.
In 1940, as war loomed with Nazi Germany, Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin was assiduously purging the Red Army of its best and its brightest because he deemed them to be politically unreliable and potential competitors for power. He had just done the same to Soviet society, killing close to a million and shipping vast numbers to the Gulags but his careful attention to the military would have catastrophic results just a year later when Adolf Hitler invaded the Soviet Union and very nearly captured Moscow. Stalin barely survived that first year of the war with Germany and only recovered with a massive loss of human life that he was certainly partly responsible for.
Stalin didn’t use words like equity – it wasn’t yet Marxist nomenclature – but he was entirely prepared to commit irrational acts in the name of power and politics. And, after all, if junior officers without any training or talent were suddenly catapulted into high rank far above their capabilities, wasn’t that a form of equity.
China still likes to tell you that it holds the Marxist line but of course wouldn’t consider for a moment introducing an equity program in their military because it is trying to dominate the world, not appease any woke audience at home or in the United States.
It must surely be laughing heartily as the United States continues to degrade its military forces in the name of politics.
But look no further than the leadership in the DoD to see just how poorly the department is doing.
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin began leading his department not against foreign adversaries but against Americans, or “extremism” in our midst.
“We will not tolerate actions that go against the fundamental principles of the oath we share, including actions associated with extremist or dissident ideologies. Service members, DoD civilian employees, and all those who support our mission, deserve an environment free of discrimination, hate, and harassment. It is incumbent upon each of us to ensure that actions associated with these corrosive behaviors are prevented. Commanders, supervisors, and all those who hold a leadership position within the Department have a special responsibility to guard against these behaviors and set the example for those they lead.”
Suddenly the military was a preponderance of “dissident ideologies” working against the woke cohesiveness that the Biden administration was sworn to uphold. How incredibly stupid and dangerous was this? But it was only the beginning because as the year went on we learned that the military was increasingly becoming a social laboratory for left-wing ideas and less and less a place of military preparedness.
No less a spokesman for woke America was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley – the kind of general who might have made a George Patton or Curtis LeMay wonder what the hell national defense was coming to. Milley famously let the Leninist out of the bag during congressional testimony before the House Armed Services Committee on June 23, when he said he expressed a desire to comprehend "white rage" and its presumed relationship to the Jan. 6 “insurrection.”
What a pathetic scene. Like the old Bolsheviks confessing their torture-induced sins before a show trial, admitting they had sabotaged industry and spied for the enemy, here was Milley supposedly baring his soul about a “white rage” problem that doesn’t really exist in society and certainly doesn’t exist in the color-blind military.
Milley raised the issue in response to questions about the military allowing the insidious Critical Race Theory to be taught in its educational system.
Days later, Milley had the gall to suggest politics had no place in the military – at least the non-approved kind.
Then came the fiasco in Afghanistan and Americans could see just what kind of military these two were building. The success of the Taliban took them completely by surprise and they were incapable of accurately assessing the ability of this force to take Kabul. They watched helplessly as these terrorists seized an airport and then billions of dollars-worth of American equipment. They made the evacuation of Saigon look like a tactical victory.
Their ungainly performance unquestionably emboldened Russian President Vladmir Putin’s resolve to invade Ukraine because he clearly saw it was amateur hour in a U.S. military that was more concerned with keeping left-wing activists happy than satisfying the operational bottom line.
Now we have more corrosion on the way.
“Equity” will decide how the military buys equipment? Does that mean we’ll buy inferior products if the right equipment doesn’t benefit diversity? We’ll put bases in locations that somehow promote equity? We’ll train soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen in ways that promote equity?
Are we seeing the madness in this?
And what about unit cohesiveness, perhaps one of the most important factors to consider in appraising whether a military is fighting fit or not. The scourge of equity will infect the entire military with a degree of suspicion and mistrust that will be impossible to overlook. Was the captain promoted because she was a woman? Did that base commander get the job because of his race? Was the executive officer appointed because of his sexual orientation?
Maybe yes, maybe no.
You eradicate meritocracy and you open a vacuum of the unknown.
You may remember when the infamous Sen. Joe McCarthy decided to go after communists in the U.S. Army, it was enough for then-President Dwight Eisenhower and McCarthy’s inquisition ultimately led to a confrontation with lawyer Joseph Welch who said, “Have you no sense of decency, sir?”
The same might be said today of a failing president who is forcing a failed woke agenda on the U.S. military. Has he no sense of decency or respect for national security? Leave the military alone before it is too late.
