On Prejudice and Waste by the Pentagon

This from the August 5, Christian Science Monitor, in an article titled “U.S. Army hopes to keep native Arabic speakers”

The Army may begin paying a retention bonus of as much as $150,000 to Arabic speaking soldiers in reflection of how critical it has become for the US military to retain native language and cultural know-how in its ranks. Only one other job in the Army, Special Forces, rates such a super-sized retention bonus. Now, as the military makes a fundamental shift toward rewarding the linguistic expertise it needs the most, it is expanding a program to train and retain native Arabic and other speakers from the same regions in which it is fighting.

Nowhere in the article is there mention of how the same U.S. Army has been discharging expensively trained Arabic linguists by the dozens…because they are gay.

As of May 2007, the military had kicked out at least 58 Arabic linguists because of their sexual orientation, and because of “Don’t ask, Don’t Tell,” a policy that prohibits openly gay individuals from serving in the military.

A couple of weeks ago, on the occasion of the House of Representatives’ first hearing in 15 years on the policy, I commented on the absurdity, shame, and cost of this policy.

Specifically referring to the waste in skills, talent, money and, most importantly, human resources and dignity that this policy is costing our nation, I wrote:

Never mind that the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy cost taxpayers nearly $191 million in lost training and personnel and skills replacement costs during the policy’s first 10 years, according to a GAO report.

Never mind that the policy has resulted in the release of 12,000 good troops for reasons of sexual orientation, including dozens of Arabic speakers whose skills are of immense value to the military in the war on terrorism.

Yes, we frivolously kicked out dozens of these “capable, highly skilled Arabic linguists…[a loss that] continues to compromise our national security during time of war,” as stated in a letter from the House of Representatives to the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee after three more gay linguistic specialists were fired a year ago.

In continuing to stress the importance of having Arabic linguistic experts in the war on terror, the Christian Science Monitor shares with us:

After the invasion of Iraq and the insurgency that followed, the US military recognized its dearth of linguistic competence in the country it had just toppled, and it scrambled to identify Arabic and other linguists. The military’s conventional language training program, the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, Calif., could not churn out enough American soldiers proficient in Arabic, Kurdish, Dari, Pashtu, and Farsi, and the military quickly turned to private contractors to fill the gap.

Yet, not a word about those linguists the U.S. Army has shown the door because of their sexual orientation.

Why are we paying $150,000 bonuses when a little tolerance might have sufficed?