DIVERSITY IN THE MILITARY

Diversity in the Military

Diversity in the Military

Introduction

The issue of diversity in the military has repeatedly been in the news in recent years. The service of large numbers of women in the Gulf War led to a Presidential Commission review and new policies regarding women's roles in the American military (Presidential Commission, 1992). The Tailhook and Aberdeen scandals, among other events, demonstrated that the military has not yet learned to manage its gender relations.

Former President Clinton's attempt to lift the ban on gay men and lesbian in the military early in his presidency led to a national debate and a new policy of "don't ask, do not tell, do not pursue." While racial integration has been a long-standing goal of the military, the courts-martial of former Sergeant Major of the Army Gene McKinney and Aberdeen drill sergeant Delmar Simpson raised questions about racism in the military justice system (Segal, 2008).

At the same time, White officers in the Judge Advocate General's Corps who were passed over for promotion filed suit against the Army claiming that the equal opportunity guidance routinely given to promotion boards is discriminatory against Whites. With the 50th anniversary of President Truman's Executive Order 9981 of 1948 mandating equal racial treatment in the military, it is an opportune time to review current research on social diversity in the military.

Given the interdisciplinary nature of most such research, the works reviewed here go beyond the disciplinary boundaries of sociology. This term paper will discuss monographs on race in the Army (the service within which most military race relations research has been conducted) at three different historical periods, and three anthologies that address the contemporary issues of gender and sexual orientation in the military (Pellegrin, 2005).

Each of the three volumes on race in the Army reviewed here is remarkable, albeit for different reasons. The U.S. Army was racially segregated from the end of the Civil War until the Korean War, and women did not serve in the Army in positions other than nursing until World War II. The roles of both women and African Americans were controversial issues in that war. Women of color recruited by the Women's Auxiliary Army Corps (WAAC) from its establishment in 1942, while the Navy did not accept African-American women until almost three years after its women's branch established, and the Marine Corps did not enlist African-American women until after the war. Other than nurses, only one unit of African-American women soldiers-the 6888th Postal Directory Battalion, which served in England and France-was deployed overseas in World War II (and not until February 1945). It serves as the canvas for Brenda Moore's captivating depiction of the intersection of race, gender, and military organization (Clifton, 2009).

To Serve My Country discusses how the political activities of African American organizations (and the personal intervention of Eleanor Roosevelt) led to the establishment of the Postal Directory Battalion. Moore uses official archival records, confidential documents, and intensive interviews with the 51 surviving women of the 885 who served to ...