NYT Editorial
General Pace and Gay Soldiers
Published: March 15, 2007
There’s a good reason that military officers avoid commenting on politics, society and public policy. The results are usually bad.
Consider the offensive comments that Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, made this week about gay people. They carried a special measure of hurt coming from the nation’s highest military officer when thousands of gay men and lesbians are serving their country in Iraq.
By refusing to apologize, General Pace compounded the injury and reminded the entire country of what happened the last time the top brass took on this subject. It was Gen. Colin Powell’s public rebuke of a new president, Bill Clinton, for even entertaining the idea of allowing homosexuals to serve openly that led to the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.
It is a bad system, which has ruined people’s lives and hurt the military, but it still is the policy, established by General Pace’s civilian bosses, and it allows gay people to serve as long as they don’t say anything about their orientation.
Which made it all the more offensive to read that General Pace told the editorial board of The Chicago Tribune that he believes homosexuality is an intolerable immoral act equivalent to adultery.
Instead of apologizing, General Pace later said his mistake was focusing his comments on his view of morality instead of on military policy.
General Pace is wrong in every way, and out of step. An increasing number of Americans in and out of the military now recognize that the current policy is indefensible. Those Americans include Gen. John Shalikashvili, who was chairman of the Joint Chiefs when the benighted policy was adopted. In an Op-Ed article in this newspaper in January, General Shalikashvili wrote that conversations with gay soldiers and marines had showed him “that gays and lesbians can be accepted by their peers.”
General Pace should still apologize for his remarks, forthrightly. Then perhaps some good could come out of his bigoted remarks if they added to the growing movement on Capitol Hill to finally allow gay men and lesbians to serve openly in the military. |
