WTH!?!?!? First they LIE about the “report, then try to spin the lie, now they ignore the very heart of what the military is, the boots on the ground!

Defense Secretary Robert Gates

CNSNews.com) – Although up to 60 percent of U.S. combat troops think overturning the law that bars homosexuals from serving in the military will affect “unit cohesion,” those concerns do not pose a ‘insurmountable barrier’ to repealing the statute, Defense Secretary Robert Gates told a Senate panel on Dec. 2.

This week, the Pentagon released a study on the effect of repealing Title 10, U.S. Code Subsection 654, which is the law that bans homosexuals from serving in the armed forces. The study is based on a survey sent to members of the military.
The law was signed by President Bill Clinton in 1993. (“Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is a separate Clinton policy directive established in December 1993, as CNSNews.com has previously reported.)
In his testimony on Wednesday before the Senate Armed Forces Committee, Gates said, “The survey data showed that a higher proportion – between 40 and 60 percent – of those troops serving in predominantly all-male combat specialties – mostly Army and Marines, but including special operations formations of the Navy and the Air Force – predicted a negative effect on unit cohesion from repealing the current law.”
He later added, “In my view, the concerns of combat troops as expressed in the survey do not present an insurmountable barrier to a successful repeal of ‘Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.’
“This can be done, and it should be done, without posing a serious risk to military readiness,” said Gates. “However, these findings do lead me to conclude that an abundance of care and preparation is required if we are to avoid a disruptive – and potentially dangerous – impact on the performance of those who are serving at the tip of the spear in America’s wars.”
Gates mentioned that as a result of the 40 to 60 percent of combat troops expressing concern about repealing the law, the military service chiefs are not upbeat about changing the statue.
“The uniformed service chiefs are less sanguine than the working group about the level of risk of repeal with regard to combat readiness,” said the defense secretary. “The chiefs will have the opportunity to provide their expert military advice to the Congress tomorrow, as they have to me and to the president. Their perspective deserves serious attention and consideration, as it reflects the judgment of decades of experience and the sentiment of many senior officers.”

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). (CNSNews.com/Penny Starr)

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), the ranking member of the Senate panel that held the hearing and who is opposed to repealing the law, questioned Gates about his reaction to the combat troops’ response as described in the Pentagon study.
Gates told McCain, “What I believe is that with proper time or preparation or training, whether it’s before deployments or after deployments, however it works out, if we are allowed to do this on our terms, I believe that those concerns can be mitigated.”
Gates went on to indicate that the combat troops’ response to repealing the law stems from their lack of experience serving in the military with homosexuals.
“I couldn’t disagree more,” responded McCain, adding that if they are mature enough to go into combat, they are mature enough to “make a judgment on who they want to serve with and the impact on their battle effectiveness.”
Despite the Pentagon survey results about combat troops’ apprehension towards repealing the law that prohibits homosexuals from serving in the military, Admiral Mullen said, “Repeal of the law will not prove an unacceptable risk to military readiness. Unit cohesion will not suffer if our units are well-led. And families will not encourage their loved ones to leave the service in droves.”
“I do not discount for a moment the findings in the Johnson-Ham survey which indicate resistance to repeal by those in the combat arms and irregular warfare communities,” he said. “I do not find these concerns trivial or inconsequential.”
“Nor do I believe we can afford to ignore them,” said Mullen. “Given that this reluctance arises from the ranks of the very troops upon which much of the burden of these wars has fallen, we would do well to pay heed and to move forward in a deliberate and measured manner.”
In the survey, members of the military were not directly asked for their opinion on repealing the law. Critics of the survey were disconcerted by this fact.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates, left, and Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Michael Mullen prepare to testify before the Senate Armed Services Committee on the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy on Feb. 2, 2010. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta, File)

“I think in effect doing a referendum of the members of the armed forces on a policy matter is very dangerous,” Gates told Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) when he asked why the Pentagon survey failed to include a direct question about whether the law should be changed.
In response to a similar question by Sen. McCain, Adm. Mullen said, “I fundamentally, sir, think it’s an incredibly bad precedent to ask them to essentially vote on a policy.”
“This is not voting, sir,” McCain told Mullen. “You’re asking their views.”
Mullen then said he disagreed with the idea of asking military members for their views on the policy that bans gays from openly serving in the military.

Here is the best article ever written on this subject!

Gay rights: Don’t ask, don’t think
Frank Turek – Guest Columnist – 2/5/2010 10:15:00
The central argument in favor of same-sex marriage or overturning “don’t ask, don’t tell” contains a fatal flaw. In fact, this is the flaw at the heart of the entire gay rights movement.

Joint Chief Chairman Adm. Michael Mullen dutifully proclaimed the flaw as truth the other day when speaking in favor of ending the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. He said, “I cannot escape being troubled by the fact that we have in place a policy which forces young men and women to lie about who they are in order to defend their fellow citizens.”

Lie about who they are?

Sorry Admiral, but as a former ROTC instructor and legal officer in the United States Navy, I helped deny entrance to potential recruits and prosecuted existing service people for all sorts of behaviors that were incompatible with unit cohesion and military readiness. As you know, the Uniformed Code of Military Justice prohibits numerous behaviors that are not criminal offenses in civilian life (including adultery, fraternization, and gambling with a subordinate), yet I never once saw anyone excused for their behavior by claiming that’s who they are.

The military is essential to our survival as a nation. It’s not a social experiment, and serving in it is not a right. People have to qualify and then make sacrifices. Military people must subordinate many of their individual rights to advance the national interest. Recruits must agree to give up some of the freedoms that civilians enjoy, including certain sexual freedoms and even the freedom of speech! So even if homosexual behavior is permitted in society, that doesn’t necessarily mean it should be permitted in the military.

Having served, I believe that the military needs as few sexual distractions as possible, be they from men and women serving together in combat or open homosexuality. The job is too difficult and critical to be complicating matters sexually.

More could be said, but I want to zero in on the fatal flaw in most gay-rights causes, and the one the Admiral repeated. It is the failure to distinguish between desires and behavior. Having certain sexual desires — whether you were “born” with them or acquired them sometime in life — does not mean that you are being discriminated against if the law doesn’t allow the behavior you desire.

Take marriage as an example. Despite complaints by homosexual activists, every person in America already has equal marriage rights. We’re all playing by the same rules — we all have the same right to marry any non-related adult of the opposite sex. Those rules do not deny anyone “equal protection of the laws” because the qualifications to enter a marriage apply equally to everyone — every adult person has the same right to marry.

“But what about homosexuals?” you ask. The question would better be stated “what about people with homosexual desires?” Put that way, you can see the flaw. If sexual desires alone are the criteria by which we change our marriage (or military) laws to give people “equal rights,” then why not change them to include polygamy? After all, most men seem born with a desire for many women. How about those who desire their relatives? By the gay rights logic, such people don’t have “equal rights” because our marriage laws have no provision for incest. And bisexuals don’t have “equal rights” because existing marriage laws don’t allow them to marry a man and a woman.

If desires alone guarantee someone special rights, why are there no special rights for pedophiles and gay bashers? The answer is obvious — because desires, even if you were “born” with them, do not justify behavior, do not make anyone a special class, and should have no impact on our laws. (See Born gay or a gay basher: No excuse.)

Laws encourage good behavior or prevent bad behavior. Desires are irrelevant. We enact all kinds of laws in the country and military that conflict with people’s desires. In fact, that’s why we need them! We wouldn’t need any laws if people always desired to do good, which is why James Madison wrote, “If men were angels, no government would be necessary.”

In other words, there should be no legal class of “gay” or “straight,” just a legal class called “person.” And it doesn’t matter whether persons desire sex with the same or opposite sex, or whether they desire sex with children, parents, or farm animals. What matters is whether the behavior desired is something the country or military should prohibit, permit, or promote. Those are the only three choices we have when it comes to making law.

The standard comparisons to race and interracial marriage don’t work either. Sexual behavior is always a choice, race never is. You’ll find many former homosexuals, but you’ll never find a former African American. And your race has no effect on your military readiness, but your sexual behavior often can. Likewise, race is irrelevant to marriage while gender is essential to it. Interracial couples can procreate and nurture the next generation (the overriding societal purpose of marriage), but homosexual couples cannot.

The truth is that our marriage and military laws do not discriminate against persons for “who they are” — they discriminate against the behaviors in which they engage. But so what? That’s what most laws do. For example, the Thirteenth Amendment discriminates against the behavior of some businessmen who might like to improve their profits through slavery, but it does not discriminate against those businessmen as persons. And the First Amendment’s freedom-of-religion protections discriminate against the behavior of some Muslims who want to impose Islamic law on the entire nation, but it does not discriminate against those Muslims as persons. Likewise, our marriage and military laws discriminate against the desired behaviors of homosexuals, polygamists, bigamists, and the incestuous, but they do not discriminate against them as persons.

Now some may object to my comparison of homosexuality to polygamy, incest, or pedophilia. I agree that the behaviors are not the same, but the point here is that the logic used to justify homosexuality is the same. “I was born with these desires” could also be used to justify polygamy, incest, pedophilia, and even gay bashing — “Don’t blame me. I just have the anti-gay gene!”

That’s the logic reduced to the absurd. And that’s why people who want to make a case for same-sex marriage or homosexual practice in the military should use different arguments. Claiming you “are” your sexual desires is a case of don’t ask, don’t think.