No Soldier Left Behind

A Keynote Address to Servicemembers Legal Defense Network

by Lieutenant General Claudia Kennedy, USA (Ret.), March 2005

It is great to be here among veterans, retirees, and supporters of the U.S. military. The most important reason I have for being here is to tell you how much I appreciate your service to the nation while in uniform. When you were needed, you were there.

And I want to take this opportunity to thank Dixon Osburn for his leadership of SLDN and his constant support in advocating for gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender service members. Because of Dixon’s courage and leadership, many service members have been given the respectful treatment they deserve.

I am going to talk to you tonight about how Don’t Ask Don’t Tell affects U.S. military values and military readiness. I’ll mention the Army because it is the service I know and not because I intend to exclude the other services. I think we would agree that the issues are universal across all services. Tonight, I am going to ask some questions about this policy and will tell you what I think.

Let me ask this question first: What is the most fundamental building block of military readiness? It is our values. Army values are taught to soldiers from their earliest days in the Army. Those values are: loyalty, duty, mutual respect, selfless service, honor, integrity, and personal courage. We teach our soldiers that these are the values we expect them to live up to. I believe that as an institution, our military needs to live up to the values we demand of the service members. Military leaders need to respect all service members. We need to recognize that loyalty and selfless service are exhibited equally, by service members of every color, gender and sexual orientation.

Speaking of values, when there is discussion supporting exclusion of gays, it often refers to American values. Let me ask this: Which of these values is directly correlated to sexual orientation? Is there any value among those I listed that is unique to heterosexuals? Americans need to respect all service members.

Recruiting is driven by numbers more than by any other factor. It is also heavily dependent upon the quality of those Americans we recruit. When we broaden the approved recruiting talent pool to include those of other races, other sexual orientations, women, we improve the chance of recruiting the most qualified people. When I was a brigade commander, one of the Army’s best Chinese linguists asked to be discharged because he was gay. It was a terrible loss of linguistic talent. Our more junior Chinese linguists lost their best trainer and leader. And our intelligence operation lost some degree of readiness because of his discharge. Did you realize that more than 10,000 men and women have been discharged?—not because they were not performing well but because they were gay. Arabic linguists, doctors, helicopter pilots are among those being discharged at a time when our nation needs them most. Military readiness will improve when we stop these policies that waste our most precious asset – our people.

Beyond the consideration of collective military readiness, there is the matter of individual readiness. We should recognize that it is a challenge for any person to rise to the occasion in military operations and to give their very best. If that person feels they must hide some feature of themselves, it undermines their ability to perform without distraction. Consequently, Don’t Ask Don’t Tell can undermine the overall operation. We need every service member operating at top effectiveness. This improves military readiness.

When we ask people to hide something important about their identity, it is a challenge to their integrity and to the integrity of the institution. It is also disrespectful to them and to those with whom they serve. When we say, “You are good enough to serve in Iraq but you may not be openly gay,” we break trust with all of our service members. The Army has a credo that we will leave no soldier behind. It is found in the Soldier’s Creed and we believe it. On the battlefield, we act on this—we leave no soldier behind. How is the situation of the gay soldier any different? We need to eliminate the divisive and destructive policy called “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

When I expressed some of these thoughts to an interviewer for the Detroit News recently, I was surprised by nothing in the published article except the headline. The headline read, “Three-star general wants gays in the military.” It took me a while to figure out what caught my eye about that headline. It was this: the debate is well beyond wanting or not wanting gays in the military. That question was resolved in the early 1990’s. The debate at hand is whether or not gays should serve openly. I ask this -- openly to whom? Does anyone really believe that their peers do not already know they are gay? Does anyone really believe that their small unit commanders and other leaders do not already know they are gay? This is a hollow policy that serves no useful purpose. We have outgrown it. Our military is better than is reflected in this policy.

Let me tell you this: It is time to acknowledge that our armed services are every bit as diverse as the great nation we protect. Our country is at war. The military has serious missions in hundreds of places around the globe. This is no time to be distracted by this outdated policy. This is no time to permit any policy to undermine military readiness.

It is time to do the right thing.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your service to America in uniform and thank you for your patriotism. God bless America’s military and all its members.

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Lieutenant General Claudia Kennedy, USA (Ret.) was the first female Army officer to achieve the rank of 3-Star General. She served as Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence and wrote, Generally Speaking, a memoir about her Army career.

Reprinted with permission of LTG Claudia Kennedy, USA (Ret).

Please support the SLDN and its efforts to repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell.