BITSY’S STORY
Elizabeth “Bitsy” Recupero used a Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) scholarship to pay for her undergraduate education at the University of Pennsylvania. She delayed her military service obligation so she could go to medical school. At the end of her residency in New Jersey, she met Judith Levinson, and the two women fell in love. They obtained a civil union in Vermont in 2001 before Recupero was to start serving in the Army. Since she had a civil union, Recupero thought she wouldn’t have to worry about “don’t ask, don’t tell,” but she was wrong. She decided instead of being a closeted lesbian while serving in the Army she would write a “coming out letter” explaining her situation to the military. It took five years and a military investigation for Recupero to get an honorable discharge because of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.

LINKS:
Military Inquiry into Bitsy Recupero’s Lesbianism
Bitsy Recupero’s Coming Out Letter to the Army
Vermont Civil Union

Gay dismissals may threaten civil rights, national security

By NIKKI SCHWAB

With more troops needed in Iraq and Afghanistan and the Pentagon struggling to fill the demand with an all volunteer army, politicians are beginning to reconsider the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that bans openly gay people from serving in the armed forces.

Last week Rep. Marty Meehan, D-Mass, reintroduced the “Military Readiness Enhancement Act,” which, if passed, would repeal “don’t ask, don’t tell.” In addition to Meehan, 109 House members, including three Republicans, and nine member of the Armed Services Committee are sponsoring the legislation.

Meehan said repealing “don’t ask, don’t tell” is vital to national security.

“The President and the Republicans in Congress say they’re committed to fighting the Global War on Terror, but when it comes time for action, they haven’t provided the number of soldiers we need and are instead kicking out highly qualified servicemembers just because of their sexual orientation,” Meehan said in a statement.

Meehan originally introduced the bill in 2005 with 122 Democratic and Republican co-sponsors, but it didn’t get out of the Armed Services Committee. This time, he said, things will be different with the Democrats in control.

“It will still be an uphill climb, but the November election can only mean good things for my bill,” Meehan said in speech last week.

In fiscal year 2005, the military dismissed 49 medical personnel, 40 law enforcement officers and 14 intelligence officers. The Army discharged 35 infantrymen, as well as seven nuclear, biological and chemical warfare specialist. The Navy dismissed 17 air crewman.

Between 1994 and 2004 approximately 10,335 gays and lesbians have been discharged under the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, according to the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network.

The Pentagon, on average, fires two gay people each day.

A Feb. 13 study released by the Michael D. Palm Center, an organization that researches “don’t ask, don’t tell,” said the military’s recruitment of convicted felons had almost doubled between fiscal years 2004 and 2006. In 2004, 824 felons enlisted and increased to 1,605 in 2006. Felons are allowed to join the military as part of a “moral waivers” program that permitted previously ineligible candidates to join.

This revelation raised eyebrows in the gay community. Felons and not gays?

Honorable discharge?

As a medical doctor with experience in both pediatrics and internal medicine, Elizabeth “Bitsy” Recupero would have been a benefit to the Army. She went to college on an ROTC scholarship and delayed her service until she finished medical school. By the time she was to start her service, she had obtained a Vermont civil union with her partner Judy Levinson.

She called the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, an organization whose mission is to repeal “don’t ask, don’t tell,” and explained her situation. She thought with the civil union the law would be on her side.

“They said, back up–you can’t be gay in the military,” Recupero recalled.

She had two options. She could be in the military as a closeted gay woman or write a coming out letter.

“I had forgotten what it was like to be in the closet,” Recupero said. “So what I did was basically a coming out statement, which says I am a lesbian and I plan on serving openly and honestly with my partner, Judith Levinson.”

This statement and a subsequent five-year investigation into Recupero’s lesbianism led to an honorable discharge in 2005. She also didn’t have to pay the military back for her education.

Coming out against the policy

The “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy was passed in Congress as a compromise in 1993 after President Clinton reneged on a campaign promise to allow homosexuals to serve openly in the armed forces. Clinton had never served in the military and was unable to sway the more conservative military establishment. Instead, “don’t ask, don’t tell” was created as a middle ground in which service members could technically be gay, but were not allowed to discuss it publicly, or engage in homosexual relations.

Fourteen years later, the policy remains enforced as military recruiters struggle to bring more men and women into the armed forces during wartime.

“With the military stretched thin, and all the evidence showing this policy is a failure, I don’t think it can stand for even three more years,” said Dr. Nathaniel Frank, Senior Research Fellow at the Michael D. Palm Center at the University of California-Santa Barbara.

Steve Ralls, the director of communications for the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, also speculated that the policy wouldn’t be around for long.

“If there is a silver lining to the Iraq war, it is the event that will allow gays and lesbians to finally serve openly in the military,” Ralls said. “Inside the Pentagon, more and more people are coming out against the policy.”

Ralls cited the recent example of a former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff coming out against “don’t ask, don’t tell” in a January editorial published in the New York Times.

John Shalikashvili, who served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the Clinton Administration, wrote in the New York Times that it might be time to reconsider the policy.

Shalikashvili wrote that at the time “don’t ask, don’t tell” was implemented, he thought it best. He said now young people are much more open to serving alongside gays and lesbians.

A Harris Interactive poll released on Feb. 2, 2007, asked respondents if gays and lesbians should be allowed to serve openly in the military. Fifty-five percent of survey-takers answered yes. On closer inspection, when the respondents were broken down into age groups, the percent of affirmers increased to 65 percent of those between ages 18 and 30.

However, within the ranks of the military, the percentage of those open to gays and lesbians serving is smaller. In a December Zogby International poll, which surveyed 545 troops who served in Afghanistan and Iraq, 26 percent said gays should be allowed to serve openly in the military, and 37 percent said they should not. Thirty-two percent remained neutral.

A partisan divide

While Shalikashvili’s Jan. 2, 2007 editorial said it may be time to reexamine “don’t ask, don’t tell,” he warned Congress members that bringing it up early in the session wouldn’t help heal deep divisions between the two parties.

Rep. Meehan is going to go ahead and push for an appeal of the ban.

“Lifting the ban on gays in the military would be a landmark achievement for not just gay and lesbian rights, but for civil rights,” Meehan said. “There is no place in this country for discrimination, be it on the basis of race, creed or sexual orientation, and there is certainly no place for institutional discrimination codified in federal statute.”

Ralls said also in addition to the bill in the House, legislation is to be introduced for the first time in the Senate this month or next. However, because of the sometimes tedious process of getting legislation pushed through Congress, he said he doubted either bill would be voted on this year. He was optimistic that the legislation had a chance with the Democrats in control.

“There is certainly much more opportunity in this new Congress then in the last Congress,” he said.

Frank from the Michael D. Palm Center wasn’t quite as positive. He said Democrats would be wary of an appeal in order to avoid the same political backlash that swamped President Clinton when he pushed for the issue in 1993.

“And while opinion on letting gays serve has moved leaps and bounds since then, the new Democratic Congress is not likely to come out strongly on this one from the get-go,” Frank wrote in an e-mail.

Military-friendly and gay-friendly

Scott Tucker, the communications director of the Log Cabin Republicans, a gay rights group that works from within the Republican Party, underscored the importance of gays in the military as a conservative issue and the significant role his party will play in the passage or failure of this legislation.

“We are Republicans, we are working within the Republican Party to be more inclusive on gay and lesbian issues and with this issue of ‘don’t ask, don’t tell,’ I think people are starting to realize that this is a conservative issue,” Tucker said referring to the GOP’s reputation of being military-friendly.

He said the Log Cabin Republicans has an important role to play in this particular issue.

“You need Republican votes to pass something like this, and we have a good number of allies,” Tucker said.

For Recupero, the idea that the ban might be repealed now is bittersweet.

“It’s such hypocrisy and it makes me mad that these people will overturn ‘don’t ask, don’t tell,’ because they need bodies,” Recupero said.

While she said she wants the law to be overturned, she wished it had not taken a war to change the minds of those in the military and the government.

Then again, the ban enabled her to practice medicine in New Jersey and not in Iraq.

“Would I be happy about going to Iraq at this point? No. But I would,” she said. “If that’s what I’m supposed to do, that’s what I’m supposed to do.”