Military policy and free speech
To research the opinion piece on this page, Great Bend Tribune reporter Susan Thacker sent an e-mail to the Military District of Washington. This response came from the MDW Media Desk:
In answer to your questions, we are providing you with the following regulatory information previously provided in response to a query:
1. AR 600-20, Army Command Policy, Appendix B, provides specific guidance on Political Activities by Soldiers. Military personnel are not to engage in partisan activities while in uniform. Military personnel are also not permitted to engage in conduct that in any way may imply that the Department of the Army has taken an official position on or is otherwise involved in a political campaign or issue.
1a. AR 600-20, paragraph B-2(h), authorizes a Soldier to display a political sticker on the Soldier’s private vehicle.
1b. AR 600-20, paragraph B-3(k), however, prohibits Soldiers from using contemptuous words against the President, Congress, or certain State and Federal officials. This regulatory provision is not punitive against enlisted members (though the underlying Federal statute and corresponding article under the Uniform Code of Military Justice are punitive for officers).
Accordingly, the Soldier was not prohibited from displaying a political bumper sticker. Instead, the Soldier’s supervisor discussed the appropriateness of the bumper stickers with him and potential perceptions of others in light of the regulatory guidance. The Soldier is not, and never has been, “facing retribution and punishment from the military for having anti-Obama bumper stickers on his car, reading books written by conservative authors like Mark Levin and David Limbaugh, and serving Chick-fil-A sandwiches at his promotion party,” as is claimed.
2. AR 600-20, Army Command Policy, specifically distinguishes between performance counseling (paragraph 2-3) and disciplinary authority (paragraph 4-7). According to Field Manual 6-22, Army Leadership, “counseling is the use of constructive feedback to improve unit and individual performance to improve teamwork and mission accomplishment (FM 6-22, chapter 8 and Appendix B).
3. In general, per a commander’s duties and responsibilities covered in AR 600-20, a commander may prohibit activities while performing official duties (for example, watching television, reading, making personnel phone calls, using the internet for non-official business) if they interfere with the performance of those duties or could be considered prejudicial to good order and discipline, in violation of regulations, or inconsistent with Army values. Soldiers are entitled to their own views and beliefs, but that does not mean they are entitled to express them in the workplace in a way that may create an intimidating or hostile work environment or be potentially perceived as discrimination or harassment.
The Military District of Washington issued a statement concerning Master Sgt. Nathan Sommers, a 25-year veteran of the U.S. Army Band.
“The Soldier is not, and never has been, ‘facing retribution and punishment from the military for having anti-Obama bumper stickers on his car, reading books written by conservative authors like Mark Levin and David Limbaugh, and serving Chick-fil-A sandwiches at his promotion party,’ as is claimed.”
On Tuesday, Congressman Tim Huelkskamp issued a statement: “It appears Sgt. Sommers ‘is facing retribution and punishment from the military for having anti-Obama bumper stickers on his car, reading books written by conservative authors like Mark Levin and David Limbaugh, and serving Chick-fil-A sandwiches at his promotion party.’”
Huelskamp says Christians and conservatives in uniform need protection from persecution. He wants to amend the National Defense Authorization Act with the House Rules Committee so he can help Sommers, who “is awaiting court martial.”
Actually, Sommers was charged under Article 15, a federal law that permits commanding officers to conduct non-judicial proceedings for minor offenses. According to Fox News, Sommers is accused of giving a superior officer the wrong date for a doctor’s appointment and failing to carry out an order. (In order to comply with that order, Sommers said, he would have had to disclose private information about his autistic son’s medical records.)
Huelskamp wants to stop the “court martial” unless and until the Army first files a report for the Congress to review. Then he wants to “unblock the courthouse door so that service members whose First Amendment rights have been violated by the Federal government can seek redress like any other American.”
“It appears (Huelskamp says) Army Master Sgt. Nathan Sommers has been targeted for harassment and retaliation by several soldiers and superior officers because of his Judeo-Christian religious views, as well as his conservative political views. The Obama regime’s radical secularization, intolerance and downright hostility toward traditional and conservative views is creating a tyrannical culture of political correctness in the military. Sgt. Sommers is the poster child for an increasingly pervasive pattern of persecution ... of service members with disfavored religious beliefs (e.g., Orthodox Jews, Catholics, and evangelical Protestants) and/or disfavored political views (e.g., Republicans, Tea Party supporters, and Libertarians).”
Huelskamp appears to equate gay bashing and bad-mouthing the president with religious beliefs and Republicans, et. al.
It is true that Sommers’ supervisor discussed the appropriateness of bumper stickers with him. (He’s allowed to have them.) It is true that he was told not to be seen in uniform reading such books as Limbaugh’s “The Great Destroyer: Barack Obama’s War on the Republic” and Levin’s “Ameritopia: The Unmaking of America.” (Elsewhere he can read whatever he wants.) And it’s true that he served Chick-fil-A sandwiches at his promotion party, making sure to tweet it was to celebrate his promotion and “in honor of the Defense of Marriage Act.”
Sommers may have done a bit of “persecuting” himself, under the banner of his faith. (He believes homosexuality is a sin.) He once re-tweeted someone else’s original tweet that uses a derogatory word for homosexuals oft used by religious bigots from the Westboro Baptist Church. It read, “Lordy, Lordy, it’s f****t Tuesday. The lefty loons and Obamabots are out in full force.”
Sommers reportedly believes a group of homosexual soldiers is on a witch hunt “to silence me or ruin my career.”
Who is persecuted more, homosexuals or Christians? If a “Christian” is no longer allowed to persecute homosexuals, is that a form of persecution?
Huelskamp doesn’t need to change military policy (dating to the Civil War) that limits the free speech of service members. Unlike congressmen, they aren’t allowed to criticize the commander in chief or make political statements while they are in uniform, representing the military. Religion and politics are subjects best avoided in polite company, and when wearing a uniform that represents “one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”
