[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 91 (Thursday, July 14, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: July 14, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                                  2100
              REASONS FOR POOR MORALE IN THE U.S. MILITARY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Frost). Under a previous order of the 
House, the gentleman from California [Mr. Dornan] is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. DORNAN. Mr. Speaker, last June 30 I sent a letter to the 
Secretary of Defense asking him to please, as the senior administration 
official, convey to Mr. Clinton some thoughts on why the morale is so 
bad in the U.S. military. This morning during a 1-minute I said that I 
would list 11 or 12 things, and when my staff reminded me of this 
letter, and it is now only 14-days-old, I decided I would simply read 
the letter, let it speak for itself, and hope that this Nation will 
understand why this is not a President that can put men, and now women, 
into combat in Haiti when there are no vital U.S. interests at stake
  I wrote, and I will choose to make my own letter public, which it has 
not been for 2 weeks, to the Honorable William J. Perry, Secretary of 
Defense
  ``Dear Mr. Secretary:
  ``As an elected Representative who has the utmost admiration for the 
uniformed men and women of our great Nation, I am personally outraged 
at the continued demeaning treatment of members of the military by the 
President and his administration.
  ``The latest incident involved the use of `cream of the crop' 
military officers as servants and tray carriers at a partisan White 
House political function.'' It was for the DNC, Mr. Speaker,
  ``Unfortunately, such insults by the Commander in Chief or his White 
House staff are not isolated incidents. Recall these others:''
  Mr. Speaker, I spoke to one of the four officers who were used in 
this intolerable manner at the White House last month, and he confirmed 
everything that has been in the press, Mr. Speaker, including that he 
felt humiliated, and some of the fine Democrats at that event said that 
they felt embarrassed and humiliated for the officers.
  Here in my letter to Perry are some other events that I recalled:
  ``The verbal abuse of a general officer,'' a three-star officer, now 
four-star, and commander of one of our combat commands, ``and combat 
veteran of Vietnam,'' where he was badly wounded, ``and Desert Storm,'' 
where he led the key division, the Point of the Spear, the 24th 
Infantry Mech, the insult to this officer ``by a junior White House 
staffer with no public apology or disciplinary action.''

  Two, ``ordering, for the first time in memory, military personnel to 
show up at the White House in work clothing,'' and in this case it was 
desert camouflage fatigues, ``for a phony press event and a ludicrous 
short march down the White House south lawn to announce the completion 
of George Bush's Somalia humanitarian effort.''
  That was May 5 of 1993. Of course, we stayed through the killing of 
19 Rangers and Special Forces men on October 3rd and 4th and the 6th.
  Three, ``using members of the ultra-sharp, ceremonial U.S. Army `Old 
Guard','' as they are called, at Fort Myers ``as delivery boys to carry 
defense conversion documents to Members of Congress,'' including to 
this Member's office.
  Four, ``the use of D-day 50th Anniversary ceremonies as a political 
platform to'' attempt to raise the President's low poll ratings, and it 
failed, he dropped three points, ``including `staged' photo 
opportunities at the Anzio/Sicily'' Nattuno Cemetery ``and on the 
hallowed sand of the Normandy Beaches, when these ceremonies should 
have focused totally on the senior veterans who died or survived'' in 
that incredible day in history.
  The thing that I found most offensive was the pulling at the sleeves 
of three incredible Army heroes, now with 50 years added to their young 
years when they performed heroic deeds on the beach, including Colonel, 
then young Captain, Joe Dawson, who was asked to introduce the 
President. He was pulled by some of these little pre-pubescent workers 
of Mr. Clinton's away from the President so he could pretend to reflect 
in prayer, and there on the horizon was the U.S. San Jacinto, an Aegis 
cruiser, ironically named after the carrier, San Jacinto, that George 
Bush was flying combat missions off 50 years ago as we speak, building 
up to his almost loss of life and loss of both of his crewmen on 
September 2nd of this year, the 50th anniversary of young Lieutenant JG 
George Bush's incident.
  ``Young White House staffers with zero military experience pilfering 
towels,'' 68 of them, ``bathrobes,'' 16 of them, ``from the aircraft 
carrier USS George Washington,'' at the beginning of that D-day 
morning's ceremonies, ``and then attempting to blame the press.''
  ``The use of presidential military helicopters,'' the white-top H-3s, 
``which included members of the White House Marine honor guard, by the 
White House staff for a golf trip.''
  Mr. Speaker, I will submit for the Record the two pages that follow 
in my letter, and do a 1-hour special order on this next week, for 
which I will be asking unanimous consent.
  The portion of the letter referred to is as follows:

       The use of senior uniformed military officials as 
     background props at a staged event at Ft. McNair to announce 
     a new version of a Clinton policy aimed at lifting the 50 
     year ban against homosexuals in the military. (If the 
     President had prevailed in his early 1993 attempts, our 
     services would be riddled with practicing homosexuals and 
     bisexuals and proliferation of military chapters of 
     G.L.O.B.E. Check with HUD, the Department of Agriculture, 
     DOT/FAA, et al.)
       What makes this pattern of behavior especially contemptible 
     is the continued hardship placed on those in the military as 
     a result of official White House policy. Increased defense 
     reductions including personnel cuts, increased tempo of 
     operations including the constant discussion of using our 
     troops in Haiti and Bosnia, and the cancellation of well 
     deserved but modest benefits, including scheduled pay raises, 
     are all illustrative of this administration's official policy 
     toward the military.
       Sort of makes you wonder if the President still ``loathes'' 
     the military as he wrote on December 3, 1969, to a heroic 
     Bataan Death March survivor.
       Dr. Perry, as the Secretary of Defense and senior civilian 
     military official within the current administration, I 
     believe it is your duty, on behalf of all the men and women 
     around the world serving under you, to convince the president 
     to immediately take steps to improve relations with members 
     of our armed forces. Besides common courtesy and respect for 
     uniformed members of the military by all White House 
     officials, I also suggest the following action to improve the 
     already badly damaged morale of members of the armed forces 
     and their families:
       Immediately restore and increase annual pay raises for all 
     members of the U.S. armed forces. (A New York Times front 
     page article last week documented again that military pay has 
     fallen way behind the private sector.)
       Immediately announce full and complete implementation of 
     Congressional language upholding the ban against homosexuals 
     and bisexuals in military service.
       Immediately and fully restore the cost of living 
     adjustments (COLAs) for all military retirees.
       Immediately declare that U.S. personnel will not serve 
     under foreign or U.N. command unless a ratified treaty 
     exists, as with NATO.
       Immediately begin full development of friendly fire systems 
     designed to prevent fratricide in future combat operations.
       Such modest initiatives on the part of the president would 
     provide tremendous dividends in terms of improved moral and 
     combat readiness within the ranks of our uniformed personnel. 
     At the very least, our brave men and women deserve the common 
     respect due to any soldier, sailor, airman, or marine who 
     volunteers to sacrifice his or her life in defense of our 
     nation. That means, quite simply, that they would die for you 
     and me, Mr. Secretary.
           Best regards,
                                                 Robert K. Dornan.

       P.S. In case you're wondering, Bill, whether the father of 
     one of our sacrificed in Somalia heroic medal of honor 
     winners refused to shake the Commander in Chief's hand, I've 
     confirmed first hand--it is true.
                                  ____

  Mr. Speaker, this December 3, 1969, letter by the then 23-year-old 
Clinton explains much about his attitude toward our military forces.

             Text of Bill Clinton's Letter to ROTC Colonel

       I am sorry to be so long in writing. I know I promised to 
     let you hear from me at least once a month, and from now on 
     you will, but I have had to have some time to think about 
     this first letter. Almost daily since my return to England I 
     have thought about writing, about what I want to and ought to 
     say.
       First, I want to thank you, not just for saving me from the 
     draft, but for being so kind and decent to me last summer, 
     when I was as low as I have ever been. One thing which made 
     the bond we struck in good faith somewhat palatable to me was 
     my high regard for you personally. In retrospect, it seems 
     that the admiration might not have been mutual had you known 
     a little more about me, about my political beliefs and 
     activities. At least you might have thought me more fit for 
     the draft than for ROTC.
       Let me try to explain. As you know, I worked for two years 
     in a very minor position on the Senate Foreign Relations 
     Committee. I did it for the experience and the salary but 
     also for the opportunity, however small, of working every day 
     against a war I opposed and despised with a depth of feeling 
     I had reserved solely for racism in America before Vietnam. I 
     did not take the matter lightly but studied it carefully, and 
     there was a time when not many people had more information 
     about Vietnam at hand than I did.
       I have written and spoken and marched against the war. One 
     of the national organizers of the Vietnam Moratorium is a 
     close friend of mine. After I left Arkansas last summer, I 
     went to Washington to work in the national headquarters of 
     the Moratorium, then to England to organize the Americans 
     here for demonstrations Oct. 15 and Nov. 16.
       Interlocked with the war is the draft issue, which I did 
     not begin to consider separately until 1968. For a law 
     seminar at Georgetown I wrote a paper on the legal arguments 
     for and against allowing, within the Selective Service 
     System, the classification of selective conscientious 
     objection for those opposed to participation in a particular 
     war not simply to ``participation in war in any form.''
       From my work I came to believe that the draft system itself 
     is illegitimate. No government really rooted in limited, 
     parliamentary democracy should have the power to make its 
     citizens fight and kill and die in a war they may oppose, a 
     war which even possibly may be wrong, a war which, in any 
     case, does not involve immediately the peace and freedom of 
     the nation.
       The draft was justified in World War II because the life of 
     the people collectively was at stake. Individuals had to 
     fight, if the nation was to survive, for the lives of their 
     countrymen and their way of life. Vietnam is no such case. 
     Nor was Korea an example where, in my opinion, certain 
     military action was justified but the draft was not, for the 
     reasons stated above.
       Because of my opposition to the draft and the war, I am in 
     great sympathy with those who are not willing to fight, kill 
     and maybe die for their country (i.e. the particular policy 
     of a particular government) right or wrong. Two of my friends 
     at Oxford are conscientious objectors. I wrote a letter of 
     recommendation for one of them to his Mississippi draft 
     board, a letter which I am more proud of than anything else I 
     wrote at Oxford last year. One of my roommates is a draft 
     resister who is possibly under indictment and may never be 
     able to go home again. He is one of the bravest, best men I 
     know. His country needs men like him more than they know. 
     That he is considered a criminal is an obscenity.
       The decision not to be a resister and the related 
     subsequent decisions were the most difficult of my life. I 
     decided to accept the draft in spite of my beliefs for one 
     reason: to maintain my political viability within the system. 
     For years I have worked to prepare myself for a political 
     life characterized by both practical political ability and 
     concern for rapid social progress. It is a life I still 
     feel compelled to try to lead. I do not think our system 
     of government is by definition corrupt, however dangerous 
     and inadequate it has been in recent years. (The society 
     may be corrupt, but that is not the same thing, and if 
     that is true we are all finished anyway.)
       When the draft came, despite political convictions, I was 
     having a hard time facing the prospect of fighting a war I 
     had been fighting against, and that is why I contacted you. 
     ROTC was the one way left in which I could possibly, but not 
     positively, avoid both Vietnam and resistance. Going on with 
     my education, even coming back to England, played no part in 
     my decision to join ROTC. I am back here, and would have been 
     at Arkansas Law School because there is nothing else I can 
     do. In fact, I would like to have been able to take a year 
     out perhaps to teach in a small college or work on some 
     community action project and in the process to decide whether 
     to attend law school or graduate school and how to begin 
     putting what I have learned to use.
       But the particulars of my personal life are not nearly as 
     important to me as the principles involved. After I signed 
     the ROTC letter of intent, I began to wonder whether the 
     compromise I had made with myself was not more objectionable 
     than the draft would have been, because I had no interest in 
     the ROTC program in itself and all I seemed to have done was 
     to protect myself from physical harm. Also, I began to think 
     I had deceived you, not by lies--there were none--but by 
     failing to tell you all the things I'm writing now. I doubt 
     that I had the mental coherence to articulate them then.
       At that time, after we had made our agreement and you had 
     sent my 1-D deferment to my draft board, the anguish and loss 
     of my self-regard and self-confidence really set in. I hardly 
     slept for weeks and kept going by eating compulsively and 
     reading until exhaustion brought sleep. Finally, on Sept. 12 
     I stayed up all night writing a letter to the chairman of my 
     draft board, saying basically what is in the preceding 
     paragraph, thanking him for trying to help in a case where he 
     really couldn't, and stating that I couldn't do the ROTC 
     after all and would he please draft me a soon as possible.
       I never mailed the letter, but I did carry it on me every 
     day until I got on the plane to return to England. I didn't 
     mail the letter because I didn't see, in the end, how my 
     going in the Army and maybe going to Vietnam would achieve 
     anything except a feeling that I had punished myself and 
     gotten what I deserved. So I came back to England to try to 
     make something of this second year of my Rhodes scholarship.
       And that is where I am now, writing to you because you have 
     been good to me and have a right to know what I think and 
     feel. I am writing too in the hope that my telling this one 
     story will help you to understand more clearly how so many 
     fine people have come to find themselves still loving their 
     country but loathing the military, to which you and other 
     good men have devoted years, lifetimes, of the best service 
     you could give. To many of us, it is no longer clear what is 
     service and what is disservice, or if it is clear, the 
     conclusion is likely to be illegal.
       Forgive the length of this letter: There was much to say. 
     There is still a lot to be said, but it can wait. Please say 
     hello to Col. Jones for me.
       Merry Christmas.
           Sincerely,
     Bill Clinton.

                          ____________________