Extremism in American military

From Valor Guardians

Personnel interviewed “said that senior officers are aware that a widespread issue doesn’t exist, but won’t push back because they’re more concerned with falling in line to score promotions.”

And: “Given that investigations have repeatedly failed to prove a systemic problem, many service members told Fox News that dedicating significant time to pursuing extremists would ultimately take away from combat readiness.”

https://valorguardians.com/blog/?p=124668

In four years active duty (1964-68) and 12 years Texas Army National Guard (1978-90), I never witnessed an overt act of racism. I heard racial and ethnic words slung around, but never an act of prejudice keeping a soldier from promotion or assigning a soldier additional duty because of race.

On active duty, I learned, to my surprise: blacks don’t like Puerto Ricans; Mexicans don’t like Puerto Ricans or blacks; Puerto Ricans don’t like blacks or Jamaicans; Dominicans don’t like Mexicans, Puerto Ricans or Jamaicans; Cubans really don’t care about any other group because they had problems of their own. I heard more racial terms while on active duty than while in the National Guard, but that was because of the time periods and because Guard soldiers had been raised around each other, which was not the case with active duty soldiers.

In the Army, there is a mission. The mission takes precedent over all else. Every soldier has a part in successful mission accomplishment. There is no time for all that extraneous stuff.