And, although I am not a fan of most of the military actions that I have witnessed during my lifetime, this is one military intervention that makes complete sense. Trump has recently elevated several generals to his White House cabinet and inner circle, and they seem to be the only levelheaded people in the room. Trump apparently worships military honchos: Maybe he\u2019ll listen to them, both in rescinding his transgender tweet-ban and in making even bigger decisions as they come along.<\/p>\n
The Commander in Chief has tweeted a total ban of honorably serving transgender troops. This proposed ban, if implemented, would cause significant disruptions, deprive the military of mission-critical talent, and compromise the integrity of transgender troops who would be forced to live a lie, as well as non-transgender peers who would be forced to choose between reporting their comrades or disobeying policy. As a result, the proposed ban would degrade readiness even more than the failed \u2018don’t ask, don’t tell\u2019 policy.<\/strong> Patriotic transgender Americans who are serving\u2014and who want to serve\u2014must not be dismissed, deprived of medically necessary health care, or forced to compromise their integrity or hide their identity.<\/p>\nPresident Trump seeks to ban transgender service members because of the financial cost and disruption associated with transgender military service. We respectfully disagree, <\/strong>and consider these claims to be without merit. The RAND Corporation, as well as research in the New England Journal of Medicine, found that the financial cost of providing health care to transgender troops would be, at most, $8.4 million per year. This amounts to one one-hundredth of one percent of the military’s annual health care budget<\/strong>. As for ostensible disruptions, transgender troops have been serving honorably and openly for the past year, and have been widely praised by commanders.<\/p>\nEighteen foreign nations, including the UK and Israel, allow transgender troops to serve, and none has reported any detriment to readiness.<\/p>\n
Recently, two former Chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff have taken courageous stands in support of our transgender service members. General Martin Dempsey said of our transgender troops that, \u2018The service of men and women who volunteer and who meet our standards of service is a blessing, not a burden.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd Admiral Mike Mullen stated that, \u2018I led our armed forces under the flawed ‘don\u2019t ask, don\u2019t tell’ policy and saw firsthand the harm to readiness and morale when we fail to treat all service members according to the same standards. Thousands of transgender Americans are currently serving in uniform and there is no reason to single out these brave men and women and deny them the medical care that they require. The military conducted a thorough research process on this issue and concluded that inclusive policy for transgender troops promotes readiness.\u2019 <\/strong><\/p>\nAdmiral Mullen urged civilian leaders \u2018to respect the military\u2019s judgment and not to breach the faith of service members who defend our freedoms.\u2019 We could not agree more.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When Donald Trump announced via Twitter that he was banning transgender people from military service, 56 retired generals and admirals said, \u201cNo, sir.\u201d \u00a0Their<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":37650,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2211,1651,1100,2826,3078],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n
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