CENTRAL VIEW for Monday, October 6, 2014

Defense: Fire U.S. citizens, replace with illegals

The Eisenhower Administration relied primarily on the nuclear weapons of our Navy and Air Force to deter Soviet and Red Chinese aggression. Consequently, many U.S. Army units were hollow shells. But President Kennedy’s more aggressive foreign policy called for more combat troops and, in particular, for more Special Forces. In Augsburg, West Germany, our battalion received several hundred "legal-immigrant," Spanish-speaking recruits who agreed to serve on active duty in exchange for an accelerated path to U.S. citizenship.

While we welcomed the additional warm bodies to fill our ranks, having to teach them English and how to be soldiers was an enormous burden on our officers and NCOs. We scattered the Spanish speakers throughout our company, giving them the best chance to learn English as rapidly as possible. Other companies kept them segregated into their own platoons. Those recruits learned little English. But some of our "total-immersion" recruits learned the skills of the infantry soldier so well that they even earned the coveted Expert Infantry Badge (EIB).

But now, the Obama Administration plans to pour "illegal" immigrants into an Army that is already issuing pink slips to over 90,000 active-duty soldiers who are U.S. citizens and dumping our volunteer soldiers onto a dismal civilian job market. Question: Why would you fire 90,000 volunteer soldiers who are already U.S. Citizens and who have already learned their military job skills and replace them with illegal immigrants with limited or no English and no previous military training? We report. You decide.

But wait! There’s more: Under the Obama Plan, the "illegal" immigrant relatives of the "illegal" immigrant recruits cannot be deported while their "illegal" immigrant soldier or sailor or Marine is serving on active duty. Also the path of the "illegal" relatives to U.S. citizenship is accelerated the same as the "illegal" immigrant soldier or sailor, or Marine. Again, we report. You decide.

Our military leadership, to include the current commander-in-chief, is dysfunctional enough already. If you read Predator: The Secret Origins of the Drone Revolution by Richard Whittle, you see that inter-service rivalry, the egos of certain senior officers, and in-fighting between the White House, the Pentagon, and the CIA almost killed our most valuable drone asset before it was even born. Under President Bush, on the first night of our attacks against the Taliban, Mullah Omar, the head of the Taliban, was spotted by a Predator drone but, because of twisted lines of authority, he was allowed to escape unharmed.

If you read

American Spartan: The Promise, the Mission, and the Betrayal of Special Forces Major Jim Gant, by Ann Scott Tyson, you learn that Jim Gant’s idea of winning the war in Afghanistan "One Tribe at a Time" was sabotaged by other officers putting careerism before the mission of getting the Afghan tribes on our side. Wonder what the Taliban thought when President Obama set the date for our withdrawal from Candidate Obama’s "good" war? You decide.

President Obama is asking Congress to provide $500 billion to the Syrian rebels. When asked by Congress for the name of the rebel leader to receipt for the $500 billion, Secretary of Defense Hagel appeared clueless. Again, we report. You decide, in November.

Nationally syndicated columnist, William Hamilton, is a laureate of the Oklahoma Journalism Hall of Fame, the Colorado Aviation Hall of Fame, and the Oklahoma University Army ROTC Wall of Fame. He was educated at the University of Oklahoma, the George Washington University, the U.S Naval War College, the University of Nebraska, and Harvard University.

©2014. William Hamilton.

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Email: william@central-view.com