My Military His Military Essay Research Paper

My Military His Military Essay, Research Paper

Nearly 60 Years of Change in the Military (1941 to 2000)

I have been in the military for seventeen years and during my tenure yhere have been countless changes. When I meet a new troop with a fresh attitude I can t help but think of how it was when I first entered the service. More then once I have made the mistake of expressing my thoughts on the change of the military attitude to ex-military. They have all been more than willing to tell me about the real changes in the military. It made me wonder. If the military had changed so much during my time, then how much had it changed from my father s time or even his father s time. Unfortunately, my grandfather is not around to question. So I m left with my research and memories. My Grandfather Keith Sabin, entered the Army in 1941, my father, Earl Dickerson, entered the Navy in 1960, and I entered the Air Force in 1983.

There have been numerous changes over the years. Some have been blatantly obvious, while other have been subtler. All have had a profound impact on both the U.S service member as well as the United States. I m going to cover several key areas that range from technology to the human factor of the military.

When my grandfather entered the Army in 1941 the Air Force had not yet been established. It was still known as the Army Air Corp and would not become its own branch until September 1947. It had only been 30 years since Orville and Wilbur Wright sold their first aircraft to the army as an observation tool. Martin Luther King, Jr. was only 11 years old. Television was still in its infancy and was a long time off from being a household item.

The above information is the basic backdrop of my comparison, not merely how the military has changed but how the changes have impacted the civilian sector. The first issue that will be addressed will be segregation. Unfortunately, during this era, the military cannot hold its head very high on this particular issue. According to Michael Lee Lanning, author of The African-American Soldiers, even though public law had cleared the way for black men to be military pilots, the Army Air Corp was very diligent in its effort to stop blacks from flying. In his book he quotes this excuse given by the Air Corps on May 25, 1941:

We are having difficulty in finding twenty qualified students needed to begin instruction, and now that the War Department is funding and financing this program, and it is the policy not to mix colored and white men in the same tactical organization, and since no provision has been made for any colored Air Corps units in the Army, colored persons are not eligible for enlistment in the Air Corps, so there is no need for additional facilities. (190)

Even after laws where established forcing the military to accept anyone regardless of race, the military still practiced blatant discrimination. A memo written by the senior ranking member of the Air Corp, General Henry H. Arnold stated, Negroes will only be used in positions such as waiters in the mess halls. He went on to say, Negro pilots cannot be used in our present Air Corps units since this would result in a Negro officer serving over a white man. This would create an impossible social problem.

It would be several more years before the federal government took the military by the throat and said you will treat everyone equal. This came in the form of Executive Order 9981, initiated by president Harry S. Truman, and was enacted September 1947. This executive order simply read, It is hereby declared to be the policy of the President that there shall be equality of treatment and opportunity for all persons in the Armed Service, without regard to race, color, religion, or national origin. Of all the executive orders issued towards the military, none are as well known or as heavily emphasized as this one. It not only changed the way the military treated blacks, but gave credibility to the black man s ability to do everything the white man could. It showed the civilian sector that the black man was as good as anyone, whether they chose to believe it or not.

By the time my Father had enlisted in the military, racial equality was the military s accepted norm. This does not mean all things were equal, it simply means that this was the policy the military had adopted. According to my father, the military was very firm in its public enforcement of racial equality. He also said this of his first day of boot camp, within 15 minutes of getting off of that bus, I knew that even a blind man would have know who the black recruit was. He clarified this by saying, There were approximately 30 people on my bus, but to the Drill Instructor there were only two. They where both black and both in deep S***. He went on to say that overall the racial problems where isolated. People knew who the bigots were and stayed clear of them whenever possible. He said it was ironic that the solution to the problems brought on by integration were solved by isolationism. Everyone stayed with their own clicks and for the most part this worked well.

The war in Vietnam was another proving grounds for the blacks. There is much debate as to why the black enlistment rate soared at this time, but for the first time in history blacks were proportionally represented in the armed forces. That is to say, the percentage of blacks in the mili