THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, March 26, 1996 TAG: 9603260009
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A12 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: Short : 50 lines
A report finding little evidence of extremist activity in the Army despite some ugly incidents is encouraging, but even a little is cause for alarm.
According to the report, a survey of soldiers found 3.5 percent who admitted that an extremist group had tried to recruit them. And 7.1 percent said they knew a soldier who was probably a member of such an organization.
If one soldier in 20 is a member of a militia, white-supremacist or other hate group, it's hardly a trivial matter.
Perhaps because this country was born in a fight between citizen militiamen rising up against the army of the mother country, an apolitical military has been a central tenet of the American system.
Soldiers serve in a chain of command that ends at a civilian commander in chief, and no matter his political persuasion, the military is expected to carry out all lawful orders. That's the constitutional shape of things.
When the fraternal Society of the Cincinnati was formed by officers of the Continental Army after the Revolution was won, it aroused deep suspicion. Many saw it as the beginning of a possible military aristocracy of the sort that bedeviled Europe.
Washington disarmed those fears by serving as a model republican president, not a monarch, not a man on a white horse, not a military dictator. Ever since, keeping the military firmly in its apolitical and subordinate place has served this country well.
That's why it is important for the Army to be vigilant. There's no room in the armed forces for hate groups, extremist organizations, the militia movement or other zealotry. The safeguards recommended by the Army make sense.
Recruits should be carefully screened for extremist affiliations. Emblems of hate don't belong in the armed forces. Involvement by soldiers with groups promoting racism or advocating violence must be officially discouraged. To that we'd add education.
The armed forces need to teach recruits not just their role in the military but the role of the military. For more than 200 years an important part of its mission has been to protect democracy, never to subvert it. At a time when extreme views are heard on the fringes of society, that message needs to be heard loud and clear by all who serve it. by CNB