I’m not an expert on this, but I will chime in based on my experience in my work lecturing to U.S. army officers in the Corps, Divisions, and Brigades deploying to Iraq and Afghanistan. I often spend a couple days with the officers, and conversations are pretty free-wheeling over lunch, dinner, or after-work beers.

Generally speaking, officers tend to imply that soldiers’ views and their own have evolved over the past decade. When they extrapolate what their peers believe, they describe more tolerance toward gays in the military now than existed during the Clinton years. Attitudes in society — especially elite society — have changed. Frankly, the officer corps is more educated and worldly than many of the intellectuals I encounter in universities or professional society. Most importantly, the majority — but not all — of the officers believe ending “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” would not impact military effectiveness or morale. To me, that is the key issue. Far more harmful to morale, I’m told, is the tendency of the military to paper over serious discussion of radical Islamist ideology, which all soldiers deploying in units that will be used kinetically know they will face when they go to Iraq or Afghanistan.

There does seem to be an attitude that people can do what they want to do outside of the barracks, so long as no one has to see it. When asked if they would feel comfortable if an officer brought a same-sex date or partner to a social function, the answer is almost universally no.

The chaplaincy is less likely to accept gays in the military. Frankly, the chaplaincy for a variety of reasons tends to draw disproportionately from smaller, more religious, conservative denominations, which tend to take a harder line on the topic. I’d be curious to know whether there has been any investigation into how chaplains — whose role in the military, especially during deployments, cannot be understated — would interact with gay soldiers.