In recent years, the infiltration by left-wing identity politics of the military has garnered significant attention. We should be focused on bolstering our nuclear posture in light of unprecedented threats from Moscow and Beijing. Instead, the Navy is focused on adopting gender-neutral titles. The Biden administration’s chief of naval operations, Admiral Michael Gilday, has added Ibram Kendi’s anticapitalist screed, How to Be an Antiracist, to his list of recommended readings. And this summer, it was uncovered that training materials on the problems of “whiteness” were being disseminated at West Point.
While the wokification of the administrative state isn’t a military-specific concern, the problem is particularly acute at the Department of Defense (DOD). Ideological maladies such as critical race theory and gender ideology threaten our national security. According to a report by Senator Marco Rubio (R., Fla.) and Representative Chip Roy (R., Texas), the Biden administration’s “diversity, equity, and inclusion” initiatives have imperiled the cohesion and professionalism that make the military so effective on the battlefield.
Now the two lawmakers have introduced a bill to remedy the woke malignancy bedeviling the DOD, the Restoring Military Focus Act. The legislation would do away with the chief diversity officer position at DOD and forbid the use of government funding to create comparable offices with a race- and gender-focused personnel agenda. Enacting this proposal would go a long way in eradicating the intersectional rot undermining the armed forces.
Senator Roger Wicker (R., Miss.), one of the bill’s co-sponsors, says, “Our military is not a place for social experimentation. With the rise of severe military threats from China and Russia, any step forward in improving our national defense must include rooting out these corrosive ideas and improving the quality of life for our troops.” He’s right.
While the bill’s passage is undoubtedly a long shot in the Democratic-controlled 117th Congress or the Democratic-controlled Senate in the 118th, not to mention Biden’s veto power, it’s still worthy of GOP support. At the very least, getting a critical mass of Republicans to sign on will signal to the foreign-policy establishment that the military’s foray into the muddy waters of progressive identitarianism will not be tolerated indefinitely.