One of the most surprising developments of the last year or so is the inability of the U.S. Military to meet recruitment goals. As it turns out, this may be the symptom of a much worse problem.
As the military has become more politicized, Americans’ trust in the institution has eroded. This is not good.
Mike Brest reports at the Washington Examiner:
Political polarization saps confidence in US military, survey saysAmerican confidence in the armed services has dropped sharply over the last five years, and a new study from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute said political polarization in the military is a top contributing factor.The Reagan National Defense Survey, which was released this week, found that 48% of respondents said they had a great deal of trust and confidence in the military. That’s up slightly from 45% last year but a significant decrease from the 70% of people who answered that way in 2018.This year’s survey was the first time the group asked respondents why they lacked confidence in the military. Three of the eight options were on the military’s different types of leadership. The most common response was military leadership becoming overly politicized, with 62% of respondents picking it. Over half also palmed the performance and competence of the president, the military’s civilian leadership, uniformed military officers, and the military’s ability to win a potential future war.There was a strong partisan divide within some of the choices respondents identified as their reason for their lack of confidence in the military. Fifty percent of respondents said the “so-called ‘woke’ practices,” though “there is a sizable partisan disparity on this, with far more Republicans that Democrats blaming ‘wokeness,’” according to the summary of the survey.
Legal Insurrection’s Critical Race Training Database has been following these developments. Professor Jacobson wrote an extensive post on the topic of wokeness in the military.
Defense One notes some other details from the survey:
57 percent of those surveyed said the U.S. “must continue to stand with Ukraine and oppose Russian aggression.” But 33 percent said that “America has enough problems at home and cannot afford to spend more on the conflict.” More Democrats favored continued support for Ukraine (73 percent) than Republicans (51 percent). Some 76 percent of respondents said they view Ukraine as an ally, up from 49 percent one year ago. And 82 percent view Russia as an enemy, up from 65 percent last year. Recall: in 2019, one in four surveyed viewed Russia as an ally of the United States.Some 77 percent of those surveyed said they were concerned that Russia might use a nuclear weapon, while 74 percent said they were concerned the war in Ukraine might spill over into Eastern Europe and force the U.S. to get involved. And some 70 percent said they were concerned that the war in Ukraine is distracting U.S. policymakers “from the threat posed” by China.
This was discussed on FOX News yesterday. Watch the segment below:
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