An Inspector General report from May 2022 echoed this point, citing just nine “publicly reported incidents involving active and former military members linked to violent extremist or supremacist groups since January 2020.” In fact, after investigating 2 million active and reserve troops, Austin could only report that there were less than 15 members who could be labeled as “extremists.”
The new chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Mike Rogers (R-AL), cautioned that “we lack any concrete evidence that violent extremism is as rife in the military as some commentators claim.” Congressman Mike Gallagher (R-WI), who serves as chairman of the House Military Personnel Subcommittee, noted that Austin himself “could not define ‘extremism’” when asked about it and that “[a]fter six months of study, the Pentagon has only muddled the issue more” with rules that are “ill-defined, could easily be abused, and will have the practical effect of further politicizing the force at a time when polls indicate confidence in the military is plummeting at an unprecedented rate.”
And yet, despite lacking data to justify this scale of an effort, partisan passions prevailed and guided the expansion of counter-“extremism” efforts. In late 2022, the House Veterans Affairs Committee produced a report focused on the issue among the nation’s veterans. The report notes that “the vast majority of the nation’s approximately 18 million living veterans remain law-abiding citizens, following their military service, and the vast majority of [Domestic Violent Extremism] crimes are not committed by veterans.” Perhaps to justify the report, its authors cleverly focus on the date range of 1990–2021 (which captures the Oklahoma City Bombing in 1995 that accounts for roughly half of the 314 people killed by veterans during those three decades).
If you were wondering why the recruitment of soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines is at an all-time low on Biden’s watch, add the search for phantom extremists to the debacle in Afghanistan and the balkanization of our troops along racial and sexual lines. The answer is not hard to find. Meanwhile, they are laughing in Beijing, Moscow, and Tehran.
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The new chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Mike Rogers (R-AL), cautioned that “we lack any concrete evidence that violent extremism is as rife in the military as some commentators claim.” Congressman Mike Gallagher (R-WI), who serves as chairman of the House Military Personnel Subcommittee, noted that Austin himself “could not define ‘extremism’” when asked about it and that “[a]fter six months of study, the Pentagon has only muddled the issue more” with rules that are “ill-defined, could easily be abused, and will have the practical effect of further politicizing the force at a time when polls indicate confidence in the military is plummeting at an unprecedented rate.”
And yet, despite lacking data to justify this scale of an effort, partisan passions prevailed and guided the expansion of counter-“extremism” efforts. In late 2022, the House Veterans Affairs Committee produced a report focused on the issue among the nation’s veterans. The report notes that “the vast majority of the nation’s approximately 18 million living veterans remain law-abiding citizens, following their military service, and the vast majority of [Domestic Violent Extremism] crimes are not committed by veterans.” Perhaps to justify the report, its authors cleverly focus on the date range of 1990–2021 (which captures the Oklahoma City Bombing in 1995 that accounts for roughly half of the 314 people killed by veterans during those three decades).
If you were wondering why the recruitment of soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines is at an all-time low on Biden’s watch, add the search for phantom extremists to the debacle in Afghanistan and the balkanization of our troops along racial and sexual lines. The answer is not hard to find. Meanwhile, they are laughing in Beijing, Moscow, and Tehran.
Weapon of self-destruction: Biden’s obsessive hunt for extremism in the military - Washington Examiner
Opinion Weapon of self-destruction: Biden's obsessive hunt for extremism in the military By Robert Wilkie January 20, 2023 10:53 AM Twitter LinkedIn Facebook Email Print Opinion Weapon of self-destruction: Biden's obsessive hunt for extremism in the military By Robert Wilkie January 20, 2023...
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