Friday, December 5th, 2003
Despite Increased Post-9/11 Need, Military Fires 37 Arabic Translators For Being Gay
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=03/12/05/160238 ...She learned Arabic at the Defense Language Institute (DLI), the military's premier language school, in Monterey, Calif. Her timing as a soldier was fortuitous: Around her graduation last year, a Government Accounting Office study reported that the Army faced a critical shortage of linguists needed to translate intercepts and interrogate suspects in the war on terrorism.
"I was what the country needed," Glover said.
She was, and she wasn't. Glover is gay. She mastered Arabic but couldn't handle living a double life under the military policy known as "don't ask, don't tell." After two years in the Army, Glover, 26, voluntarily wrote a statement acknowledging her homosexuality.
Confronted with a shortage of Arabic interpreters and its policy banning openly gay service members, the Pentagon had a choice to make.
Which is how former Spec. Glover came to be cleaning pools instead of sitting in the desert, translating Arabic for the U.S. government.
In the past two years, the Department of Defense has discharged 37 linguists from the Defense Language Institute for being gay. Like Glover, many studied Arabic. At a time of heightened need for intelligence specialists, 37 linguists were rendered useless because of their homosexuality.
<snip>
TRANSCRIPT
AMY GOODMAN: Well, we are joined right now by someone who has looked closely at this issue, Nathaniel Frank. He is a senior research fellow at The Center for the Study of Sexual Minorities in the Military at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and an adjunct professor of history here in New York at New York University and New School University. Welcome to Democracy Now!.
NATHANIEL FRANK: Hi.
AMY GOODMAN: The significance of this, the story just coming out now, and can you explain what is happening?
NATHANIEL FRANK: Well, the story is not just coming out now, but it's been updated since we now have this number of 37 linguists having been fired under the policy at a time of heightened national security. And last year when the story first came out, to take one example, the Army had 84 slots to fill of Arabic translators and could only fill 42 of them. So if you take this number, 37, it's a very high number of slots that could have been filled that the government is deciding shouldn't be filled because it's insisting on enforcing an outdated policy.
more at link...
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=03/12/05/160238