COUNTERING MILITARY RECRUITMENT
Articles: Military Recruiting: Women
Recruiter Sexual Abuse: Friendly Fire at Home?
Aimee Allison, AlterNet
July 24, 2007
As more women are joining the military, they are becoming the victimsof sexual assault before they even take their oath. A former Army
specialist explains the growing problem with abuse by recruiters and
how the military is turning a blind eye.
A typical poster in the new Army Strong campaign shows three soldiers
in full battle gear, faces grim and determined. The middle soldier is a woman.
More money than ever is being spent to convince girls to join the
military. I was one of them. The promise of school tuition and job
training was attractive to me at the time, but it was just a small
part of what it meant to enlist in "this man's army."
To girls seeking a future, recruiters present themselves as a
father/friend/ guide. But as I, and many other girls discover, these
confidants cannot be trusted. Girls become victims of sexual assault
at the hands of recruiters even before they take their military oath
of allegiance.
But this isn't a story about a few unlucky recruits and a couple of
sickos in an otherwise healthy recruitment process. There is a deeper
problem of widespread abuse and a system that protects the criminals.
Recently, the Marine Corps announced a court settlement in a suit
brought by two Ukiah, Calif., teenage girls who were raped by
recruiters during a 2004 military-sponsored event.
The recruiters, Sgts. Joseph Dunzweiler and Brian Fukushima, were
court-martialed and demoted but nevertheless acquitted of serious wrongdoing.
According to press reports, the recruiters got the underage girls
drunk before the attack. The court settlement has two requirements.
First, there must now be female supervision at slumber parties with
female recruits. Second, recruiting stations throughout Northern
California must post the contact information for confidential
advocates available to abused female recruits.
An Associated Press investigation revealed that in 2005 one in 200
frontline recruiters were punished for harassment and abuse. The Army
alone had 722 recruiters accused of rape and sexual misconduct in the
last decade and called for a recruitment stand down day in 2005.
After widespread reports of rape, unwarranted jail threats, cheating
drug tests and falsifying documents, thousands of recruiters were
ordered to attend ethics training.
In California, Megan's Law has made it easier to track convicted sex
offenders. Communities sometimes use this data to run sex offenders
out of town, as in the case of Carey Verse.
Yet, military recruiters who commit the same sexual offenses are
rarely convicted in military or civilian courts. They are most often
given administrative punishment such as reduction in rank or
forfeiture of pay. Compare this with highly publicized abuse cases
involving Catholic priests. Priests convicted of sexual crimes appear
in the Megan's Law database. Recruiters given administrative
punishment do not. Ironically, priests aren't fixtures in most public
schools but military recruiters are.
Recruiters have unprecedented access to girls (and boys) thanks to
the No Child Left Behind Act which demands that public schools turn
over student contact data to military recruiters so they can "work
their market." In addition, the majority of school districts in the
country have relaxed rules that allow recruiters to come and go at
will. As a result, more young people have personal and sustained
contact with recruiters.
In the wake of severe cuts to extra curricular activities and
counseling in high schools, recruiters have filled the void and
become a regular part of the school day. With the school's blessing,
they give career advice in classrooms, take students on field trips,
volunteer during football games and teach physical education.
Recruiters can overcome a young person's hesitation to join the
military in wartime based on the strength of their long-term
relationship -- and this relationship most often begins at school.
Once trust is established, recruiters often take students off-campus
to events like the recruitment station slumber party at which the
Ukiah girls were brutalized. According to the AP report, sexual
misconduct almost always takes place in recruiting stations,
recruiters' apartments or government vehicles.
I was once a 17-year-old Army recruit ill-prepared to navigate the
male-dominated recruitment system. As I experienced, recruiters wield
immense power over teens with their promises of special favors for
choice assignments and the authority of their uniform. No one warned
me that my comrades in arms might themselves be an enemy. When I was
subjected to what can only be called an inappropriate gynecological
exam at the downtown Oakland recruiting station, I was too
intimidated to speak up for myself.
The Marine Corps settlement is a start. But is doesn't go far enough.
A piece of paper posted on a wall in a few recruitment centers won't
solve this problem. Female enlistment, making women now 20 percent of
the entire military force, is likely to grow.
Unfortunately, the abuse in the recruitment system is prescient of
military service, where a third of women who serve will be raped by
fellow soldiers. It's high time that girls courted by military
recruiters are kept out of harm's way here at home.
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