[Billthedrill]

It depends not on the military but on the underlying society, and that's as it should be. Certainly there were several known militaries in which it was common and in their parent societies it was treated differently than it is in modern Western ones. There are schools of historical revisionism ("Sparta Reconsidered" is one) that are attempting either to deny its presence or put it in a new perspective, but evidence in the classics abounds.

So the strict answer to the question is "is homosexuality always compatible with military service?" is demonstrably "no." The question "is homosexuality incompatible with current Western military practice?" is quite a different question and should be dealt with from the perspective of its acceptance in our society, and not those of days gone by. We're not Macedonians or Thebans or Corinthians or Spartans, after all.

[Alexander Rubin]

Excellent post.