Military dismisses 6 gay Arabic linguists amid shortage of translators

AP ^ | 11-14-02

[thucydides]

Years ago the practice was when army personnel working in this area were discovered to be gay, to discharge them. Thereupon they were hired as civilian DOD employees and returned to the same job with a substantial raise.

[El Gato]

Is there some reason translations can't be done by civilian support personnel?

Most are, but it's hard to get civilians to deploy to places where they might get shot at. And at least some ammount of translation must be done in those areas. Captured documents, intercepted communications, that sort of thing.

Not all civilians of course, but the sort that might have Arabic language skills are likely to be of the sort that wouldn't want to deploy.

[CapedCrusader]

The army discharges far more adulterers than it does gays.

Is this true? Can you refer to sources?

[El Gato]

if they are just used for document translations.

But hey aren't. They monitor intercepted radio transmissions, interpret for commanders dealing with the locals, and translate captured documents. All of which must be done "on site" as it were. On site being at least nearby where the bullets are flying and the motor shells and rockets are falling.

[TexKat]

What, get oudda here!! They must have been sending the wrong message.

[Clint N. Suhks]

Is this any more disruptive than male and female office rats being attracted to one another?

To compare right behavior with wrong behavior is ludicrous and disordered. Let’s see how it works with other paraphilic pathologies, shall we?

Is this any more disruptive than male mother and female adult son office rats being attracted to one another?

Is this any more disruptive than male man and female sheep office rats being attracted to one another?

Is this any more disruptive than male man and female consenting 12 year old office rats being attracted to one another?

Yep, it works every time.

[DeathfromBelow]

My Daughter was a Persian Linguist. They don't all hang out in offices, the back to back tours to Saudi Arabia made her get out. These Linguists serve in AWACS aircraft, in forward deployed units as well as windowless offices. Bottom line is you sux, you shouldn't serve.

[SunTzuWu]

Seven of the soldiers were discharged after telling superiors they are gay...

These guys weren't outed, they told their superiors that they were gay. It sounds like they were trying to start something. What better way to strike a blow (no pun) for gays in the military than using the WOT to frame the issue.

[TexKat]

Hey, hold up big uh, thats not what those sticks of dynamite is for.

[Clint N. Suhks]

we've gotta EXPAND BIGOTRY!

Umm…There’s no such thing as BIGOTRY against a behavior, otherwise I’ll bet you’re an incest bigot. Am I right?

[Prodigal Son]

Is there some reason translations can't be done by civilian support personnel? That would moot the whole issue.

Security clearance. Linguists are Military Intelligence. They have access to secret squirrel stuff. Civilians can get it (clearance) but military linguists should be deployable to combat zones, at least in some numbers, or else what's the point?

There's different levels of linguists as well, from my understanding, depending how well they did in the DLI. Simultaneous translation is apparantly the hardest level. Other people do well dealing with written material but not as well with the spoken language. Some wind up being interrogators- others wind up sitting in front of radios and listening to enemy transmissions.

Don't take any of what I say as "the word" though. I had the option to become a linguist (I did well on the test) when I joined but wanted to be infantry instead. I've garnered what little I know from talking to people who went to the DLI.

[CapedCrusader]

But it makes absolute zero sense to dismiss and, by extension, discourage people who want to serve their country as linguists, especially these days when we know that our intel concerning the Arab world in the days prior to 9-11 was about as good as....well, not so good.

[Schmedlap]

You are incorrectly assuming the criteria of the comparison. It was based on disruption caused by the friction stemming from office romances in the military, not your arbitrary notions of right and wrong behavior. Since sheep and 12-year-olds are in the ranks of the armed forces, those comparisons are of no significance. Not sure if there are rules regarding a mother and son.

[livius]

I have a friend who was an Arabic linguist in the Army (not gay!). He knew no Arabic when he started, was put through the course, and then was able to handle himself quite well as he accompanied higher ranking officers around the Middle East.

Still, this is a far cry from being native fluent, and if we're talking about interpreting live conversations, I think there are few non-native speakers who could train for a couple of years and then do it. You have to live in an area, understand its misuse of its own language, its slang, etc. Perhaps we should recruit from among Americans who have spent time, perhaps in business, in those areas, or even scholars who have a more in-depth understanding of the language (assuming we could find any who are loyal to the US!).

That said, I don't see why the US couldn't start a program to train already existing professional translators of other languages in Arabic at least to the point where they could transcribe and translate intercept tapes, rapidly and accurately translate news and other reports, etc. (I'm a professional translator, btw.)

Train them at government expense and then hire them THROUGH EXISTING TRANSLATION AGENCIES. That is, the agency gets the contract, has to provide quality control and rapid turn around, and there is also a randomness in assignment that prevents a potential traitor from getting in there and intentionally mis-translating a document.

I believe that there was some evidence that this had happened prior to 9/11, and I think the only way to prevent it is to have so much randomness in the process that no one could know enough about it to get in there and distort it.

Information is very important, and we've got to think of better ways of obtaining it than through a handful of military recruits and a bunch of "native speakers" of dubious loyalty.

[FreedomCalls]

So, 67% of gay linguists are Arabic

Odd bunch of numbers, unless they are running from the impending war with Iraq. Perhaps they saw the war coming and not wanting to find their butts in combat decided an easy way out is to go with the gay thing to get an early out (like Klinger in MASH). This would explain the high Arabic numbers as opposed to other languages.

What other languages do they train there anyway? I doubt if they have very many Latin students.

[Prodigal Son]

But it makes absolute zero sense to dismiss and, by extension, discourage people who want to serve their country as linguists,

These would be linguists would be given secret and top secret security clearances. The "don't ask don't tell" policy couldn't be much clearer. They couldn't abide by that policy for whatever reason (most likely an activist/political reason)- clearly if they had no respect for the simplest of orders and policies they could never be trusted with the security clearance. With the current military policy they could be gay and be in the military. They just can't advertise the fact. That's a very simple guideline. These guys knew they were going to be given the boot and it is entirely their own doing.

[Clint N. Suhks]

not your arbitrary notions of right and wrong behavior

Arbitrary? Maybe in your bazaaro world but I’m pretty sure society still holds these behaviors as wrong. As for your arbitrary criteria of Office Only romance I see you have no answer for incest as well as the openly practicing bestial or pedophile and their “sexual orientations”. Are you telling me the military has no problem with them whether at home or office?

[luvtheconstitution]

touche

[Slyfox]

No, this is a gay rights issue.

No, it is not a 'gay right's issue'. The policy is as follows quoting the article:

The military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy allows gays to serve provided they keep quiet about their sexual orientation.

So, in reality, the military is saying: "We won't ask you and you don't tell us that you are gay. But, if you tell us and/or we find out that you have not kept your hands to yourself, you are outta here."