The Real Reason Military Recruitment is Failing

It’s no secret that the US military has repeatedly missed some or all of its recruitment goals over the past several years. Various reasons have been offered, ranging from low pay to low unemployment rates and better opportunities in the civilian world. Others have suggested that our endless wars in foreign lands act as disincentives to enlistment because of the higher risk that recruits will end up coming home in a body bag rather than reaching retirement. But during a recent hearing before the House Armed Services Committee, one Army veteran and former Senate candidate, Jake Bequette, offered a potentially more digestible rationale. Why would young people want to sign up to serve their country if the public school they attended spent years convincing them that our country is historically awful and unworthy of their service? It’s some bitter food for thought. (Washington Times)

Recently, Ashish Vazirani, the Pentagon‘s acting undersecretary for personnel and readiness, testified to the House Armed Services Committee that the U.S. military missed its 2023 recruiting goals by 41,000. 

Jake Bequette, an Army veteran and former U.S. Senate candidate from Arkansas, responded to this report by suggesting that no one should be surprised. Why? Because of what we’re teaching in our nation’s schools.

“In our education system today, so few young people are hearing real history,” Mr. Bequette said. “They’re hearing our American heroes being represented as evil racists … who were doing all these terrible things to disadvantaged people. And that really is shaping the views of America’s youth and making them have less respect for our institutions, have less respect for our history, and therefore making them less liable to want to put their lives potentially on the line to serve in our country’s military.” 

The Times cites some examples of public school and college malfeasance that most of you probably don’t need to be convinced of this. They point to a University of Minnesota professor named Melanie Yazzie who teaches her students that America is an occupying force that needs to be decolonized and dismantled to protect indigenous communities. A Milwaukee public school is sponsoring a program focusing on “restorative justice” and globalism while pushing “queer affirming” and “transgender affirming” experiences. 

More examples can be found around the nation and we’ve covered many of them here. You will recall that when the streets were filling up with angry, antisemitic, pro-Hamas protesters, the vast majority of them were young people. Many colleges and universities were represented. They don’t randomly pick up ideas like these in a vacuum. This sort of anti-American (and anti-Jewish) hatred has seeped into their culture and they’re hearing it from their instructors.

If you are taught that America is so completely awful and broken, why in the world would you volunteer to put on a uniform, pick up a rifle, and go fight against our enemies? You’re far more likely to invite our enemies into our homeland to do the job for you. Perhaps that’s why we have so much less pushback against the Biden border crisis from the youngest voters. They have been conditioned to believe that we probably had it coming.

It’s not as if there aren’t families out there trying to dismantle these trends. Traditional parents have been running for positions on school boards around the country and trying to flush out the leftist, globalist teachers who have been infecting our youth with all of this destructive rhetoric. That is no doubt why the Biden administration finds such parents so threatening and sends out the FBI to begin tracking them. When the White House responds to this “problem” by forcing the military to reduce standards and begin accepting transgender and “diverse” applicants, the situation is not improved.

Unfortunately, even if you booted all of those teachers today, the damage has already been done to far too many students and young adults. It could take an entire generation to get this country moving back toward its moral center. In the meantime, we will no doubt keep missing our recruitment goals. And our adversaries are watching all of this unfold with anticipation.