Military is OK with Confederate flag — for now

Oriana Pawlyk and Andrew deGrandpre | Military Times

Show Caption Hide Caption The history of the Confederate Flag With the current debate surrounding the removal of the Confederate flag on South Carolina state capital grounds we look at the history of the flag, as well as how some states have incorporated the controversial flag into their own state flags.

The Confederate cause is deeply ingrained in American military history, making the country's current debate over whether to retire the "rebel flag" all the more pertinent to service members who view it as important to their heritage — important enough to display in their workplaces or even as tattoos.

After last week's racially motivated slaying of nine African Americans in a South Carolina church, the flag has become a target for those who consider it a symbol of hatred, a strident reminder of slavery and of the divisiveness that fueled America's Civil War.

Major U.S. retailers, including Walmart and Amazon, have said they'll no longer sell Confederate flag merchandise. States throughout the South are under pressure to remove it from government facilities, with Alabama doing exactly that Wednesday. And officials at South Carolina's historic military academy the Citadel voted to remove the Confederate Naval Jack from its campus chapel.

The Defense Department, which enforces strict policies prohibiting hate speech, inappropriate tattoos and the display of offensive material, is making no such gestures, a spokesman told Military Times.

"It's not something the department is reviewing," the official said. Such regulations, he added, remain "under the purview" of the four individual services.

Those regulations are clear when it comes to tattoos and office paraphernalia deemed overtly racist, sexist, extremist or derogatory. They're not permitted — period.

Less clear is how the individual services' senior leaders intend to respond, if at all, to the anti-Confederate groundswell.

Gen. Daniel Allyn, the Army's vice chief of staff, understands the flag's historical significance within the military. The Civil War, and the decades leading up to it, was a difficult period, he said during an interview Thursday at the Pentagon.

"I think that, when you are a student of military history, let's face it: One of our greatest military generals in the history of our nation was Robert E. Lee," Allyn said, referring to the legendary Confederate commander.

At Army posts throughout the country, there are "thousands of battle pictorials of Grant and Lee going up against each other with their requisite flags," he added, noting Lee's Union counterpart, Gen. Ulysses Grant, who later became America's 18th president. "So yes, you will find those resident. And if those are offensive to people, I'm sure that our commanders will deal with that.

"We swear our allegiance to the flag of the United States of America," Allyn said, " and we will protect and defend that flag."

It's a complex issue for the military, said Craig Warren, a Pennsylvania college professor who has authored two books on the Civil War. While the Confederate battle flag's origin is a "military symbol of a slave-holding republic determined to preserve and prolong institutionalized racism," he said it has taken on other meanings over time.

"For many Americans, the flag came to represent the South as a region," he said. "For many white Southerners today, it still symbolizes regional pride. For others, it represents a particular interpretation of Southern history. For still others, it represents rural life. And for many others, the flag represents rebellion against authority, whether motivated by politics or simple mischief."

Service members may embrace it for any of those reasons, he said, adding that to ban it within the military would be "controversial."

"It would need to be acknowledged that not everyone who displays the flag does so with racist intent," Warren said. "Owing to the flag's documented history and ongoing life as a symbol of hatred and racial violence, it could be explained that the flag undermines the American armed forces' commitment to inclusivity, mutual respect and the defense of all Americans.

"Ban without an educational initiative, one that simply associates the battle flag with swastikas and other racist imagery, would needlessly and predictably inspire more controversy."

Today, more than 40% of all military recruits come from the South, according to Defense Department statistics. By comparison, fewer than 15% are natives of the Northeast.

Moreover, there are military facilities everywhere in the South. More than one-third of the nation's troops — about 420,000 — are based in Virginia, Texas, North Carolina and Georgia alone.

When questions were raised Wednesday about the 10 Army posts named for Confederate leaders, officials once again pointed to those individuals' historical relevance. All Army installations are named that way, said Brig. Gen. Malcolm B. Frost, the service's chief of public affairs. It has nothing to do with "causes or ideologies," he said.

"It should be noted," Frost added, "that the naming occurred in the spirit of reconciliation, not division."

As USA Today reported on Wednesday, Army National Guard units in Southern states also continue to embrace their Civil War legacy via campaign streamers, the cloth flag tassels that denote their participation in specific battles. In South Carolina, which has become ground zero in the Confederate flag debate, 16 of the Army Guard's 150 flag streamers date back to the Confederacy, Lt. Col. Cindi King said.

"These streamers signify the unit's history and honors the lives lost on the campaign," said King, the command's spokeswoman. "It is not within the jurisdiction or authority of a unit to remove or change a streamer."

Chuck Porter, a Marine Corps veteran who served during the 1990s, said service members tend to have intense pride in their home states or communities. Already heavily tattooed, Porter has been thinking about adding another — one depicting South Carolina — to commemorate his home state.

The Confederate flag, he said, is "almost decorative."

"It doesn't have any real meaning for me. ... I get the sentiment from people that this is a bad thing; but it's also our history," said Porter, marketing director at Ranger Up, a military apparel retailer.

Still, if troops want to stamp themselves with the the Confederate battle flag, he said, it likely will come back to haunt them.

"The lens through which people are looking at that flag is the same lens that people are using to look at a (Nazi-era) swastika," he said, adding that it wouldn't surprise him if the Defense Department addressed the matter once the hype dies down several months from now.

That's not inconceivable. The military in recent years has taken several deliberate steps to become more inclusive — from repeal of "don't ask don't tell," the Clinton-era policy barring openly gay men and women from military service, to gender integration and the all-out war on sexual assault.

Race also has been a focus, with each of the services seeking to boost minority representation, particularly in the officer ranks. However, there have been race-related setbacks as well.

In May, for instance, lawmakers representing Asian, black and Hispanic congressional caucuses demanded the Pentagon address reports of widespread racial hazing within an Alaska-based Army unit. An investigation substantiated just one allegation, dismissing the others as "racial jokes."

Also within the last year, African-American women serving in the Army and the Navy challenged what they called prejudicial regulations governing hairstyles. The Army amended its policy as a result. The Navy separated a woman who refused to cut off her dreadlocks and conform to policy, but later relaxed rules for a hairstyle popular with black women.

If the Pentagon elects to restrict display of the Confederate flag, troops will support the move, said Warren, the Civil War scholar.

"Ultimately," he added, "I imagine that most service men and women, regardless of race, would accept the restriction as one meant to unify rather than to divide."