Today's Washington Times editorial, “The New Gay Army on parade,” is so well-stuffed with misinformation about the Pentagon's report on the military's ban on openly gay service, that it is best to simply review the piece from front to back. From the editorial, emphasis added:

The Pentagon on Tuesday released a long-awaited report intended to advance a key campaign promise made by then-Sen. Obama to the fringe activist groups that supported his presidential aspirations. Now as commander in chief, President Obama has made it clear to military brass that he expects them to embrace the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered) agenda. It should come as no surprise that the release of the military's new “Don't Ask, Don't Tell” survey was carefully orchestrated to accomplish this mission.

Contrary to the Times' suggestion that only “fringe activist groups” support repeal, polling shows widespread public support, including Republican support, and military leaders and notable Republicans who support repeal include Dick Cheney, Robert Gates, Admiral Mike Mullen, and Colin Powell. Moving on. From the editorial:

From the outset, the Pentagon had no interest in eliciting honest responses from the troops about whether the law outlawing homosexual conduct in the ranks should be preserved or repealed. Instead, soldiers, airmen, sailors and Marines were addressed in terms implying that repeal is inevitable. The Obama administration leaked selected results to sympathetic media to create the illusion that the troops have no problem stacking the barracks and submarines with homosexuals. The final report's release is a last-ditch effort to provide Democratic members of Congress the cover they need to ram through the law's repeal in the lame-duck session.

As made clear in the report, the survey was never meant to directly ask service members whether or not DADT should be repealed. From page 17 of the report, emphasis added:

To be clear, the Service member survey did not ask the broad question whether Don't Ask, Don't Tell should be repealed. This would, in effect, have been a referendum, and it is not the Department of Defense's practice to make military policy decisions by a referendum of Service members. But, among the 103 questions in the Service member survey and the 44 questions in the spouse survey were numerous opportunities to express, in one way or another, support for or opposition to repeal of the current policy. Among the 72,000 online inbox submissions were numerous expressions both for and against the current policy. If the impact of repeal was predominately negative, that would have revealed itself in the course of our review.

Next, we learn that the survey was somehow skewed to minimize the voice of combat veterans. From the editorial:

It isn't going to work. A closer examination of the headline result shows that 63 percent of respondents live off-base or in civilian housing and consequently answered that a change in policy might not affect them. Those in combat roles - where unit cohesion and trust are life-and-death concerns - gave a different response. About half with combat experience said a change would have a negative or very negative impact in the field or at sea. Among Marine combat troops, two-thirds said combat readiness would suffer.

Perhaps that's why the working group held 51 “information exchange forums” at bases only in the United States, Germany and Japan. Minimizing the views of those serving in combat situations in Iraq and Afghanistan helped further dilute the potential for a negative response.

While higher percentages of troops with combat experience and those in combat arms unit predict a negative outcome, those distinctions disappear when data is gathered from service members with actual experience in a unit with personnel believed to be gay or lesbian. How many times does this need to be said before it sinks in? From page 6 of the report, emphasis added:

Given that we are in a time of war, the combat arms communities across all Services required special focus and analysis. Though the survey results demonstrate a solid majority of the overall U.S. military who predict mixed, positive or no effect in the event of repeal, these percentages are lower, and the percentage of those who predict negative effects are higher, in combat arms units. For example, in response to question 68a, while the percentage of the overall U.S. military that predicts negative or very negative effects on their unit's ability to “work together to get the job done” is 30%, the percentage is 43% for the Marine Corps, 48% within Army combat arms units, and 58% within Marine combat arms units.

However, while a higher percentage of Service members in warfighting units predict negative effects of repeal, the percentage distinctions between warfighting units and the entire military are almost non-existent when asked about the actual experience of serving in a unit with someone believed to be gay. For example, when those in the overall military were asked about the experience of working with someone they believed to be gay or lesbian, 92% stated that their unit's “ability to work together,” was “very good, ”good" or “neither good nor poor.” Meanwhile, in response to the same question, the percentage is 89% for those in Army combat arms units and 84% for those in Marine combat arms units--all very high percentages. Anecdotally, we heard much the same. As one special operations force warfighter told us, “We have a gay guy [in the unit]. He's big, he's mean, and he kills lots of bad guys. No one cared that he was gay.”

As for the Times' assertion that the location of information exchange forums (IEF) somehow undermines the opinions of troops with combat experience, it is patently, demonstrably, and clearly false, as large populations of troops based in the U.S. are veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Further, using the locations of IEFs as an indication of skewed survey results is absurd: the survey questions were developed after the IEFs. From pages 34-36 of the report, emphasis added:

At the Secretary's direction, IEFs were not conducted in Iraq and Afghanistan to avoid interference with the missions there. However, at installations such as Fort Hood, Fort Bragg, Fort Benning, Camp Lejeune, and elsewhere, we encountered large numbers of Service members who had deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan one or more times, or were preparing to deploy. These Service members shared their perspectives concerning the impact of repeal in combat situations and deployed environments.

[...]

The Service member survey was developed by representatives from the Working Group, Westat, the Defense Manpower Data Center, and the Services' survey offices. The survey questions were devised to address each area of the Terms of Reference, as well as additional topics of concern (e.g., privacy) that were identified through our IEFs and other engagements with the forces.

Among the “other engagements with the forces” was an “Online Inbox,” an anonymous electronic system by which service members could submit their comments and concerns to the Working Group. From page 35 of the report, emphasis added:

The Working Group established this mechanism to allow all Service members and their families to anonymously express their views to the Working Group through a website accessible with a Common Access Card (CAC). Access to the online inbox was restricted to CAC holders to help ensure that comments were entered only by Service members. The Working Group also encouraged Service members to input comments provided by their family. To ensure the comments we received did not include identifying information (other than rank and Service), the Working Group contracted with the Data Recognition Corporation to redact names, units, and other similar information prior to providing the comments to the Working Group. In all, the Working Group received 72,384 total comments about Don't Ask, Don't Tell via the online inbox, with 98% (70,732) of these comments from Service members. Among Service member comments, 70% were from the enlisted ranks.

So, to review, the IEFs were a method to develop the survey questions, and in doing so the Working Group engaged many troops with combat experience. Any interested service member could anonymously submit questions to the Working Group. Despite all of that, the Times expects you to believe that the Defense Secretary's direction that the IEFs be held only outside of active war zones somehow indicates a vast left-wing gay rights agenda parade within the Department of Defense. Further, nearly 70 percent of respondents had combat experience. From page 162 of the report:

What will the Times say next, that a full one-fourth of service members will leave the force post repeal? From the editorial:

Only 6 percent of troops said repeal would improve either recruitment or morale, and about a quarter said they would leave the military early if the repeal is signed into law.

[...]

In contrast, allowing open homosexual conduct would only “benefit” a tiny - but loud - minority. Since 2005, only 1 percent of those booted from the military were kicked out for violating the “Don't Ask, Don't Tell” rules. It's dangerous to cater to this handful at the expense of hundreds of thousands of troops who, according to the results, would begin planning their exit from the military if the policy were changed. This nation's defenses shouldn't be so weakened.

Are you kidding? This was equally absurd when Oliver North popped up on Fox to claim that repeal would mean a return to the draft. 12.6 percent of surveyed service members answered that they would leave sooner than they had planned. 11.1 percent said they would think about leaving sooner. That adds up 22.7 if every single service member who said they would leave early actually did, and if every person who said they would think about leaving early made the decision to leave early, and then actually did so. Which, historically, does not happen. Despite much stronger resistance to repeal indicated in similar polls among British and Canadian troops, recruitment and retention were not hurt.

There's not an honest argument in this editorial, but that's not unexpected from a paper with a long history of absurd homophobic ramblings.