The Post & Email by Joseph DeMaio 2/11/2021
The newly-minted Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, has issued a memo to the entirety of the nation’s military force commanders. That memo states as its objective a one-day “stand-down,†to be identified by individual commanders, sometime between Feb. 5, 2021 and April 5, 2021. On that day, “discussions†are to be held with military personnel under their command
(Stand-Down to Address Extremism in the Ranks (defense.gov)). The topic of the discussions will be the importance of identifying and preventing “actions that go against the fundamental principles of the oath we share, including actions associated with extremist or dissident ideologies.â€
The terms “extremist†and “dissident ideologies†are not defined in the memo, but the memo references another document – an “Instruction†paper identified as the “Department of Defense Instruction (DoDI) 1325.06, ‘Handling Dissident and Protest Activities Among Members of the Armed Forces’ which is said in the Austin memo to “provide the core tenets to support such discussions.†These tenets are not bad goals but instead provide a useful guide to maintaining necessary order and discipline in the military. So far, so good.
Interestingly, the Instruction came into being largely as a result of the 2009 Ft. Hood, Texas massacre carried out by Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan. Recall that the reason the death toll (13) and wounded (over 30 others) was so high was because Ft. Hood commanders had ordered that no military personnel on base were allowed to carry personal sidearms.
More:
https://www.thepostemail.com/2021/02/11/the-coming-military-stand-down/
