Black Enlistment In Military Plummets

After Years Of Being Armed Forces' Backbone, Many Refuse To Serve Because Of Bush, Iraq

(CBS)  It's a new tradition for some old leathernecks: the second annual reunion of black Marines. In reality, it's not that old a tradition because there weren't any black Marines before World War II.

That's when blacks were first allowed into the Corps, but had to train at a segregated base at Montfort Point, N.C. Some of those old-timers joined younger Marines at the reunion in Las Vegas.

American blacks had to fight for the right to fight in segregated units in World War II. It wasn't just the Montfort Point Marines, but also the famed Tuskegee Airmen and Buffalo Soldiers. Blacks continued to sign up in great numbers for Korea, Vietnam and beyond.

Retired commander Gregory Black was a Navy diver for most of his 21 years in the service. In Maryland, he runs a year-old Web site, BlackMilitaryWorld.com, which chronicles what African-Americans have contributed to the armed services of this country.

"Once we joined the military, when the call went out that we had to fight, we fought," he told CBS News correspondent Bill Whitaker. "Above and beyond the call of duty because we had something to prove. What the military got was a ready source of young, eager, educated Americans who were eager to prove themselves."

African-Americans made up 13 percent of the total population, but comprised a full quarter of the military service.

"African-Americans have been the backbone of the ground forces of the military since World War II," Black said.

And African-Americans have gotten plenty back, too.

"The blacks in the military look at the military as a source of self-improvement and, most important, as a source of economics," Black said.

And a source of several generations of black leaders and role models -- a theme that rang through the reunion. Master Gunnery Sergeant Robert Council has three tours in Iraq under his belt. He said he would advise young black people to look at the military as a way to get on the right track.

"If you don't have no direction right now in your life, and your life is at a standstill and you don't know where you're going ... you need a foundation, and [the armed services] helps you establish that foundation," he said.

Former Staff Sergeant Bonita Williams, who served in the Marines, agrees.

"If you believe in this country, then you should be willing to go over and fight for it," she said.

But lately, the message has been falling increasingly on deaf years. African-Americans aren't signing up like they used to.

Just in the last several years, enlistment by blacks in the Army, for example, is down by about half, which means Army recruiter Sgt. Tulsa Scales has his work cut out for him. He is burning up shoe leather in the South Los Angeles area to remind African-Americans the Army can be a ticket to a bright future.

"If they say they want a career, that means we're going to talk about a career," he said. "If they say 'I want college money,' like myself, I wanted college money. That's the thing the recruiter talked to me about: college money."

The Department of Defense has studied why black enlistment has plummeted and found many of the people they call "influencers" in the black community -- parents, teachers, clergy -- feel in general that Bush administration policies have hurt African-Americans. And more than any other group, they oppose the war in Iraq.

Take 10th grader Maceo Sheffield, for example. He loves his Junior ROTC class at Los Angeles' Fairfax High School.

"I enjoy learning about respect and discipline," Maceo said. "I like the Army. I love America."

But first Maceo will have to get past his parents, Maceo Sr., and Terry Crayton, who sounds like the overwhelming majority of blacks in the Pentagon survey:

"If I was 17 or 18 years old and had that option, I would not go into the service," Sheffield said. "It's not our war."

"Exactly who are we fighting?" Crayton said. "What are we fighting for? What are we going to get out of this war?"

Other "influencers" the military pointed to include teachers, like Jamal Speakes at Los Angeles' Dorsey High. Speakes tells his students times have changed, and they don't need the military any more to get an education and a career.

"I think it is my social responsibility as a teacher, as a father, as a mentor, as person who will call themselves a role model, to give those kids the information, so they can make a well-rounded choice on what they want to do after high school," he said.

One of his students, Erica Lampkin, says she thinks she can make a difference by getting an education.

"I feel that going to college and becoming somebody, I think that's showing love to my country. Because I can change something, I can make a difference, I can change my community," she said.

"A lot of what we're seeing is, they're not falling in line with their grandfathers and uncles whose only option was the military," Speakes said.

Back in Las Vegas, some of these grandfathers and uncles who served proudly themselves worry about the ranks of black officers thinning down the road. If blacks continue to shun the military and shun the combat roles and ratings, then there won't be any future leaders -- black leaders -- in the military.

But even here, there are gung-ho Marines troubled by this war. Albert Thames retired as a staff sergeant 30 years ago.

"The war is very unpopular, and it's going to get worse," he said. "As long as it's a volunteer army, I'd tell 'em not to volunteer."

An old combat vet who loves the military, Pearl Harbor survivor Skip Davis, who spent 10 years in the Navy and 20 in the Marines, has mixed feelings.

"The 'yes' part: the money's good," he said. "And the 'no' part is going to Iraq. That's the 'no' part. I wouldn't go if I didn't have to."

And that's the attitude Army Recruiter Sergeant Scales does battle with day after day. So he hits the streets and works the phones, talking up the Army's many non-combat jobs.

"OK, what's the thing you're scared of the Army?" he said over the phone to a potential recruit. "Gotta go to war? So if you didn't have to go to war, then would you join the Army?"

[brianbwb-2009]

As a 50 year old civilian who actively opposed Vietnam, I comment because I am an American, and thus don''t feel the need to earn a right guaranteed by the constitution, a right that many of my heroes, like Dr. King, Malcolm X, Medgar Evars, and Muhammad Ali sacrificed their lives and freedoms to secure for us.

Maybe the reason that "Black" Americans volunteer in fewer numbers is because today''s wars are not about protecting the country, but are an illegal extension of economic foreign policy, protecting the agendas of corporations that still won''t pay us equal wages, exrend us equal capital for equal qualifications, etc., etc.

The lies that are used to demonize "the enemy" were once used against "Black" Americans, and the song is all too familiar, we''ve heard them before, hence we don''t believe them now, and will not die for the profit margins of people who still regard us as "second class."

[nightliter]

Whatithink - I don''t feel guilty for anything, especially for being white, unlike you perhaps.
The story was a predictable propaganda piece that would NEVER have been written unless a WhiteLiberal agenda could be presented, that being of course the constant reminders of white racism and how yet even today the "poor black man" is being used by the evil White Master Bush to fight in a far-off land against other oppressed people of color, laying the groundwork for the slew of anti-white comments from the usual Racists-of-Color and the Politically-Corrected Whites urinating over themselves.
NO, this society is going NOWHERE as long as whites like you can''t stop urinating over yourselves and handwringing about how evil whites are and/or a non-white like yourself can''t WAIT to jump in and proclaim your hatred for whitey.

[iceman_1960]

Bush politicizes Veterans Day:

"Marking his fifth Veterans Day since the invasion of Iraq, President Bush honored U.S. troops past and present at a tearful ceremony Sunday for four Texans who died in the war-torn country.

"In their sorrow, these families need to know -- and families all across our nation of the fallen -- need to know that your loved ones served a cause that is good and just and noble," Bush said. "And as their commander in chief, I make you this promise: Their sacrifice will not be in vain." (- CNN)

Bush just keeps getting lower and lower.

[battyellison]

They fought for the right in WWII but wasn''t allowed to even come home and still get lynched and beaten by the people they were fighting for but the jewish community never thank them for fighting for them when blacks were being trated here in america like Hitler was treating them but somehow thats left out of the history books

[zootallures2]

They Fought For The Right To Fight


to be controlled

As a 21 year Black Marine veteran who fought through two tours in Viet Nam, I think I%u2019ve EARNED the right to comment, unlike some on this forum. Blacks no longer flock to the military simply because there is more opportunity in civilian life than in past years. I would encourage ANY young folks to FIRST go to college, take ROTC, earn a commission and THEN go into the military.

If you are NOT going to college, I HIGHLY recommend the Corps, for discipline, training, leadership and a future, whether in or out of uniform. Whether we are at war should not be the basis for a career decision, many jobs are even more dangerous. Yet I felt differently about the draft, and youngsters being drafted to go fight and die in Viet Nam, a bogus war, much like our current one.

When the security of this country is SERIOUSLY at risk, I think we will see whites, blacks, hispanics and everyone else ready to defend our way of life. Thanks for the story, as a Montford Point Association member, and one of the Marines present at the 2nd Annual Black Marine Reunion, I appreciated it deeply.

[timji01]

It,s no surprise CBS News would take any possible opportunity to bash the war and of course Bush using Blacks in the military as their vehicle. Over the next few years CBS will be given another lesson in free market economics whereby their left wing bias will work against them to continually diminish market share. Liberalism and the Welfare state have almost destroyed Black family and culture in the US. Today they''d rather kill each other in the streets over drugs than endure the rigors and discipline of military life. Instead of military life which might help to offer a way out of this morass, they''ve chosen crack,out-of-wedlock marriage and prison as their more attractive options.

[fibonacci_]

The fought for the fight to fight.

[jsmith1233]

SeaRation:
Have you ever said that to all those neocons and government tough guys like GWBush, *** Cheney who got us into IRAQ?

Anybody who is not willing to fight for their freedom doesn''t deserve any of the benefits that freedom grants!

[whatithink-2009]

nightliter,

Our country will never progress as long as the likes of you spend so much time fighting the fear that you have of feeling guilty. Nobody is asking you to feel guilty. The story is what it is. If you don''t want people talking about history, you should find a time machine and go back in time to change it.

[whatithink-2009]

MichaelT302,

There are so many good black kids out there. So many. There are also many black kids now serving in our armed forces (30% of the armed forces), fighting a war in a country that did nothing to us, while there is still work to do in our country.

[krenz4]

same old disrespectful *** from the likes of you Michael T. Read a book, find out that the "facts" you quote, apply more to whites than to blacks. By the way, why arent you signing up and honoring your grandfather? Black children dont have the same choice? Hmmm....... I guess whites dont have out of wedlock babies, smoke crack or go to prison. They are all lining up to fight for their country......arent they??

[nightliter]

Never a story that doesn''t get spun into a "Hate Whitey" angle to draw out the Racists-of-Color who pretend to be so concerned about "racism" yet their only concern is to disply their OWN racism.
Nice going CBS...

[gkc99]

The White elite that kept their jackboot on the neck of Blacks, Indians, and Latinos didn''t disappear. They''re still around. Bushit the Elder voted against the Civil Rights Act of 1964. His son was too busy snorting coke and boozing it up to remember, but he''s a twig off the old poison ivy.

[g-gfather]

What is the price for a slave today. The recuiter can give you a quote. Who will do the bidding? Massa/Bush&Co.? You got hell at home, why make hell for someone else just like you because Massa says so?Proud to be black? How about being proud of something you had something to do with like not selling yourselves as mercenaries to enrichen the man.Bless you all my brother and sister americans.LOVE=PEACE.WE ARE NOT CANNON FODDER,MR.Bush. Greatgrandfather.

[nsadmi]

You know a day like this, why do you send your second comand to lay the wreath on a day to honor the Vet''s Day . And he is at ranch in texas, what is more important.

[abigail70]

"...because many disagree with Bush administration policies and the war in Iraq."

- and partially, as my nephew just did, because the judge handed down a ruling to either go into the military to straighten out an f''ed up life, or go to jail. What BS to think that all black folks who join the military do so because they disagree with Bush.

[runningralph]

Adversity makes better stronger people. Welfare makes weaker more foolish people.

[michaelt302]

They fought for the right to fight, and now their grandkids smoke crack, have 5 babies a year out of wedlock, and compete to see who can get to prison fastest. Hey, nice way to honor your grandparents, kids!