Military Soft On Don't Ask, Don't Tell?

60 Minutes: Is Military More Tolerant Of Gay Members In Wartime?

(CBS)  "We aren't the Brits. We're not the Europeans. We're not the Swedes," says Republican Congressman Duncan Hunter, who is the ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee.

Hunter argues that gays do not belong in the U.S. military because American troops need to be hardened warriors, unlike soldiers in the 15 NATO countries where gays serve openly.

"The Fallujahs of the world, the Ramadis of the world that require heavy combat and lots of fire-fighting capability - those are the places the Americans go. The other countries tend to go to the so-called peacekeeper zones, where they have fewer fire fights and less contact with the enemy," Hunter says. "And the European nations show little will to send large contingents of their military people into dangerous places."

West responds: "I think American troops are very brave and I think British troops are very brave. But we do it in a little bit of probably a quieter way generally, you know? We don't have to go 'Huh, huh, huh' and shave our heads off and shake hands very hard. You can still kill someone without having to do that."

"But there is a culture of conservatism and macho-ness that goes way back," Stahl remarks.

"You read about the Spartans, they were all homosexuals, the whole lot of them," West says. "And I don't think anyone would suggest for a second that the 500 Spartans fighting against the Persian Army were not pretty macho."

But introducing openly gay troops into gung-ho U.S. combat units could be difficult. That David Santos, the Arabic interpreter, was gay was no secret at his home base in Georgia, but he went back into the closet when he was assigned to a combat unit of Marines in Fallujah.

"When it comes to those kind of places, there's a lot of homophobic remarks made," Santos says.

Like what?

"Never directed at me," he says. "Just anything that a high schooler would say negatively about a homosexual."

Santos says the remarks weren't aimed at him because he was in the closet at that point, but that he heard remarks "all over the place."

"Are you guys being a little naïve? I mean there is hostility. David's the only one of you who's admitted it so far. But there is," Stahl asks Chlapowski, Lorandos and Fricke.

"I never experienced hostility," Chlapowski says.

"Yeah, but you know it's there," she says.

"Oh sure it is. Sure it's there. But there's also still sexism in the Army. There's still racism in the Army. It still exists," Chlapowski says. "But you have harassment policies to cover that."

Harassment policies notwithstanding, Steve Lorandos, the submariner, Brian Fricke, the Marine, and Jarrod Chlapowski, the Army linguist, did not re-enlist because of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," like an estimated 4,000 other gay soldiers a year. After David Santos was caught chatting about being gay on a government computer, he was discharged.

Rep. Hunter says with the Pentagon starting to meet its recruiting goals, now is not the time for change. "Would we risk doing away with this system that works, where American families sit around the dinner table and they make a decision that their young man or their young woman is going to go into this military because they share the values of that military. Or should we experiment at a time when our military is totally volunteer, when it’s extremely capable and perhaps lose that capability and perhaps lose those numbers? Perhaps lose those re-enlistments and perhaps lose that effectiveness?" he asks.

But Cholene Espinoza says "Wait a second. In 2006, the Army -- the only way they could meet the recruiting standards was to give waivers and allow convicted felons, lower mental standards, lower physical standards. We are giving twice the number to enlist of bonuses financially, three times to re-enlist. Thousands of gay people go out the door voluntarily."

"Like you," Stahl remarks.

"People like me. I'm gone. Never to come back. You spent $2 million training me to fly airplanes. Thank you very much. And what do you get for all this? What do we get as a country? Because we've thrown out an Arabic linguist or because we've thrown out a medic. Are we any safer? Are we anymore secure?" she asks.

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After this story aired last December, months went by and Sgt. Darren Manzella began to think the Army would let him continue to serve as an openly gay soldier. But recently, Sgt. Manzella was discharged from the Army for "making statements that you are a homosexual." A transcript of his 60 Minutes interview was attached to the discharge papers. Manzella, who served two tours in the Iraq war, was given an honorable discharge.