Silence = Relief.

• Author: WEBB, ANDREW

Do gays in the military prefer the closet?

BOB (NOT HIS REAL NAME) WAS AN active-duty Navy petty officer when I met him at the HIV ward of San Diego's Naval Medical Center in 1991. He was there for the semi-annual check-up given to all HIV-positive military personnel; I was a former Coast Guard officer working for the University of California at San Diego, recruiting volunteers for a rigorous HIV study.

Sexual transmission of HIV from female to male is extremely rare, and random drug tests make IV-drug use an almost impossible transmission route for the virus among servicemembers. Nonetheless--because of regulations requiring all gay military personnel to be discharged--we lived a bizarre fiction that all the alumni (as the HIV-positive personnel call themselves) were heterosexual, and the HIV-ward staff rigorously adhered to a tacit "don't ask, don't tell" policy even before it existed. But for the most part, the alumni seldom opened up about being gay, believing that nothing said to anyone on the Defense Department payroll was privileged.

Perhaps sensing a kindred spirit, though, servicemen would often let me know they were gay during screening interviews. I was thus flattered to find myself in all kinds of conversations the alumni didn't feel comfortable having with other military personnel. Bob was one of those with whom I had far-ranging discussions. He came from a large Catholic family in Massachusetts and his father was a Marine. Like many active-duty members, Bob had joined the military right out of high school. When I met him, he had been in the Navy nearly 12 years and had been HIV-positive for about six. Before he was infected, he had almost been kicked out as a result of a witch hunt.

Given Bobs experience, I felt certain that he would be elated when, in 1991, presidential candidate Bill Clinton promised to repeal the ban on gay men and lesbians serving openly in the military. Instead, Bob was more worried about seeing the ban on gays repealed than about continuing to live under the existing policy. The Navy was his career. If being closeted about his sexual orientation was the price of remaining in his chosen career, he was willing to pay it.

Eliminating the existing policy would have meant he could have military guests in his home without having to "straighten it up" beforehand or worry about being spotted in a gay bar, but Bob didn't see how it could be eliminated by flat without creating an unofficial backlash that would make the official witch hunts seem like picnics.

At that time, gay men and lesbians in uniform constituted a kind of secret society and generally protected each others' identities. In turn, the services for the most part didn't go out of their way to root them out. Bob seemed to sense that if the exclusionary policy were rescinded, solidarity would evaporate and he would be alone to face a more actively anti-gay military.

He also feared that other gay servicemembers would feel no need to maintain their previous silence and might innocently (or even maliciously) identify those who preferred to remain closeted. And suspicions about who might be gay, widespread homophobia, and a new focus on homosexuality. (fueled by all the practical problems rescission of the policy would cause) was a volatile combination Bob feared would erupt in violence.

As I became friends with more of the alumni, I found that Bobs feelings were shared by most of them. Their position surprised me, because until then, I had pretty much taken the activist line that the policy should be eliminated. My viewpoint was born out of the grudge I carried for years after losing my job as a civilian intelligence analyst at the National Security Agency because of my sexual orientation. But the pragmatism of my gay acquaintances and friends in the military trumped my resentful ideology and convinced me that the time wasn't right for such a change in 1991, and that it's still not right today. Clinton's promise to eliminate the gay ban was deeply misguided, and in part because of his supporters' failure to take into account the feelings of servicemembers like Bob, the "don't ask, don't tell" policy has proven to be a disaster for its intended beneficiaries.

The accession of a Republican to the presidency may seem a major defeat to those who would like all restrictions related to gays serving in the military removed. But many active-duty gay people may actually be relieved that the issue is unlikely to surface during the next four years, relieved to return to a regime that has an out-of-sight-out-of-mind...