A better way to prosecute military sex crimes

The incompetence of our military, in failing to reduce sexual abuse inside its ranks, is finally leading to a result the Pentagon has resisted. A law taking prosecution of sexual abusers out of the hands of commanders has more than 60 Senate co-sponsors.

The Pentagon’s ineffective response to the problem dates back to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. In 2004, reacting to reports of sexual abuse by troops in Iraq, he launched a review of abuse policies. In 2005 the Pentagon established the Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office.

Congress also tried. "Congress enacted 249 statutory requirements related to sexual assault prevention," an official of the Government Accountability Office testified at a March hearing of a Senate Armed Services Committee subcommittee, chaired by Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.). Gillibrand has sponsored a bill that proposes to take prosecution of these crimes away from commanders and give it to trained, independent military prosecutors, who would handle all serious crimes — not just sexual ones. Commanders would still control prosecution of military-unique offenses, like absence without leave.

In her office, Gillibrand kept a whiteboard with the names of senators supporting the bill that she first introduced in 2013, and those who needed persuading. The instinctive deference of politicians to the military made persuasion tough. But she persisted. At an April press conference about her bill, even the highly partisan Texas Republican Ted Cruz thanked her for "her relentless determination fighting for this bill."

Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) also called Gillibrand "relentless." Ernst’s decision to join as a co-sponsor was a major breakthrough. She was both a commander in Kuwait and Iraq and a sexual assault victim in college. "I’ve made it very clear that I have been very torn about this in the past," Ernst said. But she now sees that counting on commanders won’t work. At Ernst’s suggestion, the revised Gillibrand bill includes prevention measures, including making training in sexual abuse issues a condition for promotion, and strengthening physical security at military installations.

A key to support for the bill was the 2020 murder of Army Spc. Vanessa Guillén by another soldier at Fort Hood, Texas. That led to an independent review commission, which found that "there was a command climate permissive of sexual assault and sexual harassment," said retired Air Force Col. Don Christensen, a former military prosecutor, defense counsel and judge, now president of Protect Our Defenders, a military-focused human rights organization. "To have a finding that, at one of the largest installations in the United States military, they had a climate permissive of sexual assault and sexual harassment really eroded the military’s argument that the commanders were the solution."

Among the horrors that commanders have failed to curb were the deaths of several women from dehydration at a camp in Iraq. "They died because, despite 120-degree heat, they stopped drinking water every afternoon," wrote anthropologist David Vine in his book "Base Nation." "They stopped drinking water because they feared being raped by other GIs while using the unlit latrines at night."

Despite congressional actions and the Pentagon’s efforts, it’s getting worse — with commanders making the decisions. "The numbers have gone the wrong directions since 2013," Christensen said. "Sexual assaults are up. Reports are up. But prosecutions and convictions are way down." Gillibrand’s bill is the answer — not a narrower version covering only sexual crimes. Once her bill becomes law, those numbers will trend in the right direction.

Bob Keeler, a retired Newsday journalist, is writing a book on the military.