A STARRS supporter recently sent a letter to his elected Representative, Diane DeGette of Colorado:
Dear Congresswoman DeGette:
According to numerous news reports, our military has fallen far short of its recruitment goals for the past two years. The Army has been particularly impacted, falling many thousands short in recruiting qualified officers and enlisted men.
Some senators and house representatives have even advocated accepting unassimilated foreigners to “solve” the problem.
History (and common sense) makes it clear that it would be a serious mistake to recruit persons into our armed forces who have no allegiance to our country.
Based on my personal observations I wonder if this recruitment shortfall is being caused (and/or exacerbated) by Pentagon policies.
Let me explain.
I know a young man, a college graduate, who recently went through the long and involved process of applying for an Army officer’s commission through the Officer Candidate School (OCS) program.
He scored very high in the aptitude test, was a varsity athlete in high school and is in excellent physical shape, achieved Eagle Scout rank in Boy Scouts, and passed the military’s medical examination.
His Army recruiter, who took notes during the OCS panel, said it was one of the best he had ever witnessed.
The members of the panel were very upbeat and gave him practical advice to remember when he reported to Basic Combat Training (BCT) and later to OCS. His brother had obtained an Army commission through the same program several years earlier.
So it was a great surprise (really a shock) when, several weeks later, his recruiter informed him he was not accepted into the program.
The recruiter did not give a reason, but with the thousands of unfilled Army positions it surely raises the question, how can this make sense?
Is it targeted DEI recruiting we’ve heard so much about? With no reason given it’s a reasonable suspicion.
I ask that you look into the Pentagon’s criteria and priorities in accepting recruits into the armed forces to ensure they are not rejecting qualified candidates who want to serve our country for ideological reasons.
Paul Caldwell
The same is true for TSA. I taught aviation security at the Metropolitan State University of Denver (https://www.msudenver.edu/). While demonstrating to students how to apply for a position, I decided to apply for a screening position myself given the fact that I am a co-inventor of US Patent 8643507 Vehicle-Based Threat Detection System. I continue to occasionally apply over the past twenty years and have never been given a reason for rejection. Recently, I did research on the Secret Service with regard to their approach to detecting nuclear or radiological weapons hidden inside nearby vehicles at political rallies like Butler, PA (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dirty_bomb). You can probably guess that the recommendations of the independent review panel do not even address this possible risk because it hasn’t happened yet (https://www.dhs.gov/publication/independent-review-panel-report).
For more info, see my nonprofit website (no-nuclear-911s.org).