An excerpt from Defense One -
Racial Division, Troops’ Role in Protests Has Hurt Minority Recruiting, Air Force Says
Black interest in military service plummeted after the George Floyd protests. Can the Pentagon undo the damage?
By Tara Copp
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| U.S. Air Force basic military graduation Apr. 16, 2020, at the 320th Training Squadron’s Airman Training Complex on Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland, Texas. U.S. AIR FORCE / JOHNNY SALDIVAR |
Years of racial tension, and the use of National Guard troops last June after the death of George Floyd, have hurt the military’s ability to recruit minorities, the head of Air Force recruiting said Wednesday.
That drop is part of a worrisome long-term trend that the military is fighting against: that fewer recruitment-age youth show an interest to serve.
According to the Defense Department’s latest twice-a-year Futures Survey, released in August, the share of eligible youth who reported they have an interest in military service has dropped about two percent overall in the last couple of years, said Maj. Gen. Ed Thomas, commander of the Air Force Recruiting Service.
Most concerning, Thomas said, was that “the biggest drop in propensity to serve is from Black males, Hispanic males, and females.”
The percentage of Black respondents who reported an interest in military service dropped from 20 percent in summer 2019 to 11 percent in summer 2020, according to the data. By fall 2020, the percentage of Black respondents interested in military service had dropped to 8 percent.
The percentage of Hispanics reporting an interest in military service dropped from 18 percent to 14 percent over the same time. Interest from recruitment-eligible whites remained steady, from 8 percent in summer 2019 to 9 percent in summer 2020.
“The last couple of years has done damage, there’s no doubt,” Thomas said. “The data shows us that the racial division in our nation has done damage to our recruiting efforts.”
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