Likely impact of removing transgenders from U.S. military

Transgenders in the U.S. military services – institutions that were, until recently, bastions of forced wokeness thanks to the Biden administration – are now being removed from America’s armed forces under President Donald Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.

\Within the Defense Medical Epidemiology Database, ICD-10 diagnosis codes have shown a significant rise in “transsexualism” within the military in recent years. And according to a 2023 survey conducted by this reporter, 59% of the survey’s 229 participants disclosed that they have served with a transgender.

With transsexualism on the rise with no end in sight, the U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled that President Trump could constitutionally carry out his ban on transgender service members. The ruling came after Trump issued a Jan. 27 executive order banning transgenders from serving in the military. Then on May 8, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth sent a memo to senior Pentagon leadership and others within the Department of Defense to begin their removal.

According to Hegseth’s memo, the active-component transgender service members have 30 days to voluntarily separate or be forced out, while those in the National Guard and Reserve have 60 days. The directive immediately impacts about 1,000 openly identifying as transgender service members.

WorldNetDaily spoke to retired U.S. Army Lt. Col. Darin Gaub, a former UH-60 Blackhawk pilot and battalion commander, who considers Hegseth’s memo “a good move.” As he wrote for Armed Forces Press, he is “happy to see these failed experiments end, hopefully never to return.”

In Gaub’s view, “It sends a clear message that weakness and wokeness will no longer be tolerated,” adding, “The SecDef is portraying and messaging to everybody that our military is not a political work force, but a force of lethality and readiness.”

“Regardless of the politics and the personal opinions of all this,” he said, and even the sympathy many may feel for people drawn into transsexualism, “we have been wasting time, money, medical and other resources on people who often cannot do the job they signed up to do in the military in the first place,” particularly “if they’re going through” a so-called “transition” process “while they’re on active duty.”

“These individuals impact recruiting, retention and morale,” Gaub argued. “For example, consider a parent’s perspective who might not have want their kids involved in a woke military.” Removing wokeness benefits such a family.

For the former battalion commander and pilot, “The whole issue has been magnified so much to the point where it was made very large in the eyes of the country’s population, so this thousand people affected by getting kicked out of the military for being transvestites could have had an impact on the military’s capability to meet recruiting goals.”

Gaub added, “The message” – that is, removing transgenders and wokeness in general from the U.S. armed forces – “this sends to those within our country, or out of it, is one of strength and readiness, so their removal is worth this benefit.”