Is diversity good for the Military?

Racism was rooted out of the military after WWII.

Overt racism was typical in American bases in Vietnam. Although initially uncommon at the start of the war, after the Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., overt racism occurred at a higher rate.[3] Following the assassination, some White troops at Cam Ranh Base wore Ku Klux Klan robes and paraded around the base.[6][11]:183 At least three instances of cross burning were confirmed to have happened.[12] Da Nang Air Base flew the Confederate flag for three days in response.[12][6] In addition to being used in response to King's murder, Confederate flags and icons were commonly painted on jeeps, tanks, and helicopters; bathroom graffiti proclaimed that African Americans, not the Vietnamese, were the real enemy. Black troops were discouraged from taking pride in Black identity, with one troop ordered to remove a "Black is beautiful" poster from his locker.[6] Following complaints from African American soldiers, Confederate flags were briefly banned but soon allowed after resistance from Southern politicians objected.[3] Black identity publications and speeches were restricted, with some commanders banning recordings of speeches by Malcolm X or the newspaper The Black Panther.[11] Despite segregation being abolished in the military, it still affected troops.[8]

According to journalists Wallace Terry and Zalin Grant by 1968, racial incidents in Danang, Cam Ranh Bay, Dong Tam, Saigon, and Bien Hoa happened on an "almost daily basis" and had become "commonplace". Similar reports came from official channels with there being at least 33 incidents of racial violence in the two months between December 1969 and January 1970. In 1970 there were 1,060 reported cases of violent racial conflict.[3] Racial incidents also affected the Navy and Air Force. Following King's death race riots and conflicts occurred at Long Binh jail and Camp Lejuene. The former was the worst race riot in the U.S. Army's history and the latter garnered national attention due to 44 African-American soldiers being arrested but no white soldiers. It also inspired an investigation and creation of a committee to study racial bias and African American militancy in the armed forces.[5] Grant once claimed that the "biggest threat" to the U.S. military was "race riots, not the Vietcong."[3]

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African American troops were punished more harshly and more frequently than White troops. A Defense Department study released in 1972 found that Black troops received 34.3% of courts-martial, 25.5% of nonjudicial punishments, and comprised 58% of prisoners at Long Bình Jail, a military prison.[8] It further remarked, "No command or installation...is entirely free from the effects of systematic discrimination against minority servicemen."[9] Black troops were also almost twice as likely as White troops to receive a punitive discharge.[9] In 1972, African-Americans received more than one-fifth of the bad-conduct discharges and nearly one-third of the dishonorable discharges.[5]

In the Vietnam War, African American troops initially had a much higher casualty rate than other ethnicities,[8] though this declined somewhat throughout the course of the conflict. In 1965, nearly a quarter of troop casualties were African American. By 1967, it had fallen to 12.7%.[3] In total, 7,243 African Americans died during the Vietnam War, representing 12.4% of total casualties.[14] The refusal, by some southern communities, to bury dead African American soldiers in unsegregated cemeteries was met with outrage by African American communities.[5]