|
Article Excerpt
INTRODUCTION
I. TAILHOOK A. The Reaction B. The Pentagon Inspector General's Investigation C. The Navy Prosecutions 1. Paula Coughlin: The Victim's Face 2. Cole Cowden and Elizabeth Warnick 3. Robert Stumpf 4. Other Victims of Prosecutorial Overreaching D. The End Result of the Navy Process E. Unlawful Command Influence II. BEYOND TAILHOOK A. The Navy in the Aftermath of Tailhook B. The Coast Guard, Too C. Then Came Aberdeen D. Fraternization, Adultery, and Harassment 1. Kelly Flinn 2. "Payback': General Joseph Ralston 3. Claudia Kennedy: A High-Ranking "Victim" III. THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY A. The Air Force Academy B. A Medley of Little Scandals C. Lieutenant Bryan Black D. Lamar Owens E. A Lack of Balance CONCLUSION
INTRODUCTION
Over three decades after the birth of the All-Volunteer Force and integration of the service academies, and over a decade since some combat positions--including aviation and service on warships--were opened to women, sexual integration of the military continues to be fraught with controversy. (1) Differences in physical strength and in a variety of psychological characteristics make the sexes differently suited to both combat and non-combat positions. Apart from these individual differences between men and women, interpersonal dynamics between men and women can imperil the cohesion of military units in a number of ways, and the military's response to these dynamics can imperil cohesion even more.
The subject of sex--that is, sexual relations--is an integral part of the story of integration of women into the military. It is a fact of life that, when large numbers of reproductive-aged men and women are brought together, there will be a fair amount of sexual behavior, a fair amount of unwanted sexual attention, and, especially unfortunately, some sexual coercion. The military is not unique in this respect. The same can be said for, say, universities, corporations, and bars. A number of attributes of the military present special challenges, however, including the existence of a formal rank structure, the fact that the military is an inherently masculine enterprise, (2) and the centralized--and often politicized--mechanisms for responding to sexual issues at the level of the service, the Department of Defense, and Congress.
As harmful as sexual behavior sometimes can be, the military's reaction to it can be even worse. It is fair to say that a characteristic response to sexual issues by military overseers has been to label men as sexual predators who require punishment and to label women as victims who require counseling (at most), irrespective of the willingness with which women participated in the challenged activities. The military's reaction to sexual scandals--often driven by political pressures operating on the military's civilian leadership and its congressional overseers--has been a repeated source of military morale problems.
I. TAILHOOK
Perhaps the "granddaddy" of all military sex scandals was the one arising out of the September 1991 convention of the Tailhook Association, which was held at the Hilton Hotel in Las Vegas. The association, which gets its name from the hook on the rear of a plane that snags the arresting wire on an aircraft-carrier flight deck, is a private association of active-duty and retired Navy and Marine aviators? Although the 1991 convention has by now acquired the reputation of an out-of-control fraternity party from Animal House--a reputation not wholly undeserved--it also served the more serious function of a professional association, including symposia on aviation issues and providing aviators the opportunity to mingle with their superiors. (4) The events for which the convention has come to be known were not themselves sponsored by the Association, but rather by individual members and their flight squadrons. In all, about 4,000 participants attended this Tailhook convention (the first since the military's dazzling success in the 1991 Gulf War), including thirty-two active-duty Navy admirals and Marine generals. (5)
The story is a familiar one that has been told many times, often being embellished in the retelling. On Friday and Saturday of the convention, "hospitality suites" hosted by various flight squadrons were the scene of what can accurately be described as debauchery. (6) The activities included performances by female strippers, sexual interaction with these strippers, (7) drinking "belly/navel shots," (8) which entails men drinking alcohol out of women's navels, "butt biting" (9) and leg shaving, (10) which are what they sound like, and "ball walking," which consisted of fully clothed male officers walking around with their genitals exposed. (11) The activities spread into the third-floor hall linking the suites. The most infamous of the activities occurred on Saturday night. A "gauntlet" (or "gantlet')--a double line of male aviators, one on each side of the hallway--was set up, and those women who had the fortune or misfortune, depending upon their preferences, of finding themselves in the hallway were fondled and groped as they walked past the men. (12)
One of those women was Paula Coughlin, an admiral's aide who claimed that she had been victimized in the gauntlet. (13) Depending upon whose version of the story is believed, she reported this activity to her boss within a day or a couple of weeks, and the Chief of Naval Aviation learned of the event sometime shortly after that. (14) Although the convention took place in early September, it did not make the news until late October, (15) at about the same time that the nation was transfixed by allegations of sexual harassment by Anita Hill against Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas. (16)
A. The Reaction
The reaction of the Navy and Congress to the Tailhook mess converted an out-of-control party into a career-killer for hundreds of Navy personnel and a morale-killer for thousands of others. The Navy's initial response was to assign investigatory responsibility to its Inspector General and the Naval Investigative Service. This investigation turned up many incidents of inappropriate behavior but little in the way of identifiable suspects. Few women were able to identify their assailants, and few of the men attending the convention provided useful information. Although some attributed the aviators' reticence to a conspiracy, Jean Zimmerman suggests that no conspiracy was even necessary. Most of these aviators had gone through Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape ("SERE") training, she argues, and were well-versed in ways to avoid providing useful information to interrogators. (17) The failure of the investigation to produce suspects to match the lurid facts it uncovered led to charges of "cover-up." Navy Secretary H. Lawrence Garrett, III, resigned and was replaced by Sean O'Keefe as Acting Secretary, who was quick to announce that "we get it." (18)
The political reaction to the case--and to the perceived Navy cover-up--was intense. The Chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, Rep. John Murtha--who has more recently earned a measure of fame for his call for immediate withdrawal from Iraq--announced that his subcommittee was cutting 10,000 Navy jobs in retaliation for the Navy's handling of the scandal. (19) The Senate Armed Services Committee put a hold on promotions of about 4,500 Navy and Marine Corps officers until it could be determined which ones were associated with the Tailhook convention. (20)
Advocates of an expanded combat role for women seized on Tailhook to argue--somewhat irrationally, if one thinks about it--that the scandal proved the necessity of placing women into combat positions. Opening such positions to women would result in their receiving greater respect from their male colleagues, they argued, making women's abuse at the hands of their colleagues less likely. (21) Others drew the opposite conclusion, asking how women are going to stand up to the enemy if they require intervention of Congress and the Pentagon to protect them from their peers. (22) As one columnist suggested, "If a grown woman can't handle some friendly drunks in a public place, then she's hardly qualified to command men in the much more serious and stressful environment of war." (23) Or, as Elaine Donnelly of the Center for Military Readiness put it, the argument is that "military women must be exposed to thugs behind enemy lines in order to protect them from drunken comrades at home." (24)
Make no mistake: The third floor of the Hilton Hotel was not a place one would like his daughter, his wife, his girlfriend, his sister, or his mother to be (or, for that matter, his son, his brother, or his father). Unquestionably, sexual misconduct occurred that reflected poorly on the Navy and, at a minimum, warranted administrative punishment of some of the participants. The investigation, however, went far beyond any reasonable bounds. The approach of the Navy and of its congressional overseers was to view all complaints as well-founded, all of the women involved as victims (whether or not they viewed themselves that way), and all of the men who attended the convention (and many who did not) as oppressors of women.
B. The Pentagon Inspector General's Investigation
Dissatisfaction with the Navy IG's investigation led to assignment of investigatory responsibility to the Department of Defense Inspector General, with the investigation being headed by Deputy IG Derek J. Vander Schaaf. (25) It was clear from the outset that the Pentagon Inspector General's Office had no taste for the kind of accusations of cover-up that sank Secretary Garrett. The Pentagon IG's investigation and subsequent Navy prosecutions were often--and not unfairly--compared to "witch hunts," (26) "inquisitions," (27) and "Star Chamber" proceedings. (28)
The Inspector General's report identified 140 Navy and Marine officers, (29) eighty-three female victims, and seven male victims, although the male "victims"--even ones who claimed to have been subjected to sexual groping by women--were never mentioned again. The investigation clearly demonstrated that the IG was more concerned about avoiding criticism for being too lax than avoiding criticism for being unfair. In Paula Coughlin's later civil trial against the Hilton, the judge refused to allow the IG report to be admitted, finding that it was "largely conclusory and based on hearsay and double hearsay indicating its lack of trustworthiness." (30) One need not feel too sorry for Coughlin, however, as she was awarded $6.7 million by the jury (reduced by the judge to $5.2 million), in addition to the $400,000 paid by the Tailhook Association to settle the case against it. (31)
Inspector General investigators engaged in conduct that can only be called abusive. Many officers were subjected to questions about whether they masturbated and the kind of sex they engaged in with their wives or girlfriends. Others were falsely told that a colleague had implicated them in misconduct, a common interrogation technique in civilian law enforcement but a dangerous one to use in a widespread fishing expedition among comrades in arms. Sowing the seeds of distrust among squadron-mates is a perilous course, and the technique contributed to the low morale already created by the investigation. As one Marine flier said,
When you're in combat, you depend on a lot of people, and one thing you don't want is people who might have to save you thinking you might be doing something' behind their back. It's very dangerous to play people off of each other who rely on each other in combat. (32)
Of course, the Tailhook investigation and the subsequent rush to put women in combat positions were never about military effectiveness.
C. The Navy Prosecutions
The Pentagon IG then passed the baton to the Navy for prosecution. Admiral Frank B. Kelso, Chief of Naval Operations, placed Admiral J. Paul Reason in charge of Navy prosecutions and Major General Charles Krulak (later Commandant of the Marine Corps) in charge of Marine prosecutions. (33) The Navy's approach to prosecutions turned out to be as heavy-handed as the IG's approach to investigations.
1. Paula Coughlin: The Victim's Face
The poster girl for the Tailhook case was Paula Coughlin herself, "Victim Number 50" in the Inspector General's report. (34) She alleged that she had come onto the third floor of the hotel on Saturday night and was immediately pulled into the gauntlet, and that men were groping her and trying to take off her panties. She says that she twice bit her primary attacker, who had grabbed her from behind, believing that she had drawn blood. She then was able to escape.
Coughlin subsequently picked out the picture of a Marine from a photographic array, identifying him as her attacker. The only problem was that the Marine pictured was a "ringer"--someone who had not attended the Tailhook convention. After being tipped off that the person she had identified had not even been at the convention, she then picked Marine Captain Gregory Bonam out of a line-up. (35) He had been wearing a burnt-orange shirt, she claimed. Unfortunately for Coughlin, pictures from the event showed that Bonam had been wearing a green shirt with a distinctive pattern. (36) Moreover, Bonam had no scar on his arm, as would have been expected from Coughlin's description of the ferocity of her bite, and Bonam had alibi witnesses who placed him on the hotel terrace at the time of the attack. (37) Also, a civilian witness had described Coughlin's assailant as being about five-foot-four, about nine inches shorter than Capt. Bonam. (38) None of this evidence was enough to spare Bonam from the efforts of Navy prosecutors, however.
It also turned out that Coughlin had been a willing participant in some of the "wrongful" activities. She claimed that her visit to the third floor on Saturday night had been her first. On Friday night, she asserted, she had been in her hotel room all evening, going to bed around 9 p.m. (39) However, she was placed on the third floor on Friday night by the sworn testimony of four witnesses, including two female pilots, one of whom had lobbied alongside Coughlin on Capitol Hill for repeal of the ban on women flying in combat missions. According to one of the female pilots, she saw Coughlin getting her legs shaved. It caught her eye because "she was in her uniform, in her whites, and she had bare legs, you know, no hose on, and she had her skirt, you know, hiked up fairly high." (40) Although this pilot attempted to tell investigators from the Inspector General's office about Coughlin's activities, she said that they were not interested in hearing anything negative about Coughlin.
Indeed, it was established Defense Department policy that the investigation would not include misconduct by female officers, and even when eyewitness accounts were provided to investigators, they took no action. (41) For example, Lt. Rolando Diaz--nicknamed "the Barber of Seville" (42)--had told IG investigators that he had shaved Coughlin's legs and that she had shown her appreciation by signing a banner, "You made me see God. The Paulster." Despite Diaz's statements and the banner bearing her signature, which the IG had in its possession, the IG claimed not to have received any direct evidence that Coughlin had participated in any misconduct. (43) Although neither Coughlin nor any other woman whose legs he shaved was subjected to any discipline, Lt. Diaz faced a court-martial that could have resulted in a prison term and dismissal from the Navy. Before trial, he agreed to accept a non-judicial punishment, which could result in a fine or letter of reprimand but spare him from the court-martial. (44)
The claim that Coughlin "unwittingly" (45) stumbled onto the third floor that Saturday night simply appears to be false. Her presence on Friday night indicates that she had reason to know what was going on. Any notion that Coughlin was a shrinking violet is also dispelled by statements by a former boyfriend given to the staff of Admiral Kelso indicating that she had shown up at a Navy "dining-in party" wearing "black fishnet panty hose, high heels, a short black miniskirt, a black tuxedo jacket and carrying a large rubber dildo." (46) Given her prevarication, it is small wonder that she later complained that she was ostracized by her fellow aviators. (47)
The double standard applied to male and female misconduct in the Tailhook affair was palpable. The IG Report specifically noted that "many women freely and knowingly participated in gauntlet activities ... and seemed to enjoy the attention and interaction with the aviators." (48) They were "smiling and giggling" and some went through the line numerous times. Yet none of the Navy women involved were censured for their participation. As military sociologist Charles Moskos observed, "no female officer who misbehaved was reprimanded or sanctioned, sending a terrible message to the fleet, meaning women were held to a different standard." (49)
2. Cole Cowden and Elizabeth Warnick
A particularly egregious case involved Navy Lt. Cole Cowden, who was prosecuted for sexual assault and for conduct unbecoming an officer. One charge, which dated back to the 1990 Tailhook convention, involved a claim by Navy Lt. Elizabeth Warnick that Cowden, along with two other men, had forcibly sexually assaulted her by pushing her down on a bed, removing her panties, and grabbing her genitals in an attempt to gang rape her. Warnick also complained that she had been receiving threatening telephone calls from California, where Cowden had been stationed at the time; that someone had slashed the tires on her car; and that she had received a bouquet of roses with a death threat. Another charge against Cowden was based on a picture showing a civilian nurse pulling his face against her clothed breast.
Warnick later admitted under oath that she had lied about the attempted gang rape. (50) She had concocted the story because she had had consensual sex with Cowden and was afraid that her fiance would find out. She also admitted that the stories about threats and vandalism were false. (51) Much of Warnick's story was apparently intended to deflect attention from her own misconduct at the 1991 convention. When IG investigators first contacted her, she had been identified by six officers as having taken part in the leg shaving and "belly shots." (52) She apparently thought--correctly, as it turned out--that playing the victim would spare her conduct from scrutiny.
After Warnick's story fell apart, the hearing officer recommended dropping the other charge against Cowden because the nurse had told investigators that the contact was consensual and she did not consider herself a victim. (53) When the Navy prosecutor concurred, expressing ethical objections to continuing the prosecution, Captain Jeffry Williams, Admiral Reason's senior legal officer, removed the Navy prosecutor from the case and advised Admiral Reason to continue with the prosecution. Captain William Vest, Jr., the judge presiding over the Tailhook prosecutions in Norfolk, Virginia, ultimately removed Williams from the case, finding that Williams had deceived and badgered Cowden and declaring that Williams had "become too personally involved in the prosecution" and had "exceeded the permissible bounds of his official role as legal adviser." (54) The charge against Cowden was subsequently dropped after review by a specially appointed lawyer.
The most serious wrongdoing in the Cowden story was Warnick's false charge of sexual assault, but she apparently received little, if any,...
|
