Posted on 04/27/2008 2:00:26 AM PDT by Antonio C
CLEARWATER — This month's death of Army Spc. Arturo Huerta-Cruz in Iraq cast a spotlight on troops serving in the U.S. military who are not American citizens.
Huerta-Cruz, 23, was born in a small town in rural Mexico and moved to Clearwater with his family when he was 10. He was a legal permanent resident, or a "green card" soldier.
That made him an exception. Noncitizens account for about 5 percent of the troops in all the branches of the U.S. military. Noncitizens now must have green cards to enlist.
But as the nation fights wars on two fronts, some wonder whether the military should recruit more heavily among immigrants here — even undocumented ones — as well as foreigners in their own countries.
Yes, say some intellectuals at Washington, D.C., think tanks.
"Those of us who support recruiting foreigners believe they are often very skilled, motivated, and in the great American tradition of immigration," Michael O'Hanlon, a Brookings Institution senior fellow on foreign policy said in an e-mail.
The "Dream Act" bill that failed in Congress last year would have done more than legalize undocumented high school students who aspire to college. It also would have given green cards to undocumented high school students who served in the military.
Such students "are well educated, they are not troublemakers, they are bilingual," said Jorge Mariscal, a professor of Latino studies at the University of California, San Diego.
"The military wants to get their hands on those folks," added Mariscal, a Vietnam veteran.
The nonprofit CNA Corp. based in Virginia has recommended mining the legal immigrant community more heavily for military recruits.
"One overlooked source of military manpower is immigrants and their families," according to a 2005 report by CNA, which advises public employers on issues ranging from national security to international affairs.
"In fact," the organization concluded, "much of the growth in the recruitment-eligible population will come from immigration."
• • •
Along with immigrant groups who have fought for the United States — Irish-Americans in the Civil War, for example — noncitizens also have enlisted since the Revolutionary War.
Green card soldiers have received widespread publicity during the Iraq war because some of the first casualties were Latin-American immigrants.
One was Lance Cpl. Jose Antonio Gutierrez, 22, from Southern California.
Gutierrez was an orphan in Guatemala. Fleeing poverty, he came to the United States illegally. In Southern California, he entered the foster care system and got a green card.
He joined the Marines.
He was killed on March 21, 2003, by enemy fire as American troops tried to secure Umm Qasr. A movie about him, The Short Life of Jose Antonio Gutierrez, was released last year.
After the war started, President Bush signed an executive order allowing immigrants in the military to apply for citizenship immediately. Congress followed with legislation that shortened the time that immigrants in the military have to wait during peacetime to apply for citizenship, from three years to one year.
As of February, there were 20,326 immigrants in active duty in all branches of the military. Another 13,151 were in the Reserves.
• • •
It's a small slice of the military, but CNA recommends that the armed forces should target more legal immigrants as recruits.
The foreign-born population in the United States at the time of the CNA report — 12 percent — was at least twice as high as their representation in the military.
Also, a third of the world's population is younger than 15, and many of those young people will make their way to the United States, where some will become legal residents.
For the military, the linguistic and cultural diversity of noncitizens are especially valuable, the CNA authors said.
They add that many immigrants are interested in the expedited process for citizenship that enlisted immigrants receive.
Meanwhile, O'Hanlon of the Brookings Institution and Council on Foreign Relations senior fellow Max Boot have called for a "new chapter in the annals of American immigration."
Their proposal: give foreigners recruited from other countries as well as those already here citizenship after four years of military service. That, they believe, could create a path toward assimilation for undocumented immigrants without green cards. Besides, they note, the military already relaxed age and other restrictions, including those accepting enlistees with criminal records, to meet recruiting goals.
"The idea of offering citizenship to foreigners who first join the armed forces should be a winner for everyone," they wrote in the Washington Post in 2006. "It is good for immigrants. … It is good for a beleaguered American military that is simply too small for the tasks it has been handed."
• • •
Not surprisingly, others oppose the idea of increasing the number of noncitizens fighting for American ideals.
The military would become a low-wage occupation like other industries now dominated by immigrants, warns Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, which favors more restrictive immigration policies.
"If enlisting were a way to get legalized or a way to get into the United States," Krikorian said, "soldiering would become a job Americans would not do very rapidly."
Some in the Hispanic community, already weary of recruitment among its youths, agree.
Said Mariscal: "It would be another example of the exploitation of cheap labor."
Even now, American citizenship is not guaranteed for immigrant serving in the military, Mariscal said. Meanwhile, some countries strip their nationals of citizenship if they serve in foreign militaries.
"Those people who did it would have no country," Mariscal said.
In Clearwater, Huerta-Cruz — one of 144 immigrants who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001 — was buried Tuesday.
Calvary Catholic Cemetery on U.S. 19 is his final resting place.
And one day, the United States could become his home country.
That's because Army officials have said they will seek posthumous citizenship for Huerta-Cruz.
> The “Geneva Convention” is a misnomer, as there is not one all-encompassing doctrine. In fact, there are a multitude of “Geneva Conventions” dealing with a wide variety of issues. A nation can sign or ratify all of them, some of them, or none of them. Some nations who are not signatories can voluntarily adopt one or more of them on an ad hoc basis for political or economic reasons, and they can just as easily “unadopt” them when they no longer serve their purpose.
>
> The Protocol you cited on mercs is an example. The United States is not a signatory to that protocol
Which is interesting but beside-the-fact.
The French Foreign Legion is a unit of regular French Army. It is not a mercenary unit. Not even your United States military law would consider the French Foreign Legion to be anything other than members of the regular French Army, for the reasons that I have given.
> Question for you: Were Claire Chenault’s Flying Tigers in China in the early days of WWII mercenaries?
Nope — they would have fallen under the category of “Private Military Contractors” under modern US law. And by the Geneva Convention they would have been members of the regular Republic of China Air Force.
They have done no such thing. As for the youngster offspring from "abroad", we cannot say the same.
“Noncitizens now must have green cards to enlist.”
The article makes this sound like this is some kind of new policy, which it is not. It’s been like this for as long as I can remember (decades!)
Ping!
IMNSHO, bad idea. I’m fine with a legal resident alien enlisting, and gaining citizenship. Illegal aliens should not be allowed into the military. Their penchant for law-breaking has no place in the highly structured armed forces.
AGREE! Legal resident alien OK, ILLEGALS NO!
Would you want your wife, Husband son or daughter or father fighting next to someone that you have NO IDEA where their or who their allegiance is to?
They show disrespect for our laws and continue to commit crimes with false documention. I would think their allegiance is certainly NOT with the United States.
Fine, where do they go purchase their fake green card??
American citizens aren’t volunteering in adequate numbers which is the whole problem. We are in fight for our very existence and most are to fat and lazy to get off the couch mush less walk down to the local recruiting station and sign up to serve their country. We either recruit the undocumented or we die as a nation.
Sadly, our military has already been infiltrated with gangs. The photos I saw were of tanks in tagged in Iraq.
If we need mercenaries for foreign wars, then lets keep them overseas but not buy them with citizenship and admission to this country.
I recommend a show on History channel about the huge problem of gangs in the military, many of the members foreigners.
> it worked so well more and more algerians are coming to france. hey the algerians earned the right to come to france. if the french lose france its tough titty to them.
Algerians coming to France has nothing to do with the French Foreign Legion and everything to do with how France mis-managed its dissolving empire. Rather the same with the British, sadly.
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you have not actually disagreed with me. rather you have just changed the wording. there was a point in the 19th century where there were more french in algeria than there were algerians. france believed that algeria was a part of france. and not an imperial possession. then the algerians reproduced like crazy abetted by modern medical procedures and higher living standards brought by the french. They turned the french into a small minority in Algeria. The French treated the Algerians poorly during and just after WWII and made some lasting enemies in pockets of the population. These turned on them during the 1950’s and fought a bitter war. The french gave up and retreated to france. huge numbers of algerians packed their bags and came with them. because they were not considered by the french at the time to be foreign nationals.
what’s being contemplated now with the illegals in the USA is the same kind of god awful fuzzing of nationalities which promises no end of trouble down the road.
the real issue is how do you make Mexico into a first class country. so they don’t need no stinkin americans.
That could be solved without hiring illegals. Proper funding, benefits, equipment, support personnel, genuine RESPECT from a large portion of our elected officials. Having our government honor the promises it makes to our service men would also help.
We had a larger military. Downsizing it before we fight wars is not the way to do it. We can have a large military. But we have to pay for it. And we have to maintain it between conflicts.
“Nope — they would have fallen under the category of ‘Private Military Contractors’ under modern US law. And by the Geneva Convention they would have been members of the regular Republic of China Air Force.”
They were considered mercenaries. They themselves even said as much. Same for the Abraham Lincoln Brigade in the Spanish Civil War: They were seen as mercenaries (though they received little pay — if any). Not all mercs were of Mike Hoare’s stripe (ala the Congo).
“Fine, where do they go purchase their fake green card??”
I don’t know. Have you ever seen a green card? I think they would be incredibly difficult to fake, unless someone corrupt inside the system were selling them.
In addition, a background check is done on each recruit.
How Do I Become a Lawful Permanent Resident While In The United States?
How Do I Get A Work Permit (Employment Authorization Document - EAD)?
> That they did
Hmmmmm... that’s not History the way I remember it being taught. Seems to me that:
- The British Empire, the French and the Russians did most of the fighting of Hitler, and the Americans assisted toward the end; and
- The North Vietnamese stopped the Americans in their tracks, not the other way around.
Perhaps they teach History differently in the US.
> They were considered mercenaries. They themselves even said as much.
They can call themselves whatever they like, if it helps them romanticize their history. The “Flying Tigers” weren’t mercenaries as defined by the Laws of War: in fact, they didn’t allow real mercenaries to join their group. They were established at the behest of FDR at the request of the Government of the Chinese Republic. They would not have gotten their Curtis P40 aeroplanes instead of the British if they were mercenary (irregular) combatants. Calling them “mercenaries” is sophistry, merely playing with words.
The French Foreign Legion is not and never has been mercenaries, and neither are the Ghurkas. Or the Swiss Guard, for that matter.
The proposal under consideration of this thread is not to establish a Mike Hoare-style mercenary band of illegals within the United States.
The proposal is to establish some form of military service that allows illegals to regularize their nationality over time. In concept, this sounds alot like the French Foreign Legion to me, and I think that is a good idea, well-tested over time.
Heck, you might as well give them something useful to do: they’re in the US anyway whether you like it or not. And there doesn’t seem to be much political will to get rid of them. Might as well make them earn their Citizenship rather than gifting it to them en-masse.
Three-to-five years of really hard service in a Foreign Legion-style military unit sounds like a great idea to me. (On that basis I might even consider joining.)
The illegals are already proven to be rough customers, given their crime stats: let them be rough customers against al Qaeda and the Taliban and the enemies of the US instead of the general US Populace. There’s plenty of them, with plenty more where they came from, so if you lose a whole bunch in battle, so what? I can’t think of a better thing to do with them, can you?
Somebody is going to have to occupy the deserts of the Middle East for the next 100 years: let it be the US Foreign Legion. Stick them out in the desert and give them the task of bringing back Osama bin Laden’s head. As good as they are, your regular forces haven’t been able to do that yet, and it’s now 7 years on. There’s nothing lost by getting a Foreign Legion to have a crack at it.
The sellout of the U.S. and it's people is nearly complete.
Bush has made citizenship all but pointless. Might as well start recruiting tens of thousands of illegal aliens to fight their wars.
Why not? Does it matter anymore?
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