An Army 82nd Airborne Division noncommissioned officer stationed at Fort Bragg tells Military.com that all the soldiers present for convicted felon President Trump’s Hiterlian Tuesday speech on the base were indeed all self-selected – notifications to the ranks said shit like “No fat soldiers” and “If soldiers have political views that are in opposition to the current administration and they don’t want to be in the audience then they need to speak with their leadership and get swapped out” – and almost certainly by and large didn’t know shit about what’s been going on in Los Angeles.
“I bet none of those soldiers booing even know the mayor’s name or could identify them in a lineup, they’re nonexistent in the chain of command,” the noncom officer said, adding “So, any opinion they could possibly have can only be attributed to expressing a political view while in uniform” when they booed in response to Commander Bone Spurs’ rant about Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass.
Still, the damage is done to morale. “This has been a bad week for the Army for anyone who cares about us being a neutral institution,” said one commander, anonymous for fear of reprisal. “This was shameful. I don’t expect anything to come out of it, but I hope maybe we can learn from it long term.”