Date: November 13, 2000
Press Contact: Aaron Belkin, CSSMM Director and Nathaniel Frank, CSSMM Director of Communications (805) 893-5664

Click here to download MS Word version

13 November, 2000 - SANTA BARBARA, CA. A classified report by the British Ministry of Defense is one of two new studies to conclude that London's January, 2000 decision to lift its gay ban has not harmed military performance, cohesion, recruitment, morale, or discipline.

The Ministry of Defense has not yet acknowledged the existence of the report publicly but Ministry officials released a summary of its findings to researchers at the Center for the Study of Sexual Minorities in the Military (CSSMM) at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Martin Fuller, Director of Personnel at the Ministry of Defense, told CSSMM researchers that "we've had very few real problems that have emerged, and people seem to have, slightly surprisingly, settled down and accepted the current arrangements. And we don't really have the problems that we thought we'd have."

The Ministry report marks the first comprehensive assessment of the lifting of the gay ban. Commanders from each service were asked to comment on the effects of the policy change and a Whitehall source who had access to the original, unabridged report told University of California researchers that "The report looked at all aspects, operational effectiveness, unit cohesion, and there has been no impact."

Results of the classified report are consistent with a new 70-page University of California study released this week that finds that Britain's decision to lift its gay ban has not harmed the military. The University of California study is based on a review of 101 articles, book chapters, and documents and interviews with 25 academic experts, military officials, soldiers, and journalists.

Both the Ministry report and the University of California study will be addressed at a December 9 conference at the Commonwealth Club of California in San Francisco. The conference, titled "Don't Ask, Don't Tell; Is the Gay Ban Based on Prejudice or Military Necessity?" will include three experts on the British case: Professor Christopher Dandeker, Chair of the Department of War Studies at King's College, London; Rob Nunn, an openly gay officer on a British submarine; and Steve Johnston, the President of Rank Outsiders, a gay veterans' association.

Twenty-three nations currently allow gay soldiers to serve openly. According to CSSMM director Aaron Belkin, "the new studies of the British military are embarrassing to the U.S. Pentagon. After years of citing the British case to justify its own practice of firing homosexual soldiers, two comprehensive studies now show that the lifting of the British gay ban has not had any of the negative consequences that military leaders predicted."

The Center for the Study of Sexual Minorities in the Military (CSSMM) is an official research unit of the University of California, Santa Barbara. The Center is governed by a distinguished board of advisors including the Honorable Lawrence J. Korb of the Council on Foreign Relations, Honorable Coit Blacker of Stanford University and Professor Janet Halley of Harvard Law School. Its mission is to promote the study of gays, lesbians, and other sexual minorities in the armed forces.