GOP Rep Pretty Sure Soldiers Can Just Quit Over Vaccine Requirements
That would be called going AWOL and it is very illegal.
If there is anything Republicans love, it is the troops. Particularly when "the troops" are dying for a completely pointless and avoidable reason. As such, House Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky is very upset about the military getting ready to make COVID-19 vaccinations mandatory for service members, just like all the other 89,000 vaccinations they are required to take when they are deployed to various countries.
This weekend, Massie tweeted out that he had "been contacted by members of our voluntary military who say they will quit if the COVID vaccine is mandated," and, in response to that, "introduced HR 3860 to prohibit any mandatory requirement that a member of the Armed Forces receive a vaccination against COVID-19."
I’ve been contacted by members of our voluntary military who say they will quit if the COVID vaccine is mandated.… https: //t.co/LQdXPoolSr
— Thomas Massie (@Thomas Massie) 1625343858.0
There's a wee bit of a problem with all of that though — as many people were happy to point out to Massie on Twitter, you can't just "quit" the military, because when you sign up to join the military, you sign a contract and you are required, by actual law, to serve out your time unless otherwise dismissed by the Department of Defense. If you "quit," that is called "going AWOL" or "desertion" and could result in "dishonorable discharge, forfeiture of all pay and allowances, and a one-year confinement."
There is also a pretty big problem with service members being allowed to refuse to get the vaccine, as it would impede military readiness. As mentioned, military personnel — particularly those traveling to other areas of the world — have to be vaccinated against a variety of diseases. Generally speaking, service members are meant to be killed and maimed by bombs and guns, not by germs. Soldiers getting sick from preventable diseases is not a particularly efficient way to go about having a war, and granting an exception for the COVID vaccine because morons think Bill Gates put the mark of the beast in them would lead to those same morons pushing for exemptions for every other thing they need to get vaccinated for. And then where would we be?
Not getting these vaccinations puts their fellow soldiers in danger, not to mention civilians in other countries. It would also put United States citizens in danger if we constantly had soldiers going back and forth from various countries but not being vaccinated against diseases that are common in them, like yellow fever and typhoid.
That being said, perhaps Massie should learn a little bit more about the military before he goes and puts out bills like this that affect the military. If he doesn't even know that it's illegal to quit the military, he probably doesn't know enough about military protocol to be pushing this nonsense.
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What ever happened to critical thinking?
In 1980 a group of us medical students were run through the vaccination line during Army basic training. At a certain point we were asked, "Do you want your smallpox vaccine in the right arm or the left?" Being genius med students we pointed out that there had not been a reported case of smallpox in the entire world since the early 1960s. They told us, "Well, the Russians have enormous freezers full of the smallpox virus." We all said, "The left arm will be just fine."
In 1983 we were all required to get the brand new hepatitis B vaccine. No choice, no discussion. Viruses don't care about your fucking personal autonomy or your politics. Sick soldiers can't fight or do their jobs. Rommel lost North Africa because half of his troops were down with dysentery, not because he wasn't a brilliant battlefield general.