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- [00:01]
A
Hello and welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. Happy 3rd of July. I guess we're celebrating 4th of July on the 3rd of July today. I am excited for today's guest, especially chosen for this holiday. He's a staff writer at the Atlantic. His books include the poetry collection Above Ground and the best selling how the Word Is Passed. A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America. It's Clint Smith. Welcome back to the show, man. It's been a minute.
- [00:27]
B
It's good to be here.
- [00:28]
A
I think I've had your brother since
- [00:29]
B
then, who has had my brother.
- [00:31]
A
Yeah. And he dropped me stuff some Otto on you. We're going to get to at the end, so just.
- [00:36]
B
Have you had any other sibling pairs or are we the first one?
- [00:40]
A
I believe the Smith siblings are the only ones. Correct me if I'm wrong, producer. I'm trying to think if there's any other who that would be. So kudos to you.
- [00:48]
B
All right, we're out of here.
- [00:49]
A
It's a talented family. I gotta get your sister. The what I wanna start with is you had a recent piece in the Atlantic about being a black soldier under Pete Hegseth in his new department of War. You interviewed a bunch of people. Some of the basic facts here is at the Pentagon he has blocked or delayed the promotion of 12 black and female senior officers, pushed out several of them. You removed the portrait from the art gallery of Chappie James, the first black American to be promoted to four star general. You know, this is one of those things with the beginning you start to raise your eyebrows a little bit at some of the choices. But the trend line is not subtle.
- [01:34]
B
It's not subtle. No. And you know, for this story, I interviewed over two dozen currently enlisted and retired officers, civilian and members of the military. And it was interesting because what a lot of them are experiencing is this sort of cognitive dissonance where on the one hand they are acutely aware of their own history and they are aware of the fact that, you know, oftentimes they're like second, third, fourth, fifth generation in their family to serve in the military. They've got folks going all the way back to the Civil War, like formerly enslaved people who fought in the Civil War, then people who fought in segregated units in World War I and World War II. People who were, you know, one day fighting for civil rights in the US and then the next day fighting in Vietnam. And so there's this long tradition of a recognition that black Americans have often fought for a Country that hasn't always fought for them. And in many ways for a country that's often purposefully antagonized them. And so that sense of history gives them this sense that like, all right, it's bad now, but our ancestors have been through worse, My grandfather's been through worse, my dad has been through worse. And still it's incredibly difficult to exist in the current paradigm where you are being inundated with messages, explicit and implicit rhetoric, policy that is telling you that you don't deserve the position that you're in and that you are not worthy of ascending to certain high ranking offices which within the military, that the only reason you're in the military or the only reason you're in these high ranking positions or have been considered for them. You know, the suggestion from Secretary Hegseth and his aides is that it's because of affirmative action, it's because of dei, it's because of Joe Biden's quote unquote woke military. And that is a really difficult environment for people to be in. And so there's this back and forth of should we stay, should we go? And people making different sorts of calculus about what the right thing to do is.
- [03:43]
A
Well, let's tease it out. You talk to, I guess it was Gerald Curry who somebody did decide to retire and kind of you talked to him about that very question. Like how are they thinking about this? I mean, this is one of those questions that is, you know, I've had some, you know, ex FBI folks on here and people doj. This is a tough question across the government. Right. It's like, do I work for a government that I believe to be corrupt? Is it better to have, you know, people of responsibility in these positions or not? Like that's something that weighs on a lot of people. Like this adds kind of an additional layer to it when the secretary is just being blatantly racializing these decisions.
- [04:22]
B
Yeah, I think that one of the factors for many people, and I think this is probably the case within the federal government as well. But in the military, after 20 years you get a pension that you receive for the rest of your life. And that's important for all members of the military to be clear. And that's a huge incentive for so many of them to stay on for extended periods of time. This is why so many people in the military have such long tenures. Because once you get past 20 years, even if you get to 25, 30, 35, you get paid more and more the longer you stay in. But it's Hard to overstate the role that the military has played in the. Providing an opportunity for black upward social and economic mobility in ways that. That are kind of singular in the. In the sort of intergenerational configuring of the American professional infrastructure. Right. Like, it's a huge thing that has happened is that there are so many generations of black folks in the military because it has been such reliable mechanism by which to achieve, you know, and ascend, you know, to different economic socioeconomic statuses. And so that actually the irony about
- [05:39]
A
this, because it's like actually a meritocracy, right?
- [05:42]
B
No, for sure. And the other part of this is, you know, one of the things that people I spoke to brought up is this idea that because the military is such a. Has been such a singular place in that way, a lot of the folks have come from really impoverished or working class backgrounds, and the military has made it so that they are the economic source of stability for their entire family. Right. Not just like their kids, their partner, but like their extended family. And so, you know, you have these folks who have now ascended into a different socioeconomic realm because of the stability that the military has afforded, who are trying to make calculus about whether to stay or to go with a recognition that the calculus isn't just about, you know, what red line is Hegseth going across, or how much is racism am I willing to experience. But also, like, this job is what allows me to support, you know, many, many people beyond myself. And so I think that's another layer that is added on to the sort of complexity. And Gerald, you know, Gerald Curry, who you mentioned, part of the reason he decided to join was because he joined the Air Force, was because he saw his cousin when he was a kid in Fort Knox and just saw his house he lived in and saw his pristine uniform. And it represented a sort of stability that Lt. Curry yearned for for himself. And that is one of the things that led him into the military in the first place. Yeah.
- [07:12]
A
Obviously some of the folks you had to talk to couldn't go on the record because of. Either they're in the military or I just. It's just not outside of the tradition of the military to kind of pop off about something like this. That said, I'm just. I'm kind of curious when it was, you know, just, you guys on background, like, how much bitterness there was about it, like what the vibe was about it. I mean, to me, I just can't imagine these guys, like, working their whole career serving Iraq, Afghanistan, going into war zones and having like a weekend talk show co host, clown, you know, making these types of decisions.