Growing military-civilian divide: Fewer Americans have immediate family connections to the U.S. military

The news often features stories about a growing U.S. military-civilian divide.  For example, the U.S. Department of Defense published a story earlier this year arguing that a widening military-civilian gap was endangering the country's ability to recruit and sustain the all-volunteer force. In that story, Anthony M. Kurta, acting undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, said that the growing divide "is characterized by misperceptions, a lack of knowledge and an inability to identify with those who serve."  As an example, Mr. Kurta (who retired from the Navy in 2013 as a Rear Admiral after 32 years on active duty) cited DOD survey data showing that a majority of youth believe that those who serve and then separate from the military inevitably will have psychological or emotional issues.  Although some veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan do struggle with issues such as post-traumatic stress symptoms (a 2015 review of 33 studies estimated the prevalence rate at 23% of veterans), the fact is that most post-9/11 veterans have displayed remarkable resilience as they have transitioned to civilian life.  Mr. Kurta goes on to argue that "While the American public has faith in the efficacy of our military, they feel little to no personal connection with it."

There are a number of factors contributing to this sense of a growing military-civilian divide, one of which is that the active duty military today is much smaller than during past conflicts.  A 2018 report by the Rand Corporation estimated that 2.77 million U.S. service members had deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan since the post-9/11 conflicts began.  That's actually less than 1% of the total U.S. population.  In contrast, nearly 10% of Americans served during World War II.  Because a smaller percentage of families have borne the brunt of service during the post-9/11 conflicts relative to previous conflicts, Americans are less likely to have immediate family connections to the military.

The best data on this issue come from a nationally representative survey of over two-thousand Americans conducted in 2011 by the Pew Research Center.  Among other things, the survey asked participants whether they had an immediate family member who had served in the U.S. military - where "immediate family members" were defined as parents, spouses, children, and/or siblings.  The survey found a large inter-generational gap on this measure.  For example, 77% of adults 50 year or older said they had an immediate family connection, whereas only 33% of adults 18-29 years of age had such a connection.  Younger Americans, in particular, tend to lack immediate family connections, which (among other things) means that they learn most of what they know about the military from media rather than from talking with those who have served.

In a recent post, Lt. Commander Arlo Abrahamson, a career Navy public affairs officer, spelled out the basic premise on which I hope to build in this blog:  "The military doesn’t have a visibility problem, it has a conversational disconnect with civilians."  We see military veterans being honored regularly during sporting events and community parades.  Yet Americans, especially younger Americans, lack the immediate family connections that typically existed for prior generations - which limits opportunities for more meaningful conversations between military and civilian communities.  Stereotypes abound on all sides.  As a communication scholar, I see opportunities to talk about how the work my colleagues are doing might help inform ideas for improving the quality of conversations between military-connected individuals and civilians. 

In my own case, I am a military parent - my son, Brendan, served 14 years in the Army and Army Reserves and deployed twice to Iraq.  Three of my uncles also served during the Korean War, my father was drafted shortly after that conflict ended, and both my father-in-law and brother-in-law served in the Navy.  Despite these family connections, I am an "outsider" in that I have never served in the military myself.  I am also a communication professor interested in the potential of dialogue to bridge divides.  In upcoming posts, I plan to explore issues that have created a growing sense of military-civilian divides as well as ways of promoting more productive conversations between military and civilian communities.  If you're interested in these issues, I hope that you'll read and comment on my periodic posts and share them with others.