As the COVID-19 vaccine mandate for the military approaches, service men and women are still finding themselves coerced during this “voluntary” period by the threat of lost benefits.
According to internal e-mails collected by the Washington Free Beacon, Marines are in danger of losing their pensions, tuition assistance, access to the G.I. Bill, and other key military benefits if they refuse to get the shot.
In an August 18 e-mail, Colonel Teague Pastel, a commanding officer at the Marine Barracks in Washington, D.C., wrote to colleagues that while “vaccines are still voluntary,” once they become mandatory Marines can expect that non-compliance will result in the loss of the aforementioned benefits, as well as “administration separation” and a demerit in the marine’s personal file.
“Please continue engaging with our troops on the importance of vaccinating, and stress that it is still voluntary at this time. However, once the vaccine becomes mandatory they need to be prepared to separate and potentially lose benefits,” Pastel’s e-mail read. “If the Marines are not willing to lose the benefits then they should just get the vaccine now.”
The e-mail was sent prior to the FDA’s approval of the Pfizer vaccine on Monday. This approval opened the door for the military to mandate the shot for those in the service, which they did just hours after the approval was announced.
“As you continue engaging with your Marines and Sailors about volunteering to get the vaccine now instead of waiting, please ensure they know the anticipated ramifications of refusing to vaccinate,” Pastel wrote in his memo.
According to the Pentagon, more than a million troops are fully vaccinated. So far, the Navy has the highest vaccination rate, at 65 percent. Over 65 percent of the Air Force has been at least partially vaccinated, while about 50 percent of the Army has received the vaccine.
Reports have come in of cadets at military academies being abused and discriminated against for not taking the shot.
One commander at West Point, Colonel Laura Dawson, has called cadets “selfish” and not “team players” while saying things such as “good news guys, the vaccine is going to be mandatory soon!” According to The Gateway Pundit, she has even called unvaccinated cadets a “cult.”
The outlet further reported:
One parent expressed that her son said when five cadets decided to get the shot, they were all told by their leadership to cheer and call them heroes. In another shocking incident, Colonel Dawson gathered all the new cadets that received the vaccine during basic training and had a ceremonial mask-burn to celebrate and commend them for getting vaccinated. In an ironic twist, they were all forced to get new masks, since West Point still has a one hundred percent mask policy.
At Fort Benning in Georgia, members of Easy Company are not allowed to have guests at their graduation ceremony if they (the graduates and their would-be guests) have not been vaccinated.
Similarly, parents at West point were recently sent an e-mail about Ring Weekend, an important milestone in a senior cadet’s life. The unvaccinated parents and guests are not allowed to partake in the indoor banquet.
It is becoming increasingly difficult for Americans of all backgrounds to avoid getting the vaccine. Places of work, including hospitals, are putting pressure on employees to take the shot.
The American Medical Association urged the public and private sectors to both mandate the vaccine in light of the Pfizer shot’s approval.
“The simple fact is unless a significant percentage of our population is vaccinated against COVID-19 — we could be stuck fighting this virus for many more months or even years to come,” AMA President Gerald Harmon said in a statement. “Now is the time for the public and private sectors to come together, listen to the science, and mandate vaccination.”
Joe Biden echoed that sentiment to businesses during his remarks on Monday.
“Today I’m calling on more companies in the private sector to step up the vaccine requirements that’ll reach millions more people,” Biden said. “If you’re a business leader, a nonprofit leader, a state or local leader, who has been waiting for full FDA approval to require vaccinations, I call on you now to do that.”
