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Uncle Sam Wants Latinos

Uncle Sam Wants Latinos

The Army's initiative to get more Latinos across the United States to enlist is gaining mixed reactions from the community.

The increase comes at a time when the Army is struggling to recruit new soldiers. The enlistment of black men and women, a group particularly disillusioned by the war in Iraq, has dropped off sharply, to 14.5 percent from 22.3 percent since the beginning of the Iraq war.

In cities with large Latino populations, the focus on recruitment has polarized some Latinos, prompting some to organize against recruiters and to help immigrants learn their rights. Critics say recruiters, who are under pressure to meet quotas, often mislead young people into enlisting and become aggressive, repeatedly calling them, following them to eateries and even to trips to the gym. The Army also tried to appeal to them by showing off top�of-the line Hummer vehicles wherever youths gather as promotional tools.

Army recruiters noticeably have stepped up their presence in schools and neighborhoods with large Latino populations. "You see them today where you would never see them three or four years ago," says Rick Jahnkow, program coordinator for the Project on Youth and non-Military Opportunities in San Diego.

"We see a lot of confusion among immigrant parents, and recruiters are preying on that confusion," says Jorge Mariscal, a Vietnam veteran who is director of the Chicano/Latino Arts and Humanities Program at the University of California, San Diego, and is active in the counter-recruitment movement.

Currently, Latinos make up the fastest-growing pool of military-age people in the United States and are more likely to complete boot camp and finish their military service, according to a 2004 study on Marine recruitment by CNA, a research group that operates the Center for Naval Analyses and the Institute for Public Research. Recruitment studies show that Latino re-enlistment rates are the highest among any group of soldiers, according to the Times.

In addition to their presence in schools and neighborhoods, the Army has made better use of bilingual recruiters to reach out to Latino communities, including the use of television commercials on both the Telemundo and Univision networks.


(See also: Military Recruiting in the July/Aug. 2005 issue of DiversityInc.)

posted by Victor Lloyd Smith @ 4:28 PM