{"id":51888,"date":"2020-08-21T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-08-21T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/armytimes\/uncategorized\/2020\/08\/21\/how-do-we-save-prisoners-of-the-cultural-war-within-our-military\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T07:56:03","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T07:56:03","slug":"how-do-we-save-prisoners-of-the-cultural-war-within-our-military","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/armytimes\/opinion\/commentary\/2020\/08\/21\/how-do-we-save-prisoners-of-the-cultural-war-within-our-military\/","title":{"rendered":"How do we save prisoners of the cultural war within our military?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cYou have one thing that no one can ever take from you. That\u2019s your voice.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">While it wasn\u2019t obvious to those who heard these words spoken by high school senior Thae Ohu during her <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=IIXbDZuboGs&#038;feature=youtu.be\" target=_blank>Ted Talk on bullying<\/a>, what was clear is she spoke with a sense of authority. As if she knew it to be true because she\u2019d lived it. What no one in the audience could\u2019ve known is she was a survivor who\u2019d seen her share of hardship, which, like many in search of a stronger self identify, is why she joined the Marine Corps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Knowing that gives context to why Ohu, an intel school admin specialist, now sits in a military brig in Chesapeake, Virginia. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.military.com\/daily-news\/2020\/07\/13\/family-wants-military-help-marine-cope-sex-assault-instead-shes-brig.html\" target=_blank>The charge stems from an incident<\/a> where a mental breakdown she suffered had escalated into an altercation with her boyfriend in the home they shared. Police were called. Ohu was detained and taken to a mental health facility, not to jail. This matters. While her boyfriend was certainly shaken, he suffered no apparent physical injuries, and it was clear to him and the authorities that she was a Marine in crisis, not a criminal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">While she subsequently managed to recover in an in-patient treatment facility, it wouldn\u2019t be enough to overcome what had been happening in both her mind and around her. As the facts of the case are unraveled, it appears to lend itself to a classic causality dilemma \u2014 the \u201cchicken or the egg\u201d metaphor, in lay terms \u2014 where the co-occurring legal and medical problems she faced made it hard to determine whether she broke the law or the system broke her first.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This legal-medical entanglement is typical in such cases. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.americangrit.com\/2020\/07\/24\/thae-ohu-update-from-her-family\/\" target=_blank>Beneath the allegations in Ohu\u2019s case<\/a> lies an unresolved sexual assault by a fellow Marine, a post traumatic stress diagnosis along with a history of suicidal behavior, and attempts to separate her rather than take responsibility for her mental wellness. Also, her supporters believe she is yet another case of \u201caccuser blowback,\u201d where unintended consequences follow a formally filed accusation, usually in the form of systemic retaliation. Taken altogether, these events offer no clear sense of whether their causal relationship is merely a coincidence, or whether we\u2019re seeing one of those coincidences that take a lot of planning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It is narratives such as Corporal Ohu\u2019s that I think about when we lament the rate of suicide among veterans and service members. While most people I hear talk about \u201c22 a day\u201d often refer to the statistical rate of suicide in the abstract, it is Ohu who embodies the three-dimensional profile of someone at risk. A service member who has a history of mental vulnerability and faces seemingly insurmountable hardship, lacks a support system, then runs head on into a precipitating factor or event. In this case, confinement to a vault-like, 8-by-10 cell with a bed and mattress, no Internet access, or even photos of family on the wall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Like most who served on active duty and have dealt with military assault cases, I believe key relevant questions have to be answered. Is the accused still on active duty? If so, is where he\u2019s stationed important to consider? Might he or those in his unit have influence in any way on the case? Most alarmingly, why did the DD form 2910 she filed never make it into the Defense Sexual Assault Incident Database, according to her sister? All fair questions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Fair because unanswered questions such as these are not contemplated in a vacuum. While we know <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/national-security\/2020\/07\/10\/vanessa-guillen-harassment\/\" target=_blank>U.S. Army Spc. Vanessa Guill\u00e9n <\/a>was murdered and dismembered, base officials still contended there was no proof she\u2019d been sexually assaulted or harassed. This at Fort Hood, a base that led not only in reported cases of sexual assault, suicides, and misconduct, but also had a senior-ranking unit victim advocate convicted for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thedailybeast.com\/inside-fort-hoods-prostitution-ring\" target=_blank>luring soldiers into a prostitution ring<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">While Fort Hood\u2019s reputation may not be dispositive to the case against Ohu, it does help recast what\u2019s reasonable to consider in the mind of a jurist being asked to apply a \u201creasonable person\u201d standard. An imprecise thought process that will factor into the decision on whether a person is either guilty or not guilty based on a hunch. A line of thinking that must consider in this case whether it\u2019s within the realm of possibility that her report of a rape in Okinawa, a mishandled investigation coupled with a retaliatory demotion, were causally related to the mental breakdowns she suffered because of it, including the alleged altercation with the individual who now supports her release and facially valid need for mental health support.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cPreventing sexual assault is our moral duty,\u201d said former Defense Secretary James N. Mattis. \u201cBy its nature, sexual assault is one of the most destructive factors in building a mission-focused military.\u201d Today, Cpl. Thae Ohu sits in a cell, living through the destructive fallout from the attacks on her, starting with one in Okinawa and culminating in Chesapeake. She couldn\u2019t have fathomed during her impassioned Ted Talk that someday her voice would indeed be taken in this way. The question is whether the same military culture that had successfully muted tens of thousands of other accusers, including Spc. Vanessa Guill\u00e9n, is preparing to do the same to the 26-year-old corporal in Chesapeake who\u2019s determined to be heard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><i>Sherman Gillums Jr. is a retired Marine officer and chief advocacy officer for AMVETS.<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><i>Editor\u2019s note: This is an Op-Ed and as such, the opinions expressed are those of the author. If you would like to respond, or have an editorial of your own you would like to submit, please contact Military Times managing editor Howard Altman,&nbsp;<\/i><a href=\"mailto:haltman@militarytimes.com\"><i>haltman@militarytimes.com<\/i><\/a><i>.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cYou have one thing that no one can ever take from you. That\u2019s your voice.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":44624,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":78,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[78,100,25,14],"tags":[],"coauthors":[5097],"class_list":["post-51888","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-commentary","category-daily-news-roundup","category-newsletters","category-opinion"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"EKXDP6LDCBAFDDG4OTLOWXOCVI","arc_canonical_url":"\/opinion\/commentary\/2020\/08\/21\/how-do-we-save-prisoners-of-the-cultural-war-within-our-military\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.0 (Yoast SEO v28.1) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>How do we save prisoners of the cultural war within our military? - Army Times<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"\u201cYou have one thing that no one can ever take from you. 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That\u2019s your voice.\u201d\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/armytimes\/opinion\/commentary\/2020\/08\/21\/how-do-we-save-prisoners-of-the-cultural-war-within-our-military\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Army Times\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-08-21T09:00:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-08-08T07:56:03+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Sherman Gillums Jr.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Sherman Gillums Jr.\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\n\t    \"@context\": \"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\n\t    \"@graph\": [\n\t        {\n\t            \"@type\": \"Article\",\n\t            \"@id\": \"https:\\\/\\\/one.sightlinemg.com\\\/armytimes\\\/opinion\\\/commentary\\\/2020\\\/08\\\/21\\\/how-do-we-save-prisoners-of-the-cultural-war-within-our-military\\\/#article\",\n\t            \"isPartOf\": {\n\t                \"@id\": \"https:\\\/\\\/one.sightlinemg.com\\\/armytimes\\\/opinion\\\/commentary\\\/2020\\\/08\\\/21\\\/how-do-we-save-prisoners-of-the-cultural-war-within-our-military\\\/\"\n\t            },\n\t            \"author\": {\n\t                \"name\": \"migration\",\n\t                \"@id\": \"https:\\\/\\\/one.sightlinemg.com\\\/armytimes\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/cc76c831bb37a926738c8391fca7a3b1\"\n\t            },\n\t            \"headline\": \"How do we save prisoners of the cultural war within our military?\",\n\t            \"datePublished\": \"2020-08-21T09:00:00+00:00\",\n\t            \"dateModified\": \"2026-08-08T07:56:03+00:00\",\n\t            \"mainEntityOfPage\": {\n\t                \"@id\": \"https:\\\/\\\/one.sightlinemg.com\\\/armytimes\\\/opinion\\\/commentary\\\/2020\\\/08\\\/21\\\/how-do-we-save-prisoners-of-the-cultural-war-within-our-military\\\/\"\n\t            },\n\t            \"wordCount\": 975,\n\t            \"commentCount\": 0,\n\t            \"publisher\": {\n\t                \"@id\": \"https:\\\/\\\/one.sightlinemg.com\\\/armytimes\\\/#organization\"\n\t            },\n\t            \"image\": {\n\t                \"@id\": \"https:\\\/\\\/one.sightlinemg.com\\\/armytimes\\\/opinion\\\/commentary\\\/2020\\\/08\\\/21\\\/how-do-we-save-prisoners-of-the-cultural-war-within-our-military\\\/#primaryimage\"\n\t            },\n\t            \"thumbnailUrl\": \"https:\\\/\\\/one.sightlinemg.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/08\\\/6177381.jpg.jpg\",\n\t            \"articleSection\": [\n\t                \"Commentary\",\n\t                \"Daily News Roundup\",\n\t                \"Newsletters\",\n\t                \"Opinion\"\n\t            ],\n\t            \"inLanguage\": \"en-US\",\n\t            \"potentialAction\": [\n\t                {\n\t                    \"@type\": \"CommentAction\",\n\t                    \"name\": \"Comment\",\n\t                    \"target\": [\n\t                        \"https:\\\/\\\/one.sightlinemg.com\\\/armytimes\\\/opinion\\\/commentary\\\/2020\\\/08\\\/21\\\/how-do-we-save-prisoners-of-the-cultural-war-within-our-military\\\/#respond\"\n\t                    ]\n\t                }\n\t            ]\n\t        },\n\t        {\n\t            \"@type\": \"WebPage\",\n\t            \"@id\": \"https:\\\/\\\/one.sightlinemg.com\\\/armytimes\\\/opinion\\\/commentary\\\/2020\\\/08\\\/21\\\/how-do-we-save-prisoners-of-the-cultural-war-within-our-military\\\/\",\n\t            \"url\": \"https:\\\/\\\/one.sightlinemg.com\\\/armytimes\\\/opinion\\\/commentary\\\/2020\\\/08\\\/21\\\/how-do-we-save-prisoners-of-the-cultural-war-within-our-military\\\/\",\n\t            \"name\": \"How do we save prisoners of the cultural war within our military? 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