With the (possible) revocation of the Army’s "don’t ask, don’t tell" policy, I thought it would be interesting to mention obstacles the Army could face in terms of housing its soldiers.

Current group scenario — This scenario forbids cohabitation of (presumed) heterosexual males/females unless they are married. There are only two types of billeting to consider: heterosexual males/females.

[Future] group scenario one — The "status quo" (opposite sex only) homosexual males/females along with the heterosexual males/females inhabit this scenario; four distinctly different groups. According to the current philosophy, this would mandate four types of billeting to avoid assigning a billet to the object of the other’s affection. One could reason that it would be possible to billet homosexual males/females together since neither are the object of one another’s affection. This would reduce the number of unique billets to three.

[Future] group scenario two — Take the previous four groups and add two more groups of bisexual males/females. Since the object of affection for a bisexual male/female is either sex, they would have to be billeted completely alone to avoid cohabitation. This scenario would mandate five or six billeting situations depending on the allowance of cohabitation of homosexual males/females. Otherwise the Army would have to allow six distinct billeting arrangements to avoid possible equal opportunity complaints.

The introduction of openly gay soldiers in the military is going to cost the Army millions of dollars reinventing the way we house our soldiers, not just single homosexual soldiers, but married homosexual soldiers as well.

Perhaps the Army would save a great deal of time and money if it simply allowed all homosexuals to live in private, off-base housing. This would undoubtedly cause resentment by heterosexual males/females, but it would not alter current billeting standards on Army bases.

Sgt. 1st Class Fred BallardBasra, Iraq

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