Helped establish 'don't ask, don't tell'

Scholar advised Joint Chiefs of Staff on compromise policy allowing homosexuals to serve in military

As one of the world's foremost military sociologists, Charles Moskos had the ear of top-ranking American generals and powerful politicians.

His "don't ask, don't tell" policy regarding the service of homosexuals in the military may be what's known about him by the general population, but it's a small part of the legacy of the popular Northwestern University professor, his colleagues said.

Under the policy, gays and lesbians may serve only if they keep their sexual orientation private and do not engage in homosexual acts.

Dr. Moskos' research examined the modern military experience in unprecedented detail, gleaned in part from his ease with the rank-and-file soldiers.

"He truly had an impact on the military," said Gen. Wesley Clark in a statement. "He gave many of us the reassurance that someone out there knew us, cared about us and could help see our best interests as a nation and a military were looked after."

A colleague, Wendell Bell, professor emeritus of sociology at Yale University and Dr. Moskos' graduate thesis adviser, said, "He could bond with anybody: a raw recruit or a general or even someone very high up in the Pentagon; sugar cane workers, prime minsters or professors."

Dr. Moskos, 74, died of cancer Saturday, May 31, in his home in Santa Monica, Calif., his family said.

Born to Greek immigrants on the Near West Side of Chicago, Dr. Moskos was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1956 after graduating from Princeton University with a degree in sociology. The two years he spent with the military would go on to influence the bulk of his professional career.

"He was very proud to be an enlisted man," said his wife of 41 years, Ilca. "Whenever somebody on the street would call him sir, he'd say, 'Don't call me sir, I work for a living.' "

After his military service, Dr. Moskos worked toward a doctorate at UCLA, where he studied new governments in the Caribbean with Bell. But after obtaining his PhD in sociology, he returned to his primary interest—the people and policies of the U.S. armed services.

"He was mainly concerned with military people and military institutions and how people could serve their country," said John Allen Williams, professor of political science at Loyola University Chicago. "As an enlisted person himself who was drafted, he felt the elite of this country should be willing to give back to the country in some measure of what the country had given them, in either military or civilian service."

Dr. Moskos' research ranged from the process of racial integration in the armed services, to the various motivations for soldiers to enlist in the military, to the relationship between the civilian and military spheres after the end of the Cold War, Williams said. Far from the stereotype of the aloof, sheltered academician, Dr. Moskos collected his data by talking directly to soldiers stationed abroad, sometimes in the thick of war.

"He was a military ethnographer; his phrase was, give me a hard anecdote over a squishy statistic every day," Williams said.

"His real empathy was with the rank and file, having been a grunt himself," said Allen Schnaiberg, a professor emeritus in sociology at NU. "He really felt he had a unique perspective to offer, and he was both sympathetic and actually quite courageous in putting himself at risk by putting himself out with the troops."

Dr. Moskos' work earned him the position of advising the highest-ranking officials in the U.S. military and several awards, including the Distinguished Service Medal, the highest honor the Army awards to civilians.

Though he also helped design the public service organization AmeriCorps and studied Greek-Americans, Dr. Moskos' most noted contribution was to advise the Joint Chiefs of Staff on the "don't ask, don't tell" policy, enacted into law by Congress in 1993. Though the measure attracted controversy, Dr. Moskos defended it as a compromise that was essential given the attitudes of the soldiers he had interviewed.

"Charlie was not afraid of controversy," Williams said. "He didn't seek it out, and his goal was to find areas of common agreement and to do so in a way that was respectful of others, but he was a person of very strong principle; he wasn't going to surrender principle to reach a false consensus."

Many of those who debated Dr. Moskos on the "don't ask, don't tell" policy and other issues ended up befriending him, his colleagues and family said.

"He had this gift of talking to people on the extreme opposition and yet they could remain friends," his wife said.

Dr. Moskos met his future wife when he was a graduate student at UCLA, she said. He picked her up using the line "How's the water?" at the beach on an October afternoon in 1962. They married in Chicago in 1966, had two sons and lived in Evanston for 37 years before retiring to Santa Monica in 2003.

Even after his move, he returned to NU each fall to teach an introductory sociology course that would attract as many as 600 students, said NU Provost Daniel Linzer.

Dr. Moskos also is survived by two sons, Andrew and Peter, and two grandchildren.

Visitation will be held from 4 to 9 p.m. Thursday in Smith-Corcoran Funeral Home, 6150 N. Cicero Ave., Chicago. Services will be held at 10 a.m. Friday in St. Andrew's Greek Orthodox Church, 5649 N. Sheridan Rd., Chicago.

rmitchum@tribune.com

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