The military has one job: keeping America safe from foreign enemies by focusing defense spending on capability and lethality. Under the Biden administration, however, military spending is increasingly focused on diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, which waste money and divide troops—posing a threat to our national security.

Discouraging racism—something the military had been doing for decades—is commendable. But a few years ago, the tone of these programs changed.

In June 2020, then-Secretary of Defense Mark Esper ordered a redesign of military education to teach service members about “implicit bias.” He also established an entire system of bureaucratic agencies dedicated to DEI.

This system has expanded under President Biden. In fiscal 2023, the Pentagon received $86.5 million for DEI programs, up from $68 million in 2022. For fiscal 2024, the Pentagon increased its DEI program funding request further, to a staggering $114.7 million.

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It is essential that the military make the most of the money it receives. That means spending money on projects that will improve national security, not on DEI initiatives that serve as mere virtue signaling.

But the military’s DEI programs are more than just a waste of money, as bad as that is. Rather, these programs are detrimental to America’s national security.

Consider a December 2020 memo from the acting secretary of defense instructing Pentagon officials to “remove aptitude test barriers that adversely impact diversity.” The same memo says the Defense Department will “consider, and, where applicable, address any potential barriers to developing racially diverse pools of candidates for … positions in senior leadership.”

Ultimately, it says, the department must strive to “achieve a more diverse force at the senior grades” by developing a strategy to “achieve a talent pipeline that reflects … U.S. Census projections.”

In other words, top officials have set diversity quotas for both general and leadership positions in the military—and they’re willing to sacrifice standards to achieve these quotas. For these officials, it apparently matters more that military officers and leaders tick the right identity boxes than that they be able to competently discharge their duties.

But it is not just the integration of DEI into promotions that poses a threat—so does the DEI training implemented in the military.

Currently, the military implements DEI training in all its branches and academies. DEI material is a recommended part of the leadership curricula in both the ROTC and service academies, where it is considered a “core competency.”

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Such training teaches critical race theory, a Marxist ideology that views the world through an “oppressor vs. oppressed” lens. Freedom of Information Act requests concerning various training sessions (e.g., at the Air Force Academy) show that the classes teach concepts such as White privilege, internal bias and systemic racism. Worse, the academies implement “eyes and ears” programs that encourage students to report any private conversations that contradict DEI ideology.

In teaching CRT and Marxism, the military is propagating an ideology that actively seeks the destruction of Western society—the same Western society that our soldiers are meant to protect. And rather than uniting service members behind a love of country, this training fosters divisions based on characteristics such as race, and even imply that patriotism is White supremacy.

These DEI efforts have tangibly damaged our military. In the 1970s, early DEI efforts correlated with a recruitment crisis for the American military, leaving our military lacking personnel. The same holds true today, as the military is again falling short of its recruitment goals, or is lowering recruitment goals to meet a lower number of expected recruits.

The military has one job, and one job only: protecting the United States from its enemies. DEI does nothing to further that mission. Instead, it hinders it by promoting division, diverting crucial resources and fostering anti-American ideology. It is time that we remove this ideology from our military—before it destroys us.