Senators Hear Sailors’ Fears on Gays in Service : Military: Warnings bring applause at Norfolk base. A homosexual officer says his dream is being taken away.

Sailors and Marines grimly warned U.S. senators on Monday that allowing homosexuals to serve in the military would cost lives, violate religious beliefs and hold down enlistment and retention rates in the armed services.

The hearing--the first of several to be held by the Senate Armed Services Committee at military installations across the nation--elicited a nearly solid front of opposition to President Clinton’s proposal to lift the ban on gays. For senators who want the ban to remain in place, the day--which began with visits to Navy ships--provided strong testimonials of support.

The audience of sailors and Marines, responding to what one Navy officer called “the most emotional issue I’ve witnessed in my 21 years in the Navy,” broke into spontaneous applause when witnesses said gays would never be accepted as “part of the team” and that gays “are trying to use the government to legitimize their lifestyle.”

Echoing other witnesses, one senior Navy enlisted man, Force Master Chief Harry Schafer, said that the disruption of having gays serve openly would cost blood and money.

“War or the deck of any aircraft carrier are not politically correct,” said Schafer, an aviation chief with 26 years in the service. “Lose the attention to detail, and we will lose lives.”

The proceedings also marked the first appearance before the Senate panel by two openly gay naval officers, who described their high hopes for serving their nation and their broken dreams when the Navy moved to discharge them after they revealed their homosexuality.

Of the 17 witnesses who appeared before the panel during three hours of testimony, only the two gay officers spoke in favor of lifting the ban.

“I am a red-blooded American . . . I am the person you have been talking about all along,” said Lt. (j.g.) Tracy W. Thorne, a naval aviator who is soon to be discharged for homosexuality. “This policy has wiped my dream away,” Thorne said.

Thorne’s comments drew scattered jeers from 1,000 Navy and Marine Corps personnel who packed an auditorium at Norfolk Naval Base, the sprawling Atlantic fleet headquarters. As Thorne and Lt. (j.g.) Richard Selland, a gay submarine officer also being discharged from the service, came before the committee, roughly one-fifth of the uniformed personnel in the room walked out.

When Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-S.C.) told Thorne and Selland, “Your lifestyle is not normal,” the audience burst into amused but approving applause.

With just a few exceptions, lawmakers touring the berthing compartments and working areas of several naval vessels heard similar comments from individual service members.

According to a Times Poll of enlisted personnel conducted in March, almost three-quarters of enlistees oppose lifting the ban. Of all service members, however, Navy enlistees indicated the least opposition to the move.

While several sailors told lawmakers during morning shipboard visits that they do not oppose lifting the ban, most were adamantly against such a move.

“Any gay would be an outcast,” said 20-year-old Anthony Goldston, a fire control technician aboard the attack submarine Flying Fish who talked with Sens. Charles S. Robb (D-Va.) and Dirk Kempthorne (R-Ida.). “We’re like a family here,” added Goldston as he and several bunk mates lounged in the narrow confines of a six-man berthing galley. “A person like that just wouldn’t fit in.”

Aboard the amphibious ship Austin, dozens of sailors told lawmakers that they would leave the Navy if gays were allowed in. Others predicted violence against gay sailors and Marines if the ban were lifted.

Thomas Stoddard, a gay activist directing the Campaign for Military Service, called the ship visits and hearings with service members “a side show” that distracts from the civil rights dimension of the issue and seeks to legitimize fears about gays.

“Instead of stunts and spectacles, we need the cleansing light of information and leadership,” Stoddard said. “We haven’t gotten it today.”

The afternoon hearings also revealed an undercurrent of suspicion in the military about Clinton’s plans to reduce the size of the armed services.

Petty Officer 2nd Class Al Portes, a Navy storekeeper with six years in the service, told senators that in his unit, those who sympathize with a lifting of the ban are frequently asked, “‘What are you, a Clinton fan now?”’

When Portes said Clinton had “broken every other promise” made during the election campaign, the audience again erupted in cheers.

“The yellow ribbon is faded now,” added Fleet Master Chief Ronald Carter, referring to the ubiquitous symbol of support for the armed forces during the Persian Gulf War. “We’ve become a political football.”

Speaking to sailors during a visit to the carrier John F. Kennedy, Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.) said that Clinton’s plan to allow gay men and lesbians to serve openly in the military “is not a done deal.”

At the same time Nunn, who had appeared more conciliatory toward Clinton in recent weeks, struck a new note of defiance toward the President. If Clinton does move to lift the existing prohibition, Nunn said, he and other opponents would try to overturn the presidential order.

Clinton has given Defense Secretary Les Aspin until July 15 to draft an order that would lead to ending the ban.

Of the six lawmakers touring ships and submarines Monday, all but one--Robb--oppose allowing gays to serve. As they squeezed through narrow bunk spaces and peered into toilet and shower facilities, most visiting senators clearly believed they had gathered powerful evidence for their case.

Stoddard, who spoke to reporters outside the gates of the base, said that the panel’s visit reminded him of the Senate Judiciary Committee’s field hearings throughout the Deep South in the early 1960s, when lawmakers asked white Southerners what they thought about civil rights legislation.

Nunn is expected to take his panel’s hearings on the road again next week, visiting an Army post to explore the views of ground forces there.