Army Launches Campaign in L.A. to Recruit More Latinos

Hoping to boost the recruitment of Latinos by the military, Secretary of the Army Louis Caldera on Friday came back to Los Angeles--home to the largest Spanish-surnamed population in the United States--to underscore his contention that Latinos are underrepresented in the Army.

And he recruited two well-known Californians, Gov. Gray Davis and former Serb captive Andrew Ramirez, to help him in the effort.

“[Military service] made me a better person, a more successful person,” Davis told a news conference in Hollywood.

Although Mexican Americans and other Latinos have a long and distinguished record of serving in America’s armed forces, Caldera and others say the number of Latinos in the military is not keeping up with their growth in the general population. Although Latinos currently make up about 13% of this country’s population, they constitute only 6% of the Army’s active-duty strength of 480,000 soldiers.

Ten years ago, the Army had 750,000 active-duty soldiers. Army officials say that number has been declining since the elimination of the draft in 1973. In addition, the end of the Cold War precipitated further troop reductions.

An estimated 7,000 Latinos are recruited each year into the Army. Caldera and Army brass want to increase that figure to 12,000.

To meet those projections, Caldera, a former assemblyman from Los Angeles who became Army secretary last year, said he would:

* Increase the Army’s Spanish-language TV budget from $5 million to $10 million a year.

* Boost the Army’s $100-million recruiting budget. In today’s Army, Caldera said, laptop computers and cellular telephones are just as important to recruiters as using a catchy slogan, such as “Be all that you can be,” to persuade computer-savvy recruits to sign up.

* Expand Junior ROTC programs to more high schools in Los Angeles and elsewhere with large Latino enrollments.

* Reach out to high school dropouts to help them get the equivalent of a diploma when possible. At present, dropouts are ineligible for military service unless they get an equivalency certificate.

So, Caldera enlisted Davis, a former Army signal corps captain who served in Vietnam, and Ramirez, whose home leave ends Tuesday, to talk about the benefits of military service.

Davis, who reminded reporters that he was the only veteran among those who ran for governor last year, said he is discouraged to discover that many young people, particularly those in the 17-to-24 age group that the Army is targeting, are largely uninterested in military service.

“I’m troubled that they [don’t] know about war . . . [and they] don’t fully appreciate” military service, the governor said. “I encourage all young people, all Californians, to consider [it].”

Davis then introduced Ramirez, and joked that the Army staff sergeant from East Los Angeles might one day be governor.

Ramirez didn’t reply to that. Instead, he told of a friend who didn’t follow him into the Army seven years ago. If he had joined then, Ramirez said, the unidentified friend would have obtained his undergraduate degree by now with the Army’s help.

He said the friend is still struggling to finish college because of a lack of money.

Caldera conceded that the Latino campaign won’t be easy. Staffers at the Army’s recruitment office in Hollywood say as few as six potential recruits come there each week, far fewer than the weekly average of 12 a few years ago.

In addition, the staffers admit that many Latino parents discourage their children from joining, believing that college should come before miliary service.

Sgt. 1st Class Narciso Watkins, the head of the Hollywood office, estimated that parents oppose military service in as many as 70% of the cases handled by the office.

“We have to get to the parents,” Watkins said.

Later in the day, Caldera pushed the recruitment program at a leadership conference at the downtown Westin Bonaventure Hotel. There, he posed for pictures with 18-year-old high school senior Philip Zapien of La Puente, who has been accepted to attend the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

Caldera, himself a West Point graduate, smiled broadly and shook Zapien’s hand happily.