A cultural shift since Congress passed a legal ban nearly a generation ago has changed the debate.

For many younger members of the military – those doing the bulk of the fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq – it’s hardly a debate at all. Polls show they care little about sexual orientation in their ranks.

Views in the wider society have evolved; gay marriage is now legal in five states and the District of Columbia. Opinion surveys say a majority of Americans think it’s OK for gays to serve in uniform.

“Do I care if someone is gay? I have no qualms,” said Army Sgt. Justin Graff, serving with the 5th Stryker Brigade in southern Afghanistan.

Jason Jonas, a former Army staff sergeant from Tempe, Ariz., said openly gay soldiers served in his intelligence unit at Fort Bragg, N.C., and their presence never affected unit morale.

“I don’t think it is anybody’s right to say who can and who can’t fight for their country,” said Jonas, 28, who served in Afghanistan before being injured. “Nobody cares. ‘Don’t ask, don’t tell’ is kind of a joke.”

It will not go unnoticed among military members that their most senior uniformed leader, Adm. Mike Mullen, told a Senate panel Tuesday that he personally believes it is time to allow gays to serve openly. It’s just wrong, Mullen said, that gays must “lie about who they are” to defend their country.

Although Obama said he would work to change the law this year, Defense Secretary Robert Gates gave him some extra leeway by telling Congress the Pentagon would need at least a year to implement the changes. Gates’ comment gave the impression that he thinks repeal is almost inevitable, although a leading Republican voice on defense matters, Sen. John McCain of Arizona, opposes the change.

“I fully support the president’s decision,” Gates said. “The question before us is not whether the military prepares to make this change, but how we best prepare for it,” adding that the final decision rests with Congress.

In the meantime, Gates said he is seeking latitude in how the law is enforced, and there are indications that the military already is honoring the ban mostly in the breach.

According to figures released Monday, the Defense Department last year dismissed the fewest service members for violating the policy in more than a decade. The 2009 figure – 428 – was sharply lower than the 2008 total of 619.

Overall, more than 10,900 troops have been discharged under the policy.

The list of countries that permit gays to serve openly in uniform has grown to 28, including Canada, Israel, Australia and most of Europe. Many of those nations have troops fighting alongside U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan, and Mullen said he has seen no indication that the different policy on gays by the allies in Afghanistan has hurt the war effort.

Yet in the U.S., there remains a powerful rhetorical weapon for opponents of lifting the ban – fear that it would weaken a military at war.

It’s a question that cuts to the heart of why sexual orientation has been such a sensitive topic in the military in the past – and remains so among those who see repeal of the 1993 ban on allowing gays to serve openly as putting still more stress on a military strained by years of conflict.

Mullen said he shares that concern, even as he became the first sitting chairman of the Joint Chiefs to publicly advocate allowing gays to serve openly. He told the Senate Armed Services Committee “there will be some disruption in the force” if the law is changed.

“Our plate is very full” already, he said.

Obama entered the White House as an advocate of repealing the ban, but he let it rest for a year. Last week, in his State of the Union address, he vowed to work with Congress this year “to finally repeal the law that denies gay Americans the right to serve the country they love because of who they are.”

When President Bill Clinton took office in 1993, he ignited a political firestorm by trying to use his executive powers to end the policy – not written into law at that point – of discriminating against gay service members in the military.

Congress stopped him by passing a law that does not explicitly prohibit gays or lesbians from serving but requires them to serve in silence. If they acknowledge their sexual orientation or engage in a homosexual act, they can be expelled. But if not asked, they need not disclose it.

The 1993 statute calls the military a “specialized society” in which life is “fundamentally different from civilian life.” And so it is. But the cultural differences are not necessarily as stark as in 1993.

Walter Slocombe, a defense consultant who was a senior Pentagon policy officer during the Clinton administration, says most military members “won’t care one way or another” if the ban is lifted.

All branches of the military struggle to some extent with racial, religious and gender tensions, he noted, but “that’s a result of having a military that reflects the diversity of the country.”

Some critics worry that the rabbinate and its charismatic chief, Brig. Gen. Avichai Rontzki, are infusing a militant mix of Judaism and nationalism into a traditionally secular institution that embodies the Israeli consensus.

On the Palestinian side, Islamic hard-liners already see their war with Israel through an uncompromising religious lens, and the rabbinate’s critics warn that the Jewish state must not follow suit and risk pushing the conflict closer to a zero-sum holy war.

When Israeli soldiers massed on the Gaza border for the country’s offensive against Hamas militants six months ago, uniformed rabbis stood amid the tents and tanks, reciting prayers with the men as they prepared for battle. When the troops went into Gaza, Rontzki went in with them.

That might not have seemed unusual, but some rabbis went further, distributing pamphlets that put the conflict firmly in religious terms. One suggested a parallel between today’s Palestinians and the Philistines, the biblical foes of the Israelites.

After criticism arose, the army condemned the pamphlet and Rontzki said it was distributed without his knowledge.

But the critics say it was in line with a pattern that goes against the heterogeneous nature of Israel’s conscript army.

Although mostly Jewish, the Israel Defense Forces’ estimated 175,000 regular troops include some Muslim Arabs and immigrants from the former Soviet Union who identify as Christians. The military’s advocate-general is an Orthodox Jew, and the editor of its official magazine is openly gay. All soldiers have access to their own clergy and observe their religions’ holidays, though only Jewish chaplains wear uniforms and serve in the military rabbinate.

The army chose Rontzki “instead of a more moderate personality with the hope of avoiding the kind of problems discussed around the withdrawal from Gaza,” said Gershom Gorenberg, an Israeli historian who has studied the settler movement.

“In the process, it has given a very prominent pulpit to someone whose views on other issues are extremely controversial,” he said.

Rontzki pioneered a new arm of the rabbinate dedicated to Jewish education, dubbed the Jewish Consciousness division. During the Gaza war his staff distributed colorful pamphlets exhorting soldiers to victory, accompanied by prayers, photographs of uniformed men in prayer shawls, and a number to call with questions of religious law.

“Under Rontzki’s command, the rabbinate is giving the conflict a religious overtone, and they are also using their free access to soldiers to work toward political goals,” said Michael Sfard, an attorney for Yesh Din, an Israeli human rights group. Those goals, critics like Sfard say, include making sure the West Bank, claimed by the Palestinians as part of their future state, remains in Jewish hands for good.

Rontzki has been accused of speaking out against military service for women – he denies it – and after Bamahane, the army magazine, profiled a homosexual major, Rontzki wrote to several senior officers to protest.

Israel’s army is proud of the opportunities it provides to women and openly gay soldiers. “A senior IDF officer who believes that it would be better for women not to be drafted and that homosexual soldiers should be erased from official army publications … does not deserve to serve in his position,” the Association for Civil Rights in Israel wrote to the military chief of staff.

The military responded that Rontzki was expressing his personal opinions. It declined to let Rontzki be interviewed, but Maj. Avital Leibovich, a spokeswoman, said his actions were in line with military orders.

“The jobs of the rabbinate have not changed,” Leibovich said. “The rabbinate is not supposed to be a substitute for the commander on the ground, but to give a spiritual boost to a religious soldier who might need it.”

The rabbinate’s new approach comes at a time of rising Orthodox influence in the military’s combat units. Elite troops once came predominantly from the socialist kibbutz movement; today they are more likely to be people like Rontzki – skullcapped, seminary-educated and steeped in an ethos of national service, sacrifice and building settlements.

The military does not keep statistics on religious affiliation, but it is clear that more religious Jews are making their way up the ranks. Some estimates say a quarter of the troops now completing combat officers’ training are religious. However, skullcaps like the one worn by 57-year-old Ronzki are still rare among the top brass, which remains overwhelmingly secular.

Some Orthodox leaders and educators voice concern that serving alongside secular conscripts weakens religious conviction. One of Rontzki’s goals has been to counter that tendency.

Most in the army think Rontzki’s activist Judaism is good for morale, said Yaakov Amidror, a retired general who is Orthodox himself.

Rontzki “has pushed himself into areas the military rabbinate never went before,” Amidror said. Referring to the Gaza operation, he said, “His approach was that the spiritual guide needs to be with the flock – it can’t be that soldiers are in there and rabbis are not.”

Wharton is an out gay soldier who says he came out to the army before he did to his parents, and has found the British military to be supportive.

The story appears on the tenth anniversary of the U.K. allowing gay and lesbian soldiers to serve openly. And look! Their army is still there!

In the United States, more than 12,000 service members have been dismissed since 1994 because it became known they were gay. Current targets for discharge include a West Point graduate and Iraq war veteran, Army National Guard Lt. Dan Choi.

In Britain, on the other hand, uniformed gay and lesbian service members marched in the annual Pride London parade July 4. Gay Australian soldiers and sailors had their own float in Sydney’s Gay Mardi Gras parade. In Israel, the army magazine earlier this year featured two male soldiers on the cover, hugging one another.

America’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy – which prohibits gays from serving openly – is the target of intensifying opposition, and President Barack Obama says he favors lifting the ban. But he wants to win over skeptics in Congress and the Pentagon, and a fierce debate lies ahead that will inevitably touch on the experiences of allied nations that have no bans.

U.S. Rep. Patrick Murphy, D-Pa., the first Iraq war veteran elected to Congress, has just launched a campaign for a bill to repeal “don’t ask.” He observed British troops in Iraq operating smoothly with a serve-openly policy and bristles at the contention that American forces would suffer morale and recruiting problems if they followed suit.

“I take it as a personal affront to our warriors,” he said. “To say that other countries’ soldiers are professional enough to handle this and American soldiers aren’t is really a slap in the face.”

Those seeking to preserve the U.S. ban question whether the allies’ experiences have been as smooth as advertised and depict America’s military as so unique that lessons from overseas should be ignored anyway.

“We are the military leaders in the world – everybody wants to be like us,” said Brian Jones, a retired sergeant major who served in the Army Rangers. “Why in the world would we try to adjust our military model to be like them?”

With such polarized views as a backdrop, Associated Press reporters examined how the militaries of Israel, Britain and Australia have managed with serve-openly policies, and interviewed partisans on both sides of the debate in the United States about the relevance of those experiences.

—

Israel:

A nation in a constant state of combat readiness, Israel has had no restrictions on military service by gays since 1993.

Gays were permitted to serve even before then, but not in certain intelligence positions where, at the time, they were deemed possible security risks vulnerable to blackmail. Now, gays and lesbians serve in all branches of the military, including combat duty.

Maj. Yoni Schoenfeld, a gay officer who is the editor of the military magazine, Bamahane, said there was little friction in the ranks related to gay soldiers.

He served as a combat soldier and as commander of a paratrooper company, and said his sexual orientation – though known to fellow soldiers – was never an issue. Gay jokes would sometimes surface, unusually not malicious, he said, while receptiveness to gays in combat units could vary. “Those who are more feminine in their speech and appearance have a harder time fitting in.”

Schoenfeld’s magazine has reflected the evolving attitudes. In 2001, it was shut down briefly after featuring an interview with a retired colonel who had come out of the closet. Yet this year, there was no adverse reaction to the cover picture of two male soldiers embracing.

The military also provided the backdrop for the 2002 movie “Yossi & Jagger” about two Israeli combat soldiers who fall in love on the front lines. It was a hit with critics and the public, and was even screened on military bases.

—

Australia:

Back in 1992, Anita Van Der Meer was threatened with discharge from the Australian navy for being a lesbian. She denied the allegation to save her job – and later that year the military’s ban on gays and lesbians was lifted.

This spring, Van Der Meer marched proudly with more than 100 other service members in Sydney’s annual Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Parade under an Australian Defense Force banner.

Now a chief petty officer, Van Der Meer was a junior sailor in 1992 when someone reported she was engaged in a same-sex relationship.

“It was very traumatic for me,” said Van Der Meer, 41. “But I still had the cooperation of my supervisors and my peers.”

Chief Petty Officer Stuart O’Brien, who joined the navy 19 years ago, said being openly gay has not been an issue, even when working alongside U.S. military personnel in Baghdad in 2006.

“They valued the work that I did and that’s all that it comes down to at the end of the day,” O’Brien said.

The lifting of the ban was preceded by heated debate, yet the change itself was relatively uneventful.

Among opponents of the change at the time was Australia’s main veterans group, which later withdrew its objections.

The group’s president, retired Maj. Gen. Bill Crews, said concerns about lowered morale and HIV transmission on the battlefield proved ill-founded.

“I thought there’d be a continuing problem because of prejudice that exists in parts of the community,” Crews said. “I don’t see any evidence now that homosexuals are in any way discriminated against. …A homosexual can be just as effective a soldier as a heterosexual.”

—

Britain:

British policymakers had been wrestling for years with whether to scrap a long-standing ban on gays in the military – but the pivotal decision was made abroad, by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France.

The court ruled in 1999 that Britain had violated the rights of four former service members who were dismissed for being gay and lesbian.

At the time, there was significant opposition to the change among military officers. There were predictions that unit cohesion would suffer and that large numbers of personnel would leave the military if gays could serve.

Lord Alan West, former head of the Royal Navy and now Britain’s terrorism minister, served before and after the ban was lifted.

“It’s much better where we are now,” West said. “For countries that don’t do that – I don’t believe it’s got anything to do with how efficient or capable their forces will be. It’s to do with other prejudices, I’m afraid.”

He added: “I think the Americans really need to make the move.”

Mandy McBain joined the Royal Navy at age 19, in 1986, at the lowest possible rank. Now a lieutenant commander, she remembers what it was like to serve when being a lesbian had to be a secret.

“It’s exhausting,” she said. “It’s quite incredible to look back and see how much time and energy I spent leading a double life.”

Military expert Amyas Godfrey of the Royal United Services Institute, a London think tank, was serving with the army in Northern Ireland when the policy changed.

“I remember our commanding officer at the time called the entire battalion together and said, ‘This is how it is going to be now. … We are not going to bully. If someone in your group says that he is gay, you treat them as normal,’” Godfrey recalled.

“And that, really, was the implementation of it. For all the years I served after that, it was never an issue.”

—

United States:

For those in the U.S. military community who oppose letting gays serve openly, there’s a widely shared sentiment that America has nothing to learn from the two dozen nations that have no bans.

“Who’s the only superpower military out there?” argued Maj. Brian Maue, a professor at the U.S. Air Force Academy, in a debate in June in Chicago. “This is hardly convincing to say, ‘Ah, the others are doing it. We should too.’”

Maue – who says he’s been speaking out on his own, not as a military spokesman – also suggested in an online forum that “an openly gay military would be the heterosexual equivalent to forcing women to constantly share bathrooms, locker rooms and bedrooms with men.”

Retired Army Lt. Col. Robert Maginnis, another supporter of the ban, contends that some field commanders in nations that allow gays to serve openly have resorted to “tacit discrimination” – excluding them from front-line units for fear that problems would surface in rugged, close-quarters living conditions.

Repealing the U.S. ban would trigger the departure of some career service members who object to homosexuality and deter some people from enlisting, said Maginnis.

Advocates of open service for gays acknowledge there would be some hitches, but predict the overall change would be smooth.

“There’s been very little trouble in the nations that lifted their ban,” said professor David Segal, director of the University of Maryland’s Center for Research on Military Organization. “My guess is there will be slightly more in the U.S. – we have a somewhat higher level of intolerance.”

However, Segal doubted the change would spur a large exodus or hamper recruitment.

“There will be some gay bashing at the unit level, and that will be a problem in the short run for NCOs and junior officers,” he said. “But they will deal with it, just as they dealt with racial integration and gender integration.”

Nathaniel Frank, a researcher at the University of California, Santa Barbara’s Palm Center and author of a book on “don’t ask, don’t tell,” says his studies of allied nations suggest that lifting the ban in the U.S. would not impair overall military effectiveness.

“There will be some forms of de facto discrimination and prejudice – a policy change is not going to wipe that out of people’s hearts and minds overnight,” he said. “But more and more people in the military are seeing it doesn’t serve them to have this policy in place.”

There’s no question, Frank said, that the U.S. military is unique. But he said it should be embarrassing that “our allies can tell the truth about gay soldiers and the U.S. stands with China, Iran, North Korea among the nations that can’t.”

The key to a smooth transition, Frank added, is emphatic direction from top commanders and adoption of a code of conduct spelling out unacceptable behavior.

Dan Choi, the Army lieutenant facing dismissal, says “don’t ask” forces gays who are serving to be furtive and dishonest.

“Closeting is what causes instability,” he said. “It’s the most toxic poison.”

As for the U.S. being different from its allies, Choi agrees.

“We are exceptional – because we take the lead on things,” he said. “To me, it’s an insult to the idea of American exceptionalism to say we’re somehow scared of gays.”

The winner of nine air medals for distinguished service in flight, including one for heroism the night U.S. forces captured Baghdad International Airport in 2003, Fehrenbach is in the process of getting kicked out of the military a year after an acquaintance told his bosses he was gay.

He thought he could hang on until the government eliminated the military’s policy forcing gays and lesbians to keep their sexual orientation secret, but now he isn’t so sure.

Obama “was someone who had experienced discrimination firsthand and that’s why I had a lot of faith,” Fehrenbach said. “I thought, OK I can fight this, and maybe by January Obama could be inaugurated and this won’t matter.

“That hasn’t happened.”

The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, an advocacy group seeking equal treatment of gays in the military, estimates that more than 200 service members have been discharged under “don’t ask, don’t tell” since Obama was sworn into office.

The White House insists officials are working to overturn the policy, but when that will happen is unclear. The reassurances mean little to Fehrenbach, who has flown on missions in Afghanistan and Iraq and is about to lose the only way of life he’s ever known just two years before he would be eligible to retire.

Fehrenbach, 39, is the son of an Air Force veterans – his father was a lieutenant colonel who died when he was 9 and his mother is a former military nurse who lives in Ohio. Last week he told his relatives he is gay, was being discharged from the Air Force and was going on national television to talk about it.

“Now, I’m not hiding anything,” said Fehrenbach, who has appeared on Rachel Maddow’s MSNBC’s talk show and remains on active duty at the Mountain Home Air Force Base in the Idaho desert, about 60 miles southeast from Boise. “For 18 years, I played by the rules and I kept my private life private.”

Most of the estimated 13,000 service members discharged under “don’t ask, don’t tell” since the law was enacted in 1993 have opted to leave quietly and close the final chapter of their military careers in private. Groups calling for the repeal of the ban, however, say Fehrenbach is among a growing number who are going public with a newfound sense of urgency.

In September, Fehrenbach had decided to accept an honorable discharge and waive his right to a military hearing, where he would have to lie about being gay in order to stay in the Air Force. He refused.

“I just wanted this to go away, I didn’t tell anyone, I didn’t want anyone to know,” Fehrenbach said.

He quickly changed his mind and with encouragement from five close friends, one a fellow service member, he rescinded the waiver and tried to stall the hearing that would determine his military fate.

The military hearing was delayed until April, when Fehrenbach was told he had been recommended for an honorable discharge. The process could take about five months to complete because of his record and rank, he said; he doesn’t know whether he’ll be able stay in the Air Force if “don’t ask, don’t tell” is repealed before then.

“I will fight this in uniform and I’ll fight it without,” Fehrenbach said. “I swore an oath to defend and support the Constitution, I’m going to speak out and fight this until the law is repealed because it is not constitutional.”

He said “don’t ask, don’t tell” denies American service members their constitutional right to privacy, due process and equal protection, and forces them to lie about who they are when honesty is part of the code they serve under.

The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, which is representing Fehrenbach while he explores his legal options, wants Obama to begin working with Congress to repeal the law.

“He said he was going to fix it,” said Aubrey Sarvis, the group’s executive director. “We need a plan and a timeline from the White House on how we’re going to get this done.”

A bill that would allow gays to serve openly has been introduced in Congress.

Obama’s top advisers want the president to move more slowly in overturning the policy than many gay-rights activists would like, citing other priorities including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. “We have a lot on our plate right now,” retired Marine Gen. James Jones, the White House’s national security adviser, said this month.

On the other side of the debate, the Michigan-based Center for Military Readiness gathered signatures earlier this year from more than 1,000 retired military officers urging the president and Congress to keep the ban.

“It’s really not fair to the women and men of our armed forces to be part of this social experiment,” said center president Elaine Donnelly. “Military life is difficult enough without having this additional burden. This is harmful to good order and discipline and morale.”

In the midst of debate over whether gays should be allowed to serve without fear of retribution if their sexual orientation is disclosed by them, or someone else, a family rooted in military tradition is mourning the loss of a career.

Fehrenbach’s family supports his decision to speak out and try to get the ban repealed, said his sister, Angie Trumbauer, a 47-year-old Air Force veteran who lives in Ohio.

She said she wasn’t surprised when her never-married brother told her he was gay, but when she realized he would not retire with full military honors, it was almost like there was a death in the family.

“This is the only thing he’s ever known in life,” Trumbauer said. “it’s all he’s ever wanted to do.”

Here’s hoping Barack Obama’s new house band is just as in-tune, just as rocking. Here’s hoping an Obama administration doesn’t go mellow on us, and that the first 100 days of the new administration play out like an encore to the campaign.

There’s a tendency when rockers hit it big — and Obama, for all his calm, cool frontman style, is much like a rock star — to dial down the sound and get reflective. Already the talking heads on the 24-hours news channels sound like a scratched record on the first days of an Obama presidency — “don’t overreach,” “don’t overreach,” “don’t overreach.”

Wonder what happens if you play them backward?

We don’t need an unplugged Obama in the first 100 days — there will be plenty of time for the administration to compose a masterpiece of legislation or create a timeless program. During that honeymoon period, during those first 100 days, it ought to be full-tilt boogie with Obama and his band jamming with the Congress to pass much needed reform measures.

In his first 100 days, Franklin D. Roosevelt drafted the Emergency Banking Act, moved the Civilian Conservation Corps bill, signed the Federal Emergency Relief Act into law, signed the Tennessee Valley Authority Act into law and created the Securities Exchange Commission.

John Kennedy signed an executive order creating the Peace Corps in his first 100 days.

Jimmy Carter, in his 100 days, pardoned Vietnam draft-dodgers, signed the Emergency Natural Gas Act to deal with an energy crisis and met with the prime minister of Israel and the president of Egypt.

Bill Clinton, in his first 100 days, named Hillary Clinton to head up a task force on healthcare reform, signed the Family and Medical Leave Act and revoked the Gag Rule that prohibited federally funded clinics from treating abortion as an option.

There was discord between President Clinton and some in Congress — like the Grateful Dead trying to jam with the Pat Boone family — and the White House staff ended up with some hangovers.

One of the big aches came with the failed effort to lift the ban against gays serving in the military — the push began early in the Clinton administration and the fight lasted through much of the first year. By the end of 1993, Congress had passed “don’t ask, don’t tell.”

We know where Obama stands on the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy banning gays and lesbians from serving openly in the military. He agrees that it should be repealed, that the test for military service should be a sense of duty and discrimination prohibited.

Because the Clinton administration bombed on gays in the military doesn’t mean the Obama administration shouldn’t try to cover the issue early on. Yes, the new administration will be dealing with an economic crisis, energy concerns and two wars, but the president elect was quick during the campaign to point out, “It is going to be part of the president’s job to deal with more than one thing at once.”

As the new administration acts to address military readiness and Defense Department budget concerns, the new administration can act to promote equality in the ranks.

In 1993,  the Clinton crew encountered military brass uninformed on the issue of whether gays should wear uniforms and serve openly.

Fifteen years since, the attitude among military officers has changed dramatically. In mid-November, 104 retired generals and admirals signed a statement calling for the repeal of “don’t ask, don’ tell.”

The new president will be working with a Senate that has no Sam Nunn, a House that has no Newt Gingrich and opinion polls that show a majority of people support lifting the ban.

Encore, encore.