“AND I AM TELLING YOU… I’M NOT GOING!”
Those are the words of an Army cook and single mom who faces criminal charges for skipping her deployment flight to Afghanistan, because no one was available to care for her infant son while she was overseas. Spc. Alexis Hutchinson, 21, told reporters Monday she had no choice but to refuse deployment orders because she had no family to care for her 10-month-old son. Her mother would have been the likely choice, but she was already overwhelmed by having to care for three other relatives with health problems.
Her civilian attorney, Rai Sue Sussman, said Monday that one of Hutchinson’s superiors told her she would have to deploy anyway and place the child in foster care. Spc. Hutchinson has been confined to Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah, GA while Army commanders investigate. She could end up with an honorable or dishonorable discharge and be sent home, or could face a jail sentence.
She signed on, she knew what the business of the Army is – to close with and destroy the enemy using fire, maneuver, and shock effect. When she got pregnant, she could have tgransferred into the Reserves or requested a medical discharge. She chose to stay in. There are consequences for the choices that we make. When we, as a nation, chose to allow women to serve in Active Duty units, there were consequences. The child is only 10 months old; therefore she knew what she would have to do when the child was born, have arrangements made in case she got deployed, or if she died during a training accident, or any of a host of other possibilities. It is the MILITARY – that is what they do – fight wars.