The Department of Defense (DoD) recently updated its guidance on the process to reinstate service members who left the military because of the COVID-19 vaccine mandate. Though some service members are returning to the military, it would be premature to call this a win as the policy does not do adequate justice to service members who have been harmed and doesn’t address many concerns raised by advocates of this issue.

To put the recent policy into perspective, let’s first consider the severance package offered to transgender sailors who voluntarily leave the service. In March, the Navy announced that due to the new DoD policy that prohibits transgender troops from serving, transgender sailors who voluntarily separate will receive two full years’ worth of separation pay.

Let’s compare this to the policy offered to service members separated for the vaccine mandate.

The recent memo by the DoD’s Personnel and Readiness office on reinstating unvaccinated service members differentiates between the over 8,700 who were kicked out or who “involuntarily separated” and the tens of thousands who chose to leave because of the mandate or who “voluntarily separated.” The term “voluntarily separated” will seem Orwellian for those such as myself who lost out on career opportunities, suffered persecution, and left because the alternative was being kicked out.

Army Captain John Frankman receiving his Green Beret at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, at the Special Forces Qualification Course graduation in August 2019. (Photo courtesy of John Frankman)

Army Captain John Frankman and his team conduct Military Free Fall jumps in Eloy, Arizona, in June of 2021. (Photo courtesy of John Frankman)

Army Captain John Frankman (right) and his detachment are on the ground in Eloy, Arizona, after having completed a Military Free Fall jump in June of 2021. (Photo courtesy of John Frankman)

The involuntarily separated service members will only receive back pay and time credited to their service if they agree to four additional years of service, or two for those who were eligible for retirement within two years’ time of their separation. However, the backpay is subtracted from anything the service member made between when they were kicked out and when they return to service.

Meanwhile, the much larger cohort of the “voluntarily separated” service members are not eligible for backpay and must serve two years. To add more insult to injury, the Air Force requires airmen desiring to return to sign a document stating, “My decision to separate was made freely and without coercion.” This language is disconcerting and reflects a profound disconnect between those in the DoD writing these memos and the experience of the hundreds of thousands who suffered terribly under the mandate. (When a former Air Force Intelligence Captain separated for the mandate pointed this out on X, the DoD Rapid Response account stated, “We are reviewing this.”)

Thus, unlike transgender sailors who will receive two years of separation pay for voluntary separation, those separated for the vaccine mandate who do not choose to return to service will receive nothing. Meanwhile the involuntarily separated will have the money they earned outside of the service taken out of their back pay and will accrue a four-year service commitment.

Service members who refused the COVID-19 shot are heroes who stood up for the Constitution and deserve proper restitution and justice regardless of if they return to service. Their backpay shouldn’t be used as an arbitrarily calculated re-enlistment bonus.

There are many other problems this guidance does not address that advocates against the DoD vaccine mandate have been sharing for years:

• This guidance does nothing to help unvaccinated service members make up for lost career opportunities due to the multiple DoD policies that targeted the unvaccinated.
• There is no acknowledgment that the order was unlawful as no FDA approved product was made available for service members at the time of the mandate. (See 10 U.S. Code § 1107a.)
• There is zero accountability for senior leaders who enforced an unlawful order and persecuted their subordinates.
• There is no assistance offered to the vaccine injured.

Though it is good that the DoD is inviting unvaccinated service members to return to duty, this policy does not do these brave men and women justice. These heroic individuals suffered terribly under their leaders and an organization built upon trust. Many lives were destroyed and irreparably altered by the damage this mandate caused. A reenlistment bonus just for those who choose to return is not justice, but a bargaining chip.

The DoD must assess if their goal is to simply re-recruit some individuals or to truly do right by those they harmed. If it is to truly make things right, more must be done.

Perhaps the next time they create guidance to help unvaccinated service members negatively impacted by the mandate, they would do well to include those of us who suffered under the mandate and have been advocating on this issue the past several years to make sure they get it right.

John Frankman was a Captain in the Army who served as a Special Forces Green Beret and resigned after eight years active duty due to the COVID-19 vaccine mandate. Follow him at JohnFrankman.com and on X and Instagram.