The Comprehensive Review Working Group and Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal at the Department of Defense

In February 2010, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Michael Mullen established the Comprehensive Review Working Group (CRWG) to conduct a comprehensive review of the issues associated with a repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell (DADT). Over the next 10 months, the CRWG undertook one of the most extensive studies of a personnel issue in the history of the U.S. military. This article describes the work and the findings of the CRWG (on which the author served) in the context of the activities within the Department of Defense (DoD) following President Obama's call for DADT repeal in his January 2010 State of the Union Address and leading up to the passage of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act in December 2010. It argues that the CRWG served a number of important functions in the DADT repeal process, particularly that it a) provided a rigorous, fact-based assessment of the impacts of repeal from which DoD senior leaders and Congress could base their views; b) developed a road map for a smooth and orderly implementation of repeal; and c) opened a conversation among military service members about what repeal would really mean to them. In doing so, the CRWG contributed to what has been a largely incident-free and successful transition to a post-DADT military.