Defence secretary Robert Gates today said the Pentagon will ease enforcement of its rules that ban gays from serving openly in the US military.
The military will require senior officers to review all cases of enlisted personnel who are accused of violating the ban, will tighten standards for "credible evidence" to open a case and will no longer investigate anonymous complaints, Mr Gates said at a Pentagon press briefing together with Admiral Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
"These changes will allow us to execute the law in a fair and more appropriate manner," Mr Gates said.
They "provide a greater measure of common sense and common decency to a process for handling what are difficult and complex issues for all involved."
Mr Gates said the measures are supported by all of the Joint Chiefs as well as the Pentagon's general counsel.
They will take effect immediately and are temporary until Congress decides whether to repeal the 1993 "don't ask, don't tell" policy that lets gays serve in the military as long as they don't reveal their sexual orientation.
President Barack Obama pledged to lift the ban on gays in the military in his January 27th State of the Union address.
The military discharged 259 men and 169 women last year under the law, which allows homosexuals to serve as long as they don't tell or aren't called out by other soldiers.
As many as 66,000 gay men and women may be serving in the US military, about 2.2 per cent of all personnel, including 13,000 on active duty, according to a study by the Williams Institute of the University of California at Los Angeles School of Law.
Bloomberg