That's the choice that faced Lt. Col. Victor Fehrenbach, who was serving at Mountain Home AFB in Idaho.
Plead guilty to the accusation of rape leveled at him by another man -- or admit the sex he had with the man was consensual, and be fired by the Air Force for being gay.
Fehrenbach asked Detective Mark Vucinich whether his employer had a right to see his statement. Yes, replied Vucinich.
To avoid prison, Lt. Col. Fehrenbach did what cost him his job -- what he had to do.
This is one of the many situations which still face patriots, men and women alike, because of the continued enforcement of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell".
Mind you, with an executive order, President Obama could suspend enforcement -- either because we're in a time of war, as previous presidents have done, or because it's wrong and they aim to end the practice.
There are those who would argue that the Obama administration can't just ignore a law because they want to -- that would be a very Bush-like thing to do -- but the administration is already doing that anyway when it benefits the United States for them to do so.
Suspension of DADT enforcement would most certainly benefit the United States.
Meanwhile, our gay servicemembers who follow the law are abused, and kicked out of the service for speaking up, while those who lead the abuse are promoted.
This is becoming a tragedy I'm having a harder and harder time watching. The time for the end of this law has long since passed. Rumor has it there will be hearings sometime this fall. Even so, some members of Congress are alreadly declining to discuss the matter -- because there's an election coming. This in spite of the fact that a strong majority of the public supports repeal, including a strong majority of Republicans.
So, Congress defers to the President and the Pentagon, the Pentagon defers to Congress and to the President, the President defers to Congress and the Pentagon, nothing happens, and we lose more qualified servicemembers every week -- only to replace them with the felons and gang members the armed forces have been forced to accept because they can't meet their recruiting goals in a long two-front war.