The effect these two granted waivers might have on the court cases brought by service members and the government’s appeal of the injunction granted in Texas is hard to say at this point.  The DoD may have directed services to try and grant waivers to make its own case look better in the courts given that not a single waiver had ever been granted. However, these two accommodations granted by the Marines could also form the basis of an appeal by the thousands of service members who had their requests initially denied if they could show that their request was similar to those that were approved.

The DoD in enforcing this mandate faces an administrative nightmare of having the proceed with administrative separations proceedings against 13,000 service members who have been denied waivers and presumably will still refuse to take the vaccine. In the last defense budget, Congress inserted an amendment that forbids the military from giving anything but an Honorable discharge to those who object on religious grounds.  For service members in their first enlistment, the process normally takes 30-50 days, but service members with more than six years of active duty can fight to be retained in the service in a process that can take many months to play out before a Separation Board hearing.  Under normal conditions and staffing levels this is not an issue, but up to 13,000 administrative discharges beginning that process within weeks or months of each other would create considerable strain on resources and personnel.  It would also create some serious readiness problems.  These 13,000 awaiting separation will exist in a kind of administrative limbo, they cannot deploy or train or occupy their normal place in the unit’s chain of command. NCOs and officers are stripped of their leadership positions. They are given make-work admin jobs.  These 13,000 service members are roughly the size of an entire infantry division being set aside and relegated to picking up cigarette butts and handling housing paperwork in the admin department. Given that the military stated that the vaccination mandate was related to increasing readiness of the forces, having this many people sidelined seems to be working against that goal.