Free Republic

The U.S. Army is opening the door for women to go to Ranger school. It's one of the first steps in the broader effort to allow women to begin moving into more grueling combat jobs.

Women soldiers could be issued with special sports bras as part of their kit to better protect them on active service. Defense chiefs are considering “adequate support” for servicewomen after complaints that their rigorous duties risked damaging their breasts. One solider said she had spent the last two decades having to buy her own bras because official kit is not good enough. She is also calling for the reinstatement of a “hosiery allowance” to let soldiers buy their own undergarments. But the move could cost to Ministry of Defense hundreds of thousands of pounds to properly kit out its 15,000...

New book shows women in combat suffer much more serious non-combat injuries, alleges IDF cover-up. A new book sums up 13 years of research on female participation in IDF combat units and declares the feminist experiment in the Israeli military a failure. “Lochamot Betzahal” by Col. (res.) Raza Sagi, a former infantry regiment commander, points to high rates of serious injury among women serving in combat units, and to involvement of radical political groups behind the scenes of the campaign for combat service by women. ..... "The study found that a particularly high percentage of women who served in combat...

VIDEO AT LINKAt a petite 5’3’’, Sage Santangelo may not look like a combat fighter at first glance. But the female second lieutenant has never let that hold her back from pursuing her dream of becoming an infantry officer in the Marine Corps. Growing up, Santangelo found she was always able to keep up with the guys and enjoyed playing hockey on all boys’ teams. But when she joined the Marines, Santangelo found the playing field changed; she was segregated into female-only training units and as a woman, was relegated to less strenuous physical training than her male counterparts. And...

The military is taking steps to prepare women for combat roles in 2016. The Marine Corps announced that it would give young female lieutenants who wash out of the grueling Infantry Officer Course a second shot, same as their male counterparts. The Army is conducting a study to test just how fit a soldier has to be to engage in combat. The study involves 60 women and 100 men. CBS News reported on both developments last week. The Marine Corps announcement came after Marine 2nd Lt. Sage Santangelo took the Infantry Officer Court and wrote about her experience last month...

As peacekeeping has evolved to encompass a broader humanitarian approach, women have become increasingly part of the peacekeeping family. Click on the image to see the full infographic Women are deployed in all areas – police, military and civilian – and have made a positive impact on peacekeeping environments, both in supporting the role of women in building peace and protecting women's rights. In all fields of peacekeeping, women peacekeepers have proven that they can perform the same roles, to the same standards and under the same difficult conditions, as their male counterparts. It is an operational imperative that we...

More than half of female Marines in boot camp can't do three pullups, the minimum standard that was supposed to take effect with the new year, prompting the Marine Corps to delay the requirement, part of the process of equalizing physical standards to integrate women into combat jobs. The delay rekindled sharp debate in the military on the question of whether women have the physical strength for some military jobs, as service branches move toward opening thousands of combat roles to them in 2016. Beginning this week, all female Marines were supposed to be able to do at least three...

Rabbi Yaakov Ariel, the Chief Rabbi of Ramat Gan, has come out with strong statements against mandatory military service for women. Rabbi Ariel was particularly outspoken regarding combat service for women, but made it clear in an interview with Arutz Sheva that he opposes mandatory non-combat service as well. Female soldiers should serve strictly in a volunteer capacity, he declared. […] Rabbi Ariel then made a clear distinction between male and female recruits. “We are against the approach of ‘enslaving’ girls. Women are not combatants. Women and men cannot serve together in the field in combat—it is dangerous to security,...

The U.S. Army general in charge of training recently wrote about the service's examination of gender neutral standards to open the infantry and other combat-arms jobs to female soldiers. The piece by Gen. Robert Cone, commander of Training and Doctrine Command, appears in the November issue of Army Magazine, the same month three female Marines made history by graduating from Marine infantry training. Last January, former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta ordered all services to open combat-arms roles to women that so far have been reserved for men.

The Army should use photos of “average-looking women” when it needs to illustrate stories about female soldiers, a specialist recommends — images of women who are too pretty undermine the communications strategy about introducing them into combat roles. That’s the gist of an internal Army e-mail an Army source shared with POLITICO. “In general, ugly women are perceived as competent while pretty women are perceived as having used their looks to get ahead,” wrote Col. Lynette Arnhart, who is leading a team of analysts studying how best to integrate women into combat roles that have previously been closed off to...

The Marine Corps may have to change its physical standards in order to put females in positions to one day lead infantry platoons in combat. Both the Marine Corps and the Army continue to wrestle with the mandate that former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta issued in January, directing the U.S. military to open hundreds of combat-arms jobs that have been closed to female servicemembers. So far, the Marines have been out ahead.

The USS Virginia and the USS Minnesota will be the first two gender-integrated fast-attack submarines, the Navy announced Tuesday. Six women — four nuclear-trained officers and two supply corps officers — will report to the subs by January 2015, after completing the nuclear submarine training pipeline, according to the Navy. Women are already serving aboard the ballistic missile subs the USS Wyoming, USS Louisiana and USS Maine, and the guided missile subs USS Florida, USS Georgia and USS Ohio. The Navy in 2010 officially changed the policy that had previously prohibited women from serving aboard submarines. Since then, 43 women...

An Army officer writing in a prestigious journal says the services should not overemphasize physical strength when deciding whether a woman qualifies for direct ground combat. Col. Ellen Haring, on the staff of the U.S. Army War College, says commanders need to downplay obstacle courses and judge a service member’s ability to stay calm and think quickly. The Pentagon has lifted its ban on women serving in the infantry, tanks and special operations, and the branches are examining all their physical standards in preparation for introducing women into these units in 2015. Some military analysts fear the Pentagon will discard...

Senior military personnel are considering now giving women different military training than men, The Washington Times reports. The effort was proposed by Massachusetts Democrat Rep. Niki Tsongas at a recent House Armed Services Committee hearing because so far, she says training systems do not “maximize the success of women.” Though the armed services have promised that combat standards will be the same regardless of gender, senior officers are considering initially separate training systems. Army Lt. Gen. Howard Bromberg, serving as deputy chief of staff for personnel, considers separate training programs to be more about considering all soldiers as individuals, citing...

A third pair of female Marine lieutenants has failed to complete the Corps’ Infantry Officer Course at Quantico, Va. The Marine Corps Times embedded a reporter with the latest class of candidates. It reported Wednesday that one of the women was pulled for falling behind schedule. The other made it to the course’s end but did not meet its standards, as did six men, the newspaper said. Corps commanders have said they will not lower standards to ensure that women can qualify for direct ground combat units. The Pentagon last winter lifted the ban on women in such jobs, but...

(CNSNews.com) - Why shouldn't women in the military have the same opportunities as men do? Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel asked on Thursday. It's not a matter of lowering standards, he said. In remarks at Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska, Hagel was asked how he feels about putting females on the front lines of combat -- "based on our social background of men being the protectors of women," as the questioner put it. Hagel's reponse: First, I think everyone understands, and this is the right thing, we can't lower standards. We have high standards. We should have high standards. Our...

Military leaders are ready to begin tearing down the remaining walls that have prevented women from holding thousands of combat and special operations jobs near the front lines. Under details of the plans obtained by The Associated Press, women could start training as Army Rangers by mid-2015 and as Navy SEALs a year later. The military services have mapped out a schedule that also will include reviewing and possibly changing the physical and mental standards that men and women will have to meet in order to quality for certain infantry, armor, commando and other front-line positions across the Army, Navy,...

Well, it appears that TRADOC is now well into the process of attempting to destroy the greatest armed force that the world has ever known. Training and Doctrine Command has launched “two major efforts in support of this full integration of women soldiers.” TRADOC has started a scientific review working with U.S. Army Medical Command, U.S. Army Research Institute for Environmental Medicine and Army Research Institute to assist in the development of gender-neutral physical standards for all Areas of Concentration for commissioned officers and military occupational specialties for enlisted soldiers.In addition, the “TRADOC Analysis Center is examining the institutional and cultural...

PARRIS ISLAND, SC (WMBF) - The next war fought by American troops will be fought by men and women on the front line. Today, women are allowed - even encouraged - to serve wherever they're needed. And that has every branch of the military racing to develop a plan to make sure they are not only willing to fight, but ready for the job physically and emotionally. At Parris Island the new role of women in the Marine Corps is changing tradition and attitudes about training at one of the nation's premier boot camps. It has never has been training...

In January, Obama’s soon-to-resign Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said that women will be assigned to combat missions in the U.S. military. The object, we were told, was “to provide a level, gender-neutral playing field” so that women can enter combat positions, since not being permitted to fight holds back careers. This assumes that the purpose of the military is advancing careers, not defending the country. Thus, women will march alongside men into the meatgrinder of war if Congress doesn’t stop it. Feminists have been pushing for the change for at least 20 years. In 1992, the Presidential Commission on the...