How the Front Lines Came to the Rear

Ah, at least the article alludes to the problem being ten years old. Actually, it is more than 12. It was Clinton who for 8 years actually failed to spend any money on new logistical vehicles, armor upgrades, or deployments and ammo. Totally squandered every nickel of the "peace divident" and was striving consistently to chop out more bone. GWB had 8 months to try and correct things then war was thrust upon the country by Al Queda...and the operational tempo has hindered addressing all the budgetary issues. Hardening all across the spectrum will also be fantastically expensive, and make all logistics and budgetary issues magnify three fold.

'But the fact that there is no longer a front line also means there aren't any more "rear" areas where support units can operate safely.'

This is not a new problem - there weren't any "front lines" in Vietnam either.
As a former right door gunner on an M-151 Jeep, I can appreciate the lack of armor. Our units in Vietnam used field expedients to modify 2 1/2 ton and 5 ton trucks into gun trucks for convoy defense and M-151s were fitted with a mount for an M-60 machine gun. I think our troops deserve the best that we can give them but what we have is the result of budget trade offs over the years.

A good argument (no more safe rear area) for discontinuing the ever-expanding process of enlisting women in the military (begun by feminazis like Patricia Schroeder during the Clinton Reign of Terror).

With all due respect to women, they just can't physically handle the same combat roles (with no safe rear area, all roles/MOS's become combat roles) as the majority of men, and are an undue distraction as well. I know from experience, having served in a combat MOS in the Marine Corps, and observed female Marines from other MOS's.

Patriots, good women, smart women, many of them tough women... but most of them could not handle all of the physical demands of their jobs. This meant they were often a drag to the men in their units, and had a negative impact on the accomplishment of the mission. Men, being men, would stop and help them, or would end up doing their jobs for them often. Some would be overly protective and treat them like sisters, and some would try to hit on them. Many feared them and wanted nothing to do with them during the 90's (and maybe now as well?) because they had an inordinate amount of power in the form of crying "sexual harassment", whether true of not. Men hated the fact that many women were getting pregnent just to avoid a deployment they didn't want to go on. Who had to take their place? A male Marine.

I love women (including my mother, grandmother, wife, and daughter), but don't think they should be in the military, or at the very least, not in any theater of combat. If they must be in the military, then maybe they could serve only in non-combat roles and zones.

Since it is now common for reservists to go to the combat zone (and not fill in for active duty units here at home bases, as was the practice in the past), let the males go to combat, and the females fill in here at home. Still an important job, but not one where they will be in harms way, or be a distraction and hindrance to our male soldiers and Marines in combat.

Nobody who can not fill a combat billet belongs in a combat MOS. Woman Male with disability, conscientious objector, whatever. If they are not fit for combat then they obnoxiously take up slots in choice billets that those in combat units should be rotated to. A marine running wire or fixxing HMMWVs for the past 4 years with an infantry battalion should have as much chance to spend his next tour in Hawaii or maybe Norfolk as a a Female just out of boot. Is this the case? It wasn't when i went in under Carter and it still wasn't when I got out under GHWB.

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