The Army's Gender War: A new policy is unfair to both men and women soldiers.

National Review Online ^ | January 07, 2005 | Elaine Donnelly

[anniegetyourgun]

ping

[Beckwith]

I would like to remind Elaine Donnelly, who wrote "The Army's Gender War: A new policy is unfair to both men and women soldiers", of two things:

1. All Americans are on the front lines in the War Against Terrorism.

2. Life isn't fair. (John F. Kennedy)

[xzins]

bring back the WACs....they had it right and then broke it.

I guarantee you that all the heavy lifting missions are being pulled by males even in those forward support companies.

In fact, reading between the lines in THIS ARTICLE, one realizes that under the CURRENT system ONLY males must be allowed to go on the resupply missions to forward rearm/refuel/resupply points.

The sexes will get the same job specialty identifier (MOS), the same pay, the same promotion opportunity...but they won't do the same battlefield job and experience the same danger/risk.

Real equity at work

[steplock]

when people wonder about the discipline in the US Army, especially in the reserve units (NOT as a rule) - begin looking at the generals making public statement aiding the enemy through moral encouragement, look at the generals who are promoted strictly by sex, look at the field commanders also there because of their sex, look at the .....


ahhh forget it! those who say they are conservatives now think and act more liberal than the most liberal democrat ever thought of doing in the early 1960's.

The success story of the incrementalist propaganda techniques --- see Antonio Gramsci for some of their main methods.

[VeritatisSplendor]

I saw a picture in the paper today of an NJ National Guard unit getting ready to ship out to Iraq, to Tikrit. The women lined up looked small, soft, no two of them holding their guns the same way. Some of them were crying for little children left behind.

Saddam's female guard parades looked better. And guess what? They're not the ones doing the fighting now - the Muslims have intelligently left that to the men.

Sure, take some women along to search women or their quarters, or for support positions well behind the lines (in Iraq, ha, where are the lines.)

But the military, like the clergy, does not exist for women to advance their careers on an equal basis for men.

And I'm a feminist of sorts, having grown up in the "old days", but you have to know where to stop.

Mrs VS

[colorado tanker]

I have strong reservations about the Army allowing women into too many MOS's too close to the combat units, but this strikes me as a nonissue.

Doctrine has been for the combat battalion trains to set up in the brigade trains area, where forward support companies from the support battalions also locate, such as the forward maintenance companies from the ordnance battalion. Women can serve in these forward support companies. All the new structure is doing is making what was an ad hoc attachment when units took the field a permanent integration. Women will be no closer to the front lines than they already are.

Am I missing something?

[Gritty]

With such a high percentage of women in the Army, this was inevitable. After a while, one runs out of places to turn to avoid the inevitable.

Look for lots of problems, not the least of which are impending morale and combat effectiveness breakdowns of our Army in Iraq - and elsewhere. This is going to be ugly. In the long run, it will be used to good effect by our enemies to turn the American public against this war.

We can't evade forever the chickens coming home to roost because of our deeply held desire to remake human nature and physiology by making it military policy to ignore the obvious.

[glorgau]

No one's injured son should have to die on the streets of a future Fallujah because the only soldier near enough to carry him to safety was a five-foot-two 110-pound woman.

Heck yes. The vast majority of women are too weak for this sort of thing.

[USMCBOMBGUY]

Thanks for the ping.

My sympathy for women who joined and are now required to perform is non existent. There are some good ones in service but it is the exception. My wife is a Marine and damn good one too, but she wouldn't think for one second that females should be serving in combat positions. Should women serve in Iraq at all? With the lines blurred in Iraq its a legitimate question. I can relate several stories of incidents that occurred in Iraq that would support removing women from that theater. I guess the question comes down to whats the cost of equality?

Maybe even more offensive to me is the reservist that complains about being deployed and held on duty, this is BS. They were man or woman enough to sign up, now they need to suck it up and do there duty. Again there are some damn fine men and women in those units, its the few that put a bad face on them. While home on leave I had one puke who bitched to me about being extended and deployed to Iraq. He had over 12 years in the reserves and had never deployed before, he damn sure was proud of the education and schooling he received because of the reserves. What is wrong with these supposedly mature adults?

I am done with my rant.

[USMCBOMBGUY]

*bump*

[Gunrunner2]

Not if you watch Buffy or any number of TV shows and movies with a "strong" female action hero. . .you know, the Nike/Reebok I-am-woman-hear-me-roar mind-set that allows us to believe a 110-lb kick-boxing women can pound the sand out of some 300-lb guy, but some 110-lb guy gets his back-side whipped and pushed around every time.

Movies and TV are not reality, of that we are certain and sure, but oft times these pop-culture images of female Rambo's does a lot of harm in the subtle world of impressions.

Not sure if I explained myself clearly or not, but we do the world no favors when we hype female-power or empowerment by lowering for females fire department physical standards, as well as have different military physical fitness standards for men and women. On the battlefield, as in a burning building, a threshold of physically fitness is required. . .regardless of sex. We are lying to ourselves if we think we can change without penalty the 2-man stretcher-carry task and make it a 4-person stretcher-carry task, or reduce the blast radius of hand grenades because women can't throw the darn thing far enough to avoid being blown up. Oh, and in combat we are to be blind to the horrors that may be inflicted upon a female "buddy", but at the same time we must be sensitive so we avoid offending her through some off-color comment or joke.

[Radix]

"...the soldier said she is being assigned to a forward-support company that will "collocate" with the Army's new, modular infantry/armor land combat battalions. This is a serious change in policy, unfair to men and women soldiers alike..."

Women are not integrated in the sense that they go out on combat patrols.

They are integrated in the sense that they are Brigade/Battalion assets instead of Division assets.

Aviation units are a different matter.

[colorado tanker]

That strikes me as more semantic than substantive. The women will still be in support units that will be back in the trains when deployed, just as they were when they were assigned to division-level units. Of course, in Iraq that doesn't make much difference, given the vulnerability of the convoys.

[Radix]

"That strikes me as more semantic than substantive."

"That" meaning what I posted?

It is clear that military women are equally targets in Iraq. Women also as the article says are simply not cut out for certain rigorous tasks. Who can seriously deny that? Certainly not the Troops, particularly the women Troops. For a myriad of reasons it is simply not in the best interest of the Army (military) to have women serving in combat roles. 

The insurgency meanwhile does not care about the rules. In fact it is likely that women are in even greater jeopardy over there because of the mores and attitudes here concerning women in hostile zones and combat units. The radicals use terrorist tactics because it impacts morale. How much more would they want to undermine the will for us to continue this war than by targeting women Troops? The Islamic scum certainly do read the news and are aware of American dispositions. One more reason why I so despise the old media, but I digress.

The reorganization of the structure of the units is probably meaningless. It is all on paper it seems to me. Likely some field grade officer was looking for a career boost, (and probably  got it.) The terminology and the command structure may seem to be different, but it is all newspeak. Nothing of substance has changed.

Perhaps you know more than I do concerning these matters. I certainly do not think it is worth arguing about. I see no valid reason to allow our Troops to be targets over there. We have the means to take out those who would destroy us. They'll never takes us seriously until we prove that we mean business. When you go to war, you use what assets that you have in order to win. Truman seemed to grasp that truth. The leaders of today are too involved in nuance.

It seems that it will take another 9-11 before we get serious.

[colorado tanker]

I don't think we have any real disagreement.

The reorganization of the structure of the units is probably meaningless. It is all on paper it seems to me.

That's the point I was trying to make.

If it were up to me, I would not allow women in forward support companies or the new brigade formations at all. I would not allow women forward of the division trains area. For lots of reasons. But I lost that debate 30 years ago.

You might want to take a look at "Breaking the Phalanx," which seems to be the blueprint for this new reorganization. The main idea seems to be that we are less in need of division deployments and more in need of brigade or regimental size formations and we can deploy them faster if the support units are already organic to them rather than go through the cross-attachment drill every deployment. They are also tweaking the mix of units to be more in tune with modern warfare, such as reducing FA and ADA and adding more military police, civil affairs, signal, etc. I'm interested to see if this reorganization produces results.

Bottom line for me right now is all this talk of reorganization is beside the point. The biggest reform the Army needs right now is to add more troops and units - we are stretched too thin.

[Beckwith]

Now, now motherbear, take a deep breath.

I am not now, nor have I ever been a proponent of women in combat.

On the other hand, I know some women who would be a lot better at it than many men.

I disagree completely with the author's premise. My point was that there is no front line in this war against islamofascists and that men, women and children are all at risk.

My second point is that the author is arguing for fairness and life simply isn't fair and anyone who expects it to be is in la-la-land.

[momincombatboots]

As a former "feminazi" and soldier, I agree, women do not belong in forward groups regardless of orginizational structure. Every grunt I have ever asked just looked at me hopelessly and said "Well I hafta protect you, just like my sister, wife, mother... etc.
No amount of running or weightlifting I did ever changed that thinking.
Now, women do have a place in long range recon as they are able to obtain information easily from the enemy... That would be a highly trained op though. Women are fierce when they are in control of a dangerous situation via mind manipulation, or other means. IMHO

[A Jovial Cad]

"On the other hand, I know some women who would be a lot better at it than many men"

Sez who? Gloria Steinem? The NOW gang? Surely you jest...