Women and combat badges

Stars & Stripes, European Edition ^ | 6 March 2005 | CW5 Kenneth C. Jensen

[ChiefKujo]

Women and combat badges

In October, I postulated [in a letter to the editor] the Army would not issue the Combat Infantryman Badge to soldiers with military occupational specialties other than infantry, because it would expose the canard that women are not serving in prohibited units and not conducting prohibited missions.

Army Regulation 600-13, Army Policy for the Assignment of Female Soldiers, states:

“The Army’s assignment policy for female soldiers allows women to serve in any officer or enlisted specialty or position except in those specialties, positions, or units (battalion size or smaller) which are assigned a routine mission to engage in direct combat, or which collocate routinely with units assigned a direct combat mission.”

With the recent creation of the Close Combat Badge — an award equivalent to the CIB, but for armor, cavalry, combat engineering and field artillery soldiers — the Army has taken its first official step down the slippery slope leading to full integration of the sexes.

The CCB is an official recognition that soldiers from other combat arms branches are “… assigned a routine mission to engage in direct combat. …” The Army is, in effect, declaring that the changing face of modern warfare is exposing other branches to the missions and dangers traditionally left to the infantry.

But, what do we do about the military police performing a cordon-and-search? What about that patrol led by a cook, a chemical noncommissioned officer or an aviation mechanic? What about that air defense artillery unit conducting counter-insurgency operations, knocking down doors, getting into firefights, dying in ambushes?

Oh, that’s right. There are women in those formations.

Caught in the conundrum of doing what is right (recognizing soldiers with the CCB) and flaunting both the law (USC Title 10) and ignoring its regulations (AR 600-13), the Army, as the biblical prophet Hosea warned, has “… sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind.”

[Arkinsaw]

Well, they shouldn't engage in combat. BUT IF THEY DO....they should receive the normal recognitions associated with it.

[clee1]

I can buy that.

[bad company]

Well, they shouldn't engage in combat. BUT IF THEY DO....they should receive the normal recognitions associated with it.

They do. They get a combat patch. I can't believe this was written by a Chief Warrant Officer.

[ChiefKujo]

"They do. They get a combat patch. I can't believe this was written by a Chief Warrant Officer."

The point is they are performing combat missions and are located in units at battalion-size or lower which are performing combat missions. This is AGAINST THE LAW.

So, either the law and the Army's implementing regulations need to be changed, or women need to be "put in their place."

[Meldrim]

Put in their place? I'd be happy just to see them held to the male PT standards. That would eliminate 70% of the "problems" right then and there.