Posted on 05/15/2005 7:13:35 AM PDT by metalcor
MOSUL, Iraq -- Jennifer Guay went to war to be a grunt. And the 170-pound former bartender from Leeds, Maine, with cropped red hair and a penchant for the bench press, has come pretty close.
It was mid-February and Guay, 26, an Army specialist who was the first woman to be assigned as an infantry combat medic, was spending 10 hours a day on missions with the 82nd Airborne Division, dodging rockets and grenades in the crowded streets of Mosul.
"Break-break-break: U.S. soldier down!" a hard-edged voice came over the radio. A gun battle had just broken out.
In less than five minutes, Guay was at the scene. She dashed to Sgt. Christopher Pusateri, 21, who was lying on the ground, a bullet through his jaw. "I was in charge of this man's life," she recalled. Pusateri had "a massive trauma injury, and I had to get him off the middle of the street."
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Eighteen year old women should have to register for the draft.
That's what I was thinking. Only soldiers themselves can say for sure, but I seriously doubt that there are not serious differences between the operation to take Fallujah, for example, and the smaller scale fights that arise from ambushes or policing activity.
Pass along my regards to your daughter - better yet, pass
a link to this thread. Tell her to come home safe.
yeah....
there are many sides to this story. The one fact above all is that there is not enough males in the entirity of the US Army to take care of ALL of the jobs in Iraq and Afghanistan and yet still be an effective fighting force.
I have no problem with women in support battalions. Even forward support battalions, but they need to be properly trained to protect themselves and the people around them when the event happens....
With Israel, didn't they experiment with women in combat during the 1948 war, and after deeming it to be a huge mistake, change course and keep women out of frontline combat units for then next 50+ yrs; so that, despite incorrect popular conception, women did not serve in their combat units in the subsequent wars and uprisings?
But didn't Israel just reverse course yet again a yr or so ago? I thought I had read where women now can serve in these combat units, but obviously there has been none of the large scale combat that the all-male forces faced post 1948.
LOL
This kind of thread produces opinions, as well it should.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the Russian example also grossly misused by advocates of women in combat in that they leave out the fact that Russia had lost literally millions of men fighting Germany before they let a few women fill out some combat units?
Fighting for survival of a nation is quite a bit different than a professional expeditionary force fighting overseas. And that is not to belittle the importance of the war in Iraq, but only to say that while if we left w/o a final victory, we would not face immediate extermination as a nation, whereas the Russians faced exactly that.
Of course you were impressed. That was how the interview was packaged.
She had a script that she had to read and said the perfect things that she was told to say...."in her own words." LOL. When, or if, she messed up a line, they shot it again. Her make-up and hair were taken care of by professionals, as was her uniform.
All the people who loved her and raved about her work were paraded for all to hear and see. Those who thought she sucked weren't allowed within 1000 miles of that interview.
NO ONE is perfect, but you were only allowed the see the "good." The "bad" and "ugly" were banned from the television studios or saved for the p.c. interviews that make others less p.c. look bad. We've all seen THOSE interviews. And we all know who the, er, "less p.c." just happen to be. :o)
Television and movies ARE 100% pre-planned, scripted, choreographed, well-thought-out packages, as is every single commerical, rap DVD, billboard, magazine page and newspaper. Every angle of her camera shots was done by professional, union camera people. Her interview was produced, directed, edited, with wardrobe and make-up.
THEN, it was previewed, and perhaps re-edited and re-shot. Who knows?
It is ALL a package -- HOLLYWOOD has sold YOU on female pilots.
They did THEIR job as well as you think she did her job.
I understand that one of the most compelling reasons the IDF dropped women in combat was that Arab's put up stiffer resistance when they were facing women.
Holding that view, what do you think of blatant attempts (like this article) to make it seem as though there is no difference between the job and dangers faced by a soldier or marine storming Fallujah versus those faced by soldiers in support or forward-support units?
I'd heard or read that too, and as I understand it Israel has in fact not allowed women in combat for almost all of its existence.
But I think they did revert back to the policy that actual war experience told them to reject, last year or the year before. I may be wrong about this, maybe I misread the change in policy, but I'm pretty sure they have gone back to what experience led them to reject.
After reading your other posts on this thread I'm surprised you agree with my statement?
I dont know...
both are still extremely dangerous. Both are against the same enemy....
there are dangers all around for the soldiers, both male and female, over in Iraq.
Politicos and others will use this issue, as with most issues to prove whatever point they are attempting to get too. In the end, the only opinion that matters is the soldiers on the left and right of whichever female or male that happens to be in the fight....
Fighting for survival of a nation is quite a bit different than a professional expeditionary force fighting overseas. And that is not to belittle the importance of the war in Iraq, but only to say that while if we left w/o a final victory, we would not face immediate extermination as a nation, whereas the Russians faced exactly that.
100% agreement.
Blind rifleman and infantry in wheel chairs. That way they will make their recruiting goals. Btw I did my 20, thanks.
Good God, you have no idea what you are talking about, especially as it pertains to SPC Guay, who I know through my daughter. She can outbench many of the men and does so, and beat the hell out of male troop that said she couldn't. Heart, dedication, courage makes up for some of the genetic disadvantages. If the troops of the 82nd airborne accept and honor her as their combat medic as they patrol the streets of Mosul, who the hell are you to tell them they are wrong? Tell the insurgents doing battle against our troops that it doens't work. History changes, military capabilities change, and the people needed to accomplish the missions change.
You go girl!
I think ANY male G.I. would do that.
Go down for a WOMAN enemy soldier? Most KNOW they would rather die than go back to their commander, country, community, family and friends and admit that G.I. Jane took him down.
I can imagine American G.I.s would do the exact same thing. Lol.
Can you imagine one of those hard-nosed, stiff-neccked Brit sergeants surrendering to a woman soldier from anywhere? A U.S. Marine sergeant? Not a snowball's chance in H - E - double hockey sticks.
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