Stephen Kilcullen: Women Don't Belong in Ranger School

WSJ ^ | 6-13-12 | STEPHEN KILCULLEN

[TurboZamboni]

Competition to attend the course is fierce, with about 4,000 men eligible to attend each year. Only about half graduate. Of those, only 20% make it through without having to retake various phases. For decades, completion of Ranger School has been the best indicator for determining which young men can handle the enormous responsibility of combat leadership.

[TurboZamboni]

Unless and until women have to pass the same PT test and are subject to the same Selective Service registration(The Draft), what's the point?

[EmilyGeiger]

I agree.

[Tallguy]

It’s already been decided. The ‘study’ is the usual exercise designed to paper-over the double-standard.

[G Larry]

“does it improve or hinder our ability to execute our mission?”

Congress doesn’t care about “mission”!

[rottndog]

I have to ask here the same question I ask about women on submarines...

To ANYONE who thinks this is a good idea, how does the inclusion of women to any front line combat forces INCREASE warfighting readiness and capabilities????

It's actually a rhetorical question, women don't add anything. In fact, women in these areas hurt the cause. The ONLY reasons this is being foisted on the military is political correctness, and the deliberate denigration of our US armed forces.

[Mouton]

As Clint Eastwood, as dirty harry in the enforcer, uttered during an applicant for detective board: What do you think this is, some kind of encounter group.

I guess the answer has been delayed a few years as it is obviously YES now.

[Beagle8U]

You must not have seen “GI Jane”./sarc

[kosciusko51]

The only time I can envision women being on the front line is when the country is being invaded. In Israel, it makes sense that their women can be soldiers, as they are on the defensive, and all countries around them want them dead. For us, it is all PC crap.

As a father of two girls, I would strongly urge them not to join the military, even in non-combat positions. Look at Jessica Lynch. Why did we as a country put her into that position?

[paterfamilias]

The only girl I’d like to see try out Ranger School is named Barack Obama

[Travis McGee]

What’s the point? PC-uber-alles is the point.

The military is no longer primarily about defending the country.

It’s about forcing PC social change down our throats.

[TurboZamboni]

I agree. It’s another Obama “green” jobs program.

[Bigg Red]

This woman agrees. Police and fire departments should also have identical requirements for the two sexes.

[Bigg Red]

The ONLY reasons this is being foisted on the military is political correctness, and the deliberate denigration of our US armed forces.

***
Bingo!

[yldstrk]

There are some jobs in the military where it doesn’t matter about the strength and the being female. I was a female JAG, the first one at my active duty post. I was successful trying cases.

I can see that female doctors, layers, nurses, supply folks, administrative folks can help free up men for engineers, transportation, infantry, armored cav, MP, etc. Do I think women should be in combat? well, if they pass the SAME tests and meet the SAME standards, then a truism in the military, that all individuals are/should be interchangeable is carried forward. But changing the standards, no.

[Terry L Smith]

If the standards are set, and all pass them, with them being rigorous, and not ‘fixed’ for ‘the fairer sex’, then it doesn’t matter who goes.

I remember, in the Air Force, starting in 1974, the ‘Human Relations’ mandatory attendance week-long classes. “So that we could all get along, and do our jobs.” ha-ha-ha! It did not include ‘the fairer sex’ equality training, yet.

I am becoming glad to have reached the age, where anyone pontificating the honors and blessings of a PC nature, would receive a hearty and meaningful “BLESSUM YOU!”, for I grew up before that time of indoctrination.

[bramps]

How about romantic feelings between troops affecting combat decisions? Also one more reason homosexuals should be nowhere near a combat situation.

[SECURE AMERICA]

Not sure I understand this person point?
If the training course is so hard then no woman will make it right?
Oh but what if they do?
Well then I would serve with them!
Patriotism, honor, duty, courage are not the sole property of males..

[yldstrk]

yeah, that’s bad. How does the Israeli military handle it? I wouldn’t want to make some of those gals mad.

[IronJack]

I agree. If female candidates can pass exactly the same tests and are held to exactly the same standards, then they should be allowed to serve in whatever capacity they’ve earned.

That said, I highly doubt that any female who could pass Ranger training would be one I would classify as “desireable,” or even “female” in any but the strictest biological sense.

[BuffaloJack]

> Only about half graduate.

My opinion of Ranger School training has been diminished. I thought that only 1 in 8 or 10 made it through, like the SWCCs or SEALs.

If a woman can make it through an elite military training course, then she deserves to be there. If, on the other hand, they have to lower the requirements, then she only endangers the safety of the others that she serves with.

We have elite forces for a reason and our enemies are brutal and unforgiving. To allow diminished requirements for our elite forces only serves to make them less elite and less likely to prevail in a conflict.