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Apology accepted and my apologies in return. In spirit I would think a woman willing to volunteer to serve her country is a good thing. They have for almost 100 years now. The WACS, the Waves, female Marines since WW1&2 and on down and of course as front-line nurses. But that isn't the same as being in combat. At the time I was reading your latest post I was on the phone with my military ''expert'' my best friend Paul. Paul is an Air Force brat. His late father flew P-40s in WW2 and then made the transition to being an Air Force intelligence officer after the war. Paul has lived on air bases in Maine, South Dakota, Hawaii and England. Paul served as an artillery sergeant with the First Field Forces that was part of the re-activated 9th. Infantry Division(''Americal'') at a fire-base outside of Ben Het South Vietnam(69-71). He was a first sergeant in charge of a four-gun battery of self-propelled 175mm.guns. What he told me in regards to just normal maintenance required on a daily basis to maintain those guns made me realize it is definitely no place for a woman. He said ''Men shouldn't even be doing it but that's war'' he said. For one thing he told me the tube on a 175 is 52 feet long and has to be changed out every three days, swabbed out and he said it took at least three men working together to swab it. And taking out that gun tube requires lots of ''a-frames'', jacks and other kinds of tools. "It's a bitch'' he said. Humping 100lb plus bags of powder and shells about four feet long and weighing at least 100lbs having to be unloaded, put in bunkers and then moved to the guns when firing. And doing it in a climate where it's about 100 degrees and the humidity is about the same. He said ''How long do you think some woman can go without bathing before she gets a bladder infection under those conditions?'' He said when he first arrived at the fire base and assigned to a gun at around three in the afternoon he was told ''take a nap''. He didn't understand at first but he was woken up a few hours later when it was dark, given a ''dexie''(amphetamines) and he said ''We fired all night,''interdicting fire'' he called it.After the fire mission as day light was coming he was given a joint to smoke to come down from the speed. ''All f'ing night, almost every night and every f'ing day''. he said. ''John(that's me) he said, it was like Hell on Earth''. That was Paul's day job''. Paul's father had raised him and his brother to basically accept The Bill of Rights as the only real law, primarily the First and Second Amendment , well actually really only the Second. He taught his sons how to shoot, how to clean and maintain firearms and told his sons, "There is your mother and your two sisters. When I'm not here, you two are the men in this home. If someone attempts to cross that threshold in force or anger, you drop them''. Paul became an expert shot before he was drafted. He took all the combat courses he could and the wind-up is he ended up doing, ah, how would you say, ''contract work'' for the CIA under the Phoenix Program. He said the two guys wearing the ''Hawaiian Shirts'' and shades would drive up in a jeep to his CO and Sergeant X would have to go do a ''job''. I think you know what that means. yeah, combat is no place for a woman. He said this is how communists(and I know Obama is one) destroy a free society.