Posted on 01/25/2013 6:57:52 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
When she heard that women would be allowed to serve on the frontlines of battle, former Camp San Luis Obispo garrison commander Lt. Col. Nicole Balliet’s first reaction was, “Well, it’s about time!”
The Atascadero native then had to better understand the announcement and its implications.
“It’s very overwhelming,” she said of the decision. “It’s a huge validation for all the hard work women have done serving in combat for the past several decades.”
The official announcement came after initial reports Wednesday of the Pentagon’s reversal of the 1994 ban on women serving in small frontline combat units.
In his announcement, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta also called on the armed forces to come up with a plan to comply by 2016, or to petition for exemptions if they felt specific roles could not be filled by women.
But Baillet said she thinks women will do just fine on the battlefield.
Balliet, who was promoted in November to executive officer to the adjunct general of the National Guard, served two separate tours in Iraq, 2003-04 and 2010-11. During her time there, Balliet saw many situations in which women were involved in combat, despite the ban, she said.
“Women have held these sorts of jobs for years,” she said. “We’ve had direct fire. We’ve been under attack. We’ve had vehicles blow up, just the same” as male soldiers.
Though Balliet is not sure whether she would have chosen to be on the frontlines when she entered the service 25 years ago, “it would have been nice to have the opportunity,” she said.
The decision may increase the number of women enlisting in the military, Balliet said.
“I think (an increase) is a very good possibility,” she said. “And that’s not a bad thing.”
Approximately 15 percent of active duty personnel in the military are women, according to the U.S. Department of Defense. Of these, women are most represented in the Air Force (19 percent) and Navy (16 percent).
In the past few years, those branches relaxed most of their prohibitions on women serving in combat. Women are allowed to fly fighter jets, fire weapons from ships and serve on submarines.
Pismo Beach resident and former Petty Officer 1st Class Brianne Richardson knew several female fighter pilots during her time with the Navy.
“They were very tough, very dedicated,” she said. “They were able to do what they needed to do.”
For her, the announcement of the ban’s reversal wasn’t a shock, since many females in her branch had already been serving in combat-like situations.
Richardson, who entered the military with the intent to become a nurse, said she would not choose to go to the frontlines. She was also apprehensive about the decision, because women would have to pass the same rigorous physical tests as men to go to the frontlines.
“(Right now) in the military, women don’t have to pass the same tests as men,” she said. “In combat, that goes right out the window because you are then responsible for the safety of everyone in your group. … I support it if women have to pass the same exact test as men.”
In the announcement, Panetta confirmed that women would be required to pass the same physical requirements as men to serve on the frontlines, but there may be some review of these requirements in the months to come to ensure that they are gender-neutral.
The California National Guard office in Sacramento issued an official statement in support shortly after the Pentagon’s announcement, saying the decision would strengthen the military by increasing diversity.
“This decision is more than a move toward equality, but a tactical advancement, as well,” the report stated. “This greater diversity translates directly into mission success, both in combat overseas and during domestic operations here at home.”
Can you imagine the effect a film of 10,000 women going ashore at OMAHA BEACH or IOW JIMA would go over back home in WWII?
Watching young women blown to pieces would cause a major uproar.
The Military should not be used for social engineering.
One of the scariest things about the women that want to do man things, is that they aren’t embarrassed about, or even aware of their shortcomings.
I have read many articles and some books by these women, and they can be a total flop compared to the men, but as long as they do well against the female standard, they swell up with pride and vindication at their equality.
They say things like “ I got the best total score in my class”, without ever mentioning that their “scoring” was different from the real scoring, it is like a bad movie about the totally self-absorbed, unaware boss’s son, or rich kid, who thinks that he came straight from the parking lot into the board room, because of his own 21 year old’s talents and specialness.
Richardson, who entered the military with the intent to become a nurse, said she would not choose to go to the frontlines
——————————————————————————————Gee when I went in the military we didn’t get a chance to choose.
Does this mean women want a chance to choose?
Is that what you call equality?
When you join the military honey, you go where they send you.
Now women want the right to be cannon fodder if they choose. If they don’t choose some man gets to die in their place. That’s equality?
If women are to be allowed into combat, lets stop the volunteer BS .
I would like to see one of our freeper statisticians give us a rough idea of what the loss of 300,000 child bearing age women during the Civil War, would have meant to the United States.
These idiot women will lose their taste for combat once they see what a 7.62 bullet does to human flesh.
Prove it.
This "diversity makes us strong" crap is a shibboleth.
So when will women have to sign up for selective service?
This broad says it would “have been nice to have the opportunity” to go into combat. And opportunity? I guess that means a “choice”. If women are to be “allowed” to serve in combat there should be no choice. They should be assigned just like the men are assigned.
Dunno about now, but the army will be hard pressed to find 10,000s of women who could carry this into battle.
Anyone who actually WANTS to go into military combat shouldn’t. They do not understand it and would be doing it for the wrong reasons. Just as anybody who actually WANTS to be President of the United States shouldn’t.
‘Average weight carried by an infantryman in Vietnam, 80lbs.”
...Today, that’s just the basics, before patrol ruck and basic load of ammo...
Gender neutral tests? OK - so both men and women must be able to pick up a 10 pound bag of sugar... and toss it 3 feet? Everyone passes - we all lose.
“...since many females in her branch had already been serving in combat-like situations.”
“combat-like?”
Is that where they can get like, dead?
That is their point——they want to destroy Western Civilization which created the unique “idea” of Romance and Love in marriage-—unlike all other cultures-—and replace it with vulgar hate. Identitarianism of Marx-—group against group-—so men are conditioned to kill women.
They have been trying to reinforce this idea for years in the movies with unrealistic portrayals of women to little children.....like they are interchangeable with men (Marxism). It is to destroy the Natural Family unit....and make everyone slaves of the state because the State will raise children. There will be no loyalty or love for mothers, because they don’t raise and nurture their babies like prior to the 70’s.
It is why all TV shows have made when so Ugly-—designed by homosexuals to be these plastic looking vulgar sex toys, who are at the same time wearing 5 inch heels, physically capable of Killing a hulking Bill. Rubbish for children—to destroy moral values and instill Adam Lanza/Manson thinking.
Think about it -—he KILLED his own mother at close range. Really. How sick are children’s minds????? —filled with the garbage and rot that Hollywood desensitizes them with-—glorifying all EVIL behaviors that destroys all “good” relationships.
Odd—how we hear of so many children killing a mother. That thought would not have occurred to normal kids (and most were) back in the 50’s. What changed? Conditioning of TV and Movies with evil ideas in the minds of your children. Schools do the same thing now. They are evil.
So, that sick evil Panetta who worships Lucifer, now wants men practicing shooting and killing women. Wow-—then they can show little boys how girls can be blown up—they are not special like when I grew up and any boy that hit a girl was severely punished. Kill the uniqueness of Christian culture-—which gave dignity and worth to ALL humans-—put women on a pedestal, ended slavery as “good” and ended “homosexuality and pederasty (for they always go together) as “a good”.
They are flipping Christian Ethics—to destroy Western Civ—for NWO—make slaves of all of us. Figure it out. Reclaim our Christian Culture which is enshrined in our Constitution-—Laws of Nature and nature’s God-—Rights from God!!!
It’s all to replace our Christian Ethics (kill God so State is God and determines all our Rights).
Christianity put women on a pedestal. Men used to sacrifice everything to fight for their woman and children. That has to end in the Freemason, sodomy culture of “Aghanistan” or Ancient Greece where women are chattel and put under the jackboots-—to condition men to think like the homosexual brownshirts-—who could kill and torture women and children and sodomize the boys. They just hung out with men and boys and had orgies without the women.
The Freemason Ba’al culture where orgies and vulgar use of body-—requires society to destroy all “respect” and “love” of all groups—particularly the women so little children can be sold and bought and used in their evil ceremonies—like they promote in TV programs-—the buying and selling of babies-—in the New Normal.
The R’s and D’s have already been sending women into combat.
One can argue about putting women into the combat designated mos and such, but women have been getting blown up and shot in Iraq and Afghanistan for a while.
At what point should a pregnant infantrywoman’s fetus receive combat pay?
And, albeit in lesser numbers, in Vietnam, Korea, WWII, the Civil War and the Revolutionary War. So ... to quote Hillary ... what, at this point, difference does it make?
Winter warfare is heavier than Vietnam.
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