Posted on 02/02/2013 1:22:05 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Another one of the many military jobs on the front lines of combat may be opening to women: Flying the high-tech helicopters that move special forces under cover of darkness for missions like the one that killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan.
The Army's most elite aviation unit has proposed a test program to let women serve as pilots and crew chiefs, pending congressional approval. The 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, based at Fort Campbell, Ky., and known as the Night Stalkers, decided to give women a trial as pilots and crew chiefs as part of a military-wide review on gender policies last year that preceded the Pentagon's announcement on Jan. 24 to lift a broad ban on women fighting in smaller ground combat units, which include many artillery, armor and infantry jobs.
The military announced last year that it would open up about 14,000 new jobs for women in units below the brigade level. But the aviation unit is the first among Army special operations units to move toward more unrestricted roles for women, well ahead of a 2016 deadline to integrate women across the services.
(Excerpt) Read more at kentuckynewera.com ...
>> 220lb man, 20 feet
No problem. Only allow guys no taller than 5’6” and that weigh less than 150lbs on combat missions.
When a helo goes down, all people inside become ground combatants:
1. O’Brady in Bosnia
2. Blackhawk down guys
3. Abadabad guys
LIBS THINK, “MILITARY = SOCIAL LABORATORY”
Temporary emergency duty just like a clerk at BDE HQ when the sappers hit. Not routine MOS duty.
In the spirit of ‘words mean things’:
- women have served (in the strictest definition of the word) in combat for many years (nurses come to mind right away)
- what constitutes a ‘combat’ environment has changed over the years; during WWI & WWII we had clearly defined front lines which made defining combat easy, in today’s war against terrorism the front line is the area immediately around you (360 degrees)
- serving in the military is not a ‘right’ — this is not a civil rights issue; the military discriminates all the time, that is why there is a medical physical requirement prior to enlistment and some jobs even have extensive background investigations
Let’s be clear, what many worry about:
- lowering standards of currently male-only military jobs to accommodate some misguided ‘fairness’ argument and the subsequent deterioration of readiness and lethality of our military; recently heard the SGM of the Army say they were going to evaluate physical standards of some MOS’ to see if they really needed to be where they currently are
- the unavoidable challenges with morale, order & discipline commanders will have to deal with; training and the UCMJ are no deterrent to thousands of years of DNA and hormones at work (translation - readiness problems); these already exist in current non-Maneuver/Fires/Effects Army units
- some of these all-male jobs involve a high risk to capture at the hands of lawless actors (they do not follow Geneva Convention protocols); are we ready as a society to put our daughters, sisters, and mothers in situations were they will likely suffer sexual abuse as a result of capture to satisfy socialist-egalitarian ideals?
I may be old fashion yet I still believe men and women ARE different and the Lord made it so for a reason.
My 0.02 USD.
Regards.
They will lower standards and ignore failures of standards just like they did before. I fully expect our military to be used against soon so I have no heartburn about inferior troops in their ranks.
Desert one was a disaster because of the lack of the 160th, so they were created.
Now we are moving behind what caused the failure at Desert One, regressing to a point behind where military aviation started.
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