Posted on 09/26/2013 6:04:05 PM PDT by markomalley
The former all-male Infantry Training Battalion East issued its first combat load to 15 female Marines to research gender integration in combat specialties.
The Marine Corps announced Wednesday the arrival of 19 females to the battalion. Of that group, four have voluntarily withdrawn. The group will train with Delta Company. It is the first of 17 groups to train at the battalion in the next year. The Corps' goal is for at least 300 females to attend through August 2014.
In January, former Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta overturned a policy prohibiting females in combat specialties. Panetta's decision mandates full integration by 2016.
Leon Pappa, the lead investigator overseeing research for the Marine Corps' training and education command at Headquarters Marine Corps, said females will endure 59 days of basic rifleman and infantryman instruction, during a media telephone interview Wednesday.
"There will be no standards changed for this research," he added.
Infantry Training Battalion has five training companies and is among three schools making up the School of Infantry East, which trains 17,600 students annually. ITB trains infantry and Marine Combat Training Battalion trains non-infantry Marines. The Advanced Infantry Training Battalion trains Marine leaders in advanced infantry tactics.
During recruit training at Parris Island, S.C., 114 females were screened with fitness test scores. Of the 42 qualified females, 19 volunteered.
"Volunteers not meeting the standards will receive the same remediation as their male counterparts," Pappa said. "A volunteer may recycle to a follow-on company no more than once to complete the ... periods of instruction."
At Parris Island, the females learn they can withdraw any time without penalty. By Day 29 of training, females must pass the curriculum or they are sent to MCT. Students must maintain an 80-percent average to graduate.
The female graduates will earn the infantry designation, but won't operate in the Corps as part of the infantry, Pappa said.
The results are due for the Commandant of the Marine Corps' review by October 2014.
Each female, regardless of completion, will be given an exit survey analyzing injuries, medical issues, academics and more, said Pappa.
"Females will be subject alongside the males to a physical and medical pre-screening as well as weekly physical checks to ensure they are not hiding injuries (during training)," Pappa said. "We've also inserted reconfirmation briefs where essentially we will sit down face-to-face with the volunteers at different points during the ITB training to reconfirm their volunteer status."
The confirmation briefs, Pappa said, will be "subtle" and without "excess scrutiny" on the female Marines.
"The reason we want to reconfirm them is because ... attitudes do change," Pappa said. "Males are not given that opportunity because this is their military occupational specialty assignment."
Data collectors are embedded with the training company to track volunteers. Three female combat instructors from MCT have been assigned to mentor and advise the ITB staff. A senior enlisted female Marine will advise the command and assist the three combat instructors, according to Pappa.
Female Marines will not be segregated during training, but will be housed separately from the males in the barracks. In the field, the Marines will berth together but will not share tents, Pappa said.
The training marks the first phase of the integration, which consists of preparation, research and evaluation. Phase 2 will set conditions for implementation during Phase 3
It didn’t work in Israel. But due to insanity they’re trying it again.
Men and women are not = or interchangeable. You’re a noob, so I guess you haven’t noticed that.
Indeed. It is quite pathetic. The same people who seem to be obsessed with “science” and “indisputable research” when it comes to the refusal of God and Jesus Christ and the support of “global warming” at the same time wholeheartedly refuse the same research when it seems to affirm the opposite of their own agenda. How unfortunate.
Apologies for snarkiness.
Giving you the benefit of the doubt....
I am so beyond disgusted at feminism/leftism/commie-ism/progressivism/moslemism/faggism that I want to vomit.
>>Poor insanity. Will they lower standards for everyone so women won’t feel offended by men who are better fit?<<
Don’t you have to admit it works in Israel?<<<
No, and Israel was not the first to drop deployment of women to frontline.
>>They still have plenty of women in their military, they just don’t put them in front line combat units with the men anymore.<<
Well if they were at my side while we were under attack, I would trust them to shoot straight.
The US is OCCUPIED by all kinds of feral creatures bent on our destruction!
Well, why not? Hollywood does and they can’t be wrong...
>>That’s very nice, but what you feel doesn’t necessarily have any bearing on reality.<<
Any gun trainer will tell you that women are usually better shots than men, because they don’t have bad habits to unlearn.
In WWII, the Russians’ best snipers were women. The Wehrmacht genuinely feared them.
It wouldn’t hurt you to lose the condescension — condescension toward me, and condescension toward female warriors.
“but hey, if she can do 10 pull-ups, we’ll call it good”
I am sure some other 11 Bush remember too, but I had to do 10 pullups just to enter the DFAC at chow.
Pugil sticks will weed this nonsense out. That and the 25 mile forced road marches under full ruck.
“That is exactly what they are doing.”
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Yes, and only someone very naive could imagine otherwise.
Russians preferred their snipers to be women for two major reasons, first because they needed all available adults (or close enough) to fight and placing women in sniper positions freed up more men for the front lines, and second, because men are simply bigger and denser than females and do not suffer the same 30-day cycle fluctuations that females do.
The NVA used children as rifle-shooters when they fought against our troops, first because they were cheap to find and feed, and second because our people froze when they realized they were shooting at kids.
Would you care to make the same argument that we should put kids in positions as riflemen because of their inherently small silhouette and shock factor just as they did?
It is not condescension to state a fact, no matter how personally you seem to take it or how politically incorrect it might seem.
Well, what are we going to do about it?
Agreed. Speaking from personal experience, I knew quite a few females who were also in the military. Very, very few that I would want as a member of any group I was involved in.
Well, as a normal male of course I could dream about it, but reality has this habit of making you aware of how dreams are best left at that, and the necessity of dealing with whatever reality dealt you with realistic options.
Have to admit though, some of those outback cowgirls were bloody good shots...
Oh, it’s a great idea to distract males with females while engaging the enemy. /s
Sweet, I say if they want to play, put them on the door for breaching and let them all pull point on foot patrols. Fully loaded down should be fun to see them waddling around.
This is going to be a gold mine for disability doctors.
This kind of thing worked out real well for Lt. Hultgreen trying to land a jet on an aircraft carrier.
Well cowabunga, laddie! Let’s just make them all immediate Master Seargents while we’re about it, just to make up for all the times they did not quite pass the tests. (/sarc) *grin*
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