Israeli Women in Fatigues

NRO ^ | January 11, 2005 | Mackubin Thomas Owens

[neverdem]

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January 11, 2005, 7:30 a.m.

Israeli Women in Fatigues
Learning from experience.

There's nobody quite like Elaine Donnelly. For many years, she has led the fight to resist the political correctness that constantly threatens to engulf the uniformed military and destroy its integrity. In her NRO piece of Jan 7, "The Army's Gender War," she improved on my earlier NR article on the same topic: "GI Janes, By Stealth." How could she not? Although I have been writing on the topic of women in combat for at least a decade, it was her research that formed the foundation of that piece.

It turns out that my article generated a large number of e-mails. Most were positive, but a couple of writers not so favorably disposed to my argument suggested that the Israeli experience disproved my contention that women in combat undermine unit cohesion and thereby generate Clausewitzian friction. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

In fact, the Israeli experience, contrary to the assertions of my correspondents, constitutes the closest thing we have to a laboratory experiment for testing the claims of those who would expand the role of women as the Army is trying to do.

Contrary to common contention, Israel does not currently allow women in combat — they've been banned since 1948. But they have a history of integrated fighting there that we can learn from.

During the period of the British Mandate for Palestine, Palestinian Jews formed an elite, semi-clandestine, volunteer youth organization called Palmach. During Israel's War of Independence, Palmach served as the core of Haganah, the forerunner of the Israel Defense Force (IDF).

The ideology of Palmach was egalitarian socialism, and according to the Israeli military historian Marin Van Creveld, the organization "was sexually integrated to an extent rarely attained by any armed force before or since." Van Creveld writes that before Israeli independence, Palmach women accompanied men on missions, especially "undercover missions that involved obtaining intelligence, transmitting messages, smuggling arms, and the like."

Despite Palmach's ideological commitment to radical equality for women, the practical experience of the 1948 war — which involved coordinated, combined arms-offensive actions — convinced the leaders of Israel and the IDF that the dangers of women in combat outweighed the benefits — including commitment to an abstract concept of equality between the sexes. For one thing, according to the late Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Dayan, women reduced the combat effectiveness of Haganah units because men took steps to protect them out of "fear of what the Arabs would do to [the] women if they captured them."

The Israeli case demonstrates that, at least in the past, when confronted by great danger, reasonable people can sacrifice ideology to the dictates of nature. In other words, nature trumps attempts at human engineering.

— Mackubin Thomas Owens is an associate dean of academics and professor of national-security affairs at the Naval War College in Newport, R.I. He led a Marine rifle platoon in Vietnam in 1968-69.

 

	http://www.nationalreview.com/owens/owens200501110730.asp

[End Times Sentinel]

Israeli Women in Fatigues
	Posted by neverdem On News/Activism 01/11/2005 9:11:00 AM EST · 62+ views

C'mon, look at that, 62 views and I'll just betcha, at least 50 of those Freepers and Lurkers clicked away all disappointed they didn't get to see any sexy IDF Soldierettes.  I did a little googling for you, but it's going to require more work than I'm in the mood for.  C'mon, neverdem, get crackin' .

 

Owl_Eagle

”Guns Before Butter.”

[joesnuffy]

Well given the number of socialists in Israel trying to tear her apart from the inside...
I would not trust any of their 'socialist engineering' PERIOD and would be loathe to see it
applied to the US military....

Of course if it is....I hope they confine this crap to one branch of the service and leave the airborne alone along with spec ops...

Hopefully the Marines will maintain their current level of sanity along such lines and leave social engineering to the leftist college campuses and keep it off the battlefield...

Of course those whose real agenda is to destroy the fighting capability of a military will be all for it...

imo

[StoneGiant]

[SJackson]

If you'd like to be on this middle east/political ping list, please FR mail me.

[mark502inf]

How's this:

[martin_fierro]

I'll just betcha, at least 50 of those Freepers and Lurkers clicked away all disappointed they didn't get to see any sexy IDF Soldierettes.

(raising hand)

[martin_fierro]

MAZEL TOV!

[ken5050]

Far different situation in Israel..briefly, to understand the history of women in combat forces in Israel at the time of the founding of the Jewish state, Israel was surrounded on all sides by Arabs whose stated objective was to push Israel into the ocean and kill every Jew..man, woman, and child. The Israeli forces were outnumbered by what, 20:1, 30:1...some ungodly ration. So women were intended to fill whatever non-combat positins they could do, to free up all males for teh the front lines. In Israel, originally, EVERYTHING was the front lines, so that distinction rapidly faded. Also, any female Israeli soldiers that might be captured, would, quite frankly, have been far better off dead, and to that end they needed to be at least somewhat combat capable..firearms..to take out s many SArabs as possible before succumbing themselves...

[NavyCanDo]

Ahhhhh! My daily dose of Israeli women in fatigues. It's better than coffee, in getting my day started.

[Lurker]

hubba hubba.

L

[SJackson]

I would not trust any of their 'socialist engineering' PERIOD and would be loathe to see it applied to the US military....

I disagree. We should adopt it forthwith. The arguement about women in combat would be over.

.....................

Contrary to common contention, Israel does not currently allow women in combat — they've been banned since 1948. But they have a history of integrated fighting there that we can learn from.

Despite Palmach's ideological commitment to radical equality for women, the practical experience of the 1948 war — which involved coordinated, combined arms-offensive actions — convinced the leaders of Israel and the IDF that the dangers of women in combat outweighed the benefits — including commitment to an abstract concept of equality between the sexes. For one thing, according to the late Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Dayan, women reduced the combat effectiveness of Haganah units because men took steps to protect them out of "fear of what the Arabs would do to [the] women if they captured them."

The Israeli case demonstrates that, at least in the past, when confronted by great danger, reasonable people can sacrifice ideology to the dictates of nature. In other words, nature trumps attempts at human engineering.

[End Times Sentinel]

While Golda cut a mean figure back in the 20's...

 

I think Stone Giant topped you.  Yummy!!!

Owl_Eagle

”Guns Before Butter.”

[jalisco555]

Believe it or not, Ingrid Bergman played Golda in a made-for-TV movie about her life.

[Happy2BMe]

Women in fatigues - ping.

[TexKat]

C'mon Happy2BMe get with the program. :)

The world is going to leave you behind.

[LTCJ]

BTTT

[IAF ThunderPilot]

"Contrary to common contention, Israel does not currently allow women in combat — they've been banned since 1948. But they have a history of integrated fighting there that we can learn from."

Thats not true, women are allowed to serve in combat duties for some years already.
Today there are few woman pilots and navigators in the IAF. I personaly met one of them.
There are women in other combat units- in both regular (like Police border, "Golani", "Givati") and in elite (the different "Sayarot").

[in the Arena]

I surrender...

[IAF ThunderPilot]

Ping