"Their success, widely known in the military, remains largely hidden from public view. In part, this is because their most challenging work is often the result of a quiet circumvention of military policy.
Women are barred from joining combat branches like the infantry, armor, Special Forces and most field artillery units and from doing support jobs while living with those smaller units. Women can lead some male troops into combat as officers, but they cannot serve with them in battle.
Yet, over and over, in Iraq and Afghanistan, Army commanders have resorted to bureaucratic trickery when they needed more soldiers for crucial jobs, like bomb disposal and intelligence. On paper, for instance, women have been “attached” to a combat unit rather than “assigned.”" NY Times
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Women in the infantry, Special Forces and armor? Why not? Can they do the job physically? Learning that is what P.T. tests are about. They can either pass the same tests or they can not. That is easy to find out. Some people think that women will not be as good at fighting and killing as men. I think that is a laughable idea, but, once again, the answer to that question is readily available in the wars the US is now fighting.
If women want to put up with living in the field with a lot of very basic men under conditions of constant and close association, conditions in which it is impossible to give them any sort of privacy, and it is often impossible to keep clean for extended periods of time, then they should be allowed to do so.
There is just no accounting for taste. I miss the Army, but, then... pl
CWZ
How many women riflemen do they have? pl
Posted by: Patrick Lang | 18 August 2009 at 09:05 AM
About 15% of Canadian Forces personnel are women. That number is quite a bit smaller in combat arms, but not insignificant. 1.9% of personnel serving in combat arms are female, including 3.75% of officers in those units. Female casualties seem to be proportionate to those numbers, 2-3% of our dead.
So, infantry which are 2% female have been performing quite well in combat in Afghanistan.
Why only 2%? Apparently relatively few women want to sign up for the infantry, but it's a high enough percentage that it would be strange to call these soldiers "freaks."
If you want to argue that women should not be allowed to serve in combat roles in the American army, you need to make a case that the Canadian situation is significantly different, or that Canadian forces in Afghanistan have performed poorly. Sex jokes are not an argument.
Posted by: Ian | 18 August 2009 at 06:22 PM
I served with women in the Air Force in the 1980's and would never question that they have the same commitment to serve as any man.
That said, I can't escape the notion that there's something barbaric about sending women to kill and die in wars.
Posted by: Carl O. | 19 August 2009 at 06:01 PM
My security person, Camp Taji, pre-surge (it was pretty bad), was a female who had just been med-boarded out after a tour with an intel MOS in Anbar. She carried a SAW on patrol, every day, blew out her back and the tendons in her chest, hence civilian status. She killed bad guys. She protected her buddies. She slept in the open. She ate MRES. She was a combat soldier.
For what it is worth, she was a fine soldier and demonstrated her worth on the battlefield every day, just like the folks with a combat arms MOS.
She didn't quality for the CAB, naturally. WTF? 360 degree war, all females outside the wire may see combat and had better be trained and ready for it.
This false dichotomy between "combat arms" and certain support jobs often done by women just perpetuates an injustice, IMO. You see combat, you are a combat soldier.
Stop with the condescension, already.
Posted by: Sam Earp | 19 August 2009 at 11:59 PM