Personally, I'm all for it. If our men are willing to put their lives on the line, the least the Pentagon can do is have some women around to cook them a decent meal and pick up after them.
Reference the bolded part, I'm still waiting for it to be addressed. Know what I'm waiting for? I'm waiting for one of you to come up with a real life example of your "logical reasons" coming true. Let's go through the list. 1. Women being killed will result in a media shitstorm back home. Well, we can see from the nobody-really-cares-how-many Americans that have died in non-combat roles, the Canadians that have died in combat roles, plus various Brits and other coalition members, that it really wasn't that much different than men dying in combat. I mean, yes, sometimes it garnered more attention, but not in the ways predicted. 2. If the rules are lifted, women are going to be dying in disproportionate numbers and the combat effectiveness of the army will be reduced. Well, let's look at those countries which do allow women in combat roles. As omegaham pointed out, even if there isn't a de jure rule against women in combat in the Canadian military, there are still extremely few who actually do make it into the infantry battalions, and the ones who do make it very rarely get into the actual combat. Women have not been dying in disproportionate numbers, and anyone who says that the rate limiting factor of the combat effectiveness of the Canadian military lies in the fact that women aren't specifically barred from combat roles disqualifies themselves from having their opinions taken seriously. 3. Non-combat trades will suffer. See above. In Canada, women aren't lining up left and right (and failing left and right) to get into combat trades. 4. Female POWs will cause a media shitstorm. If this were actually the case, anyone who said this would have been able to name off any and all female POWs from the last two decades, for all the media shit that would have stormed. But nobody did, because there was no storm. The only real media shitstorm about females and POW abuse was from a female soldier involved in abusing POWs. 5. The U.S. military will reduce standards to fit women in. Well, I'm not in the U.S. military, so I'll leave that one to you. But for a people who claim that theirs is the most mighty military force ever known unto history, if it can't figure out how to lift the rule on barring women from specific roles without completely fucking up the entire military, this speaks more to flaws in structure and leadership (that should be remedied even if this question weren't up for discussion) than it does to women specifically.
We have a volunteer army, are at war, have a ton of enemies, have roughly a million countries we're sending troops to/want to send troops to/will probably send (more) troops to in the future and you could probably use all of the interested, qualified people you can get? Pretty much everything I've been reading is an argument as to why there would be very few women in combat, and the majority of them are legitimate reasons. But that's not the point. Like I said in my first post, if the lift of the ban results in very few or even no women in combat, then so be it. I think with the exception of a few far-flung people on the PC spectrum, no one is expecting that suddenly women are going to be anything close to equally represented in combat, and that's not the issue here. But I haven't seen one worthwhile argument about why just allowing the possibility of interested, potentially-qualified women to try for these positions is so awful and terrifying without it being tied into a fear of a hypothetical Next Step of creating a quota - which, again, the majority of people who support this are aware that this wouldn't be a good idea, would disagree with it, and aren't even talking about it.
The Army is moments away from a massive, budget induced downsizing. They have all the volunteers we need. The biggest problem with women in combat from a feminist standpoint is that it invites regressive gender concepts to develop within 18-25 year olds. There are going to be some great women volunteering for combat, but there are going to be many more that can't hack it for emotional or biological reasons. Do you think the idiot 20 year olds they serve with will realize "well, these girls aren't representative of the whole" or think "all women are whiny, duplicitous distractions that deserve to go back to the kitchen"? The LAST thing women need is a new generation of young men with "proof" that women are inferior.
You make some excellent points, Ghettoastronaut. I think that the real problems are going to come from #5, which will lead to #2. Right now, physical standards for women are already reduced. The only reason why it doesn't matter right now is that in POG jobs, physical ability doesn't really matter very much. I'm a radio tech and part of Headquarters; I fix radios, computer equipment, phone lines, stuff like that. You can be fat as fuck and missing a leg and still do my job, as long as you're smart. The only reason that we promote people based on physical ability is that being a PT stud is positively correlated with being a good leader (Someone who takes care of his body and pushes himself to excel is more likely to be a driven, motivated individual in other aspects of his life). So, in a job like mine, you can make physical standards lower for women. As far as I know, the current PFT is scaled in favor of women so that a woman in the 80th percentile will get the same score as a man in the 80th percentile (It doesn't happen that way, but I think that's what they're trying to do. It makes me feel better to think that than to cynically think that they're just biasing it in favor of women). This way, it's a test of motivation, discipline, and drive, not a raw test of strength. There's no reason to have the latter because we're wielding soldering irons instead of mortars. Thing is, the double standard remains even in jobs where physical ability matters. For example, Ordnance. Those guys lift bombs all day. Ordnance, being a POG job, is open to women. When you walk into an ordnance shop, you'll notice that all the guys are lifting and all of the women are doing logistical work. This isn't because the women are somehow better at paperwork; it's because they simply cannot lift bombs, and the master sergeant is sticking them in the only job where they can do anything. But if said master sergeant were to downrate them on job proficiency, he'd be condemned for sexism. So seeing stuff like that happening in ordnance shops makes me pretty leery of assurances from higher that "We'll keep the standard here because it actually matters this time." That's the same thing as one of my guys gaffing off maintenance and then saying "Well, when I'm doing stuff that REALLY matters, I'll do it right." Riiiight. They need to iron out the kinks in the double standards in POG jobs before they even think of putting women into combat arms.
Really need an acronym guide to know what the fuck you people are talking about. I hear OPP is a huge problem with the women grunts over in the shit. Or something like that.
So....don't do that. If they can't fulfill the physical requirements, they don't serve in that capacity. This is a ridiculous red herring of an argument. Did those women in ordinance fulfill the basic requirements of the job? If yes, those requirements are set incorrectly, or applied incorrectly. If no, then those jobs are staffed incorrectly. Y'all fucked up. What you are saying isn't an indictment of women serving on the front lines, it's an indictment of poorly applied standards by the U.S. military. Also, have you actually seen said women fail to lift the bombs in question? Or have you just seen them not assigned to do so?
The services have all the folks they need, but is it the most capable force we can put together? The argument goes that, no, it's not, they're excluding half of the population of their (eligible) human capital. And why? Because of antiquated, outdated, prejudicial perspectives whose time has come. If you even begrudgingly admit that there are qualified female candidates for combat MOS's, the rest of the arguments fall secondary to enhancing our force readiness (by recognizing the value of female candidates for combat arms), if these arguments are even valid. Pissing off a bunch of young men? Who gives a FUCK? That's such an inconsequential concern, to call it the "biggest problem" makes me wonder if you weren't serious. Force readiness. That's what's important. As a very close analogy in this case, if Sergeant Jethro leaves the Army because there's too many unqualified niggers in charge (and anybody that's served knows Sergeant Jethro's) who cares? His and his pal's bellyaching, and maybe sabotaging, is secondary to the potential force enhancer of, again, doubling the size of the pool from which we draw excellent soldiers/airmen/sailors/Marines. I agree that execution of this integration is key, but handwringing over the potential for shitty execution is not reason enough to, again, diminish our force readiness by excluding half our population of excellent young people.
From what I've read, both in this thread and elsewhere, a pretty good chunk of American servicemembers already think this. Question for you Americans, though - what do you think of the concept of mixing genders starting in basic training? That's how things are done in Canada (as well as some other countries), and I wonder just how big of an impact that has on the general culture of the military and how men and women get along and work together.
Yes, it's definitely an indictment of poorly applied standards. But it's just the way it is, and we need to fix the system before we even think of trying to use it to make a radical move. And it's not as simple as saying "Just don't do that." Due to a combination of sexism, opportunism from women who are perfectly fine with getting special treatment in exchange for being second-class citizens, apathy from the top brass, political agendas, and inertia, the current situation is a clusterfuck that will require years of driven change to remedy. But it's okay, we're going to trust that this current system will do just fine in enforcing the standards while it's failed so badly at doing so with non-combat jobs. In the Fleet, the latter. During MOS school, though, we got to watch the Ordnance guys carrying logs on the PT field as practice. The females were underachieving, to put it nicely. There were also shitty men who got housed by the logs, but they got fucked up with remedial PT afterwards until they either shaped up or broke. The women skated. The Marine Corps is the only branch that segregates by gender during basic training. I don't think it makes much of a difference.
POG = Person Other than Grunt = support specialties = anyone that's not a trigger puller PFT = Physical Fitness Test
Which is why I'm a proponent for experimental all-female units, but not mandatory integration right off the bat. Our current combat tourism phase is a great time to make this experiment. Are we short infantry soldiers? Do we need to pull from this other half for combat arms? I've deployed with women that were as close to infantry as you can get (the SOF Cultural Support Teams), and they were GREAT at their job, which was gleaning intelligence from Muslim women male soldiers were forbidden to speak with. They were an absolute mess during actual combat, and they recognized themselves as such. At first they wanted to go on the foot patrols, but realized very quickly that it wasn't something they wanted to be doing. Which is fine, because they weren't infantry soldiers. I understand where you're coming from: the idea that a woman would be denied a job that she could do equally as well as a low-to-middle performing male sucks. If that's what this is all about, the IDEA that there is something out there women are forbidden to do, I get it. If it is about respect for the gender, I absolutely do NOT get it. At least the way it is being applied. Thankfully, my unit will be immune from this, but I still occasionally work with regular infantry units. We'll see.
I actually didn't think you were serious on this. Unless I misunderstood you, you're saying that while individual women might be capable of serving in combat, integration of women into combat arms units won't work. So the experiment needing testing is gender integrated combat units, isn't it? I appreciate the out of the box thinking. Maybe this would be a good experiment. Maybe it's already being done.
The more I think about it, the better it sounds. I think that if all-female units were a success, then we could try integration later. Think about it this way - segregated black units were successful, so people had absolutely no excuse for racist beliefs that they couldn't do the same jobs as white soldiers. You can't say they're a drag and can't do the job, since they've done it all by themselves for years. The same thing would happen with female infantry. They'd have their own developed officer and NCO corps, one that's experienced and has done stuff. Once that tradition has been created, the rest falls into place. They're not joining the boy's club anymore; they're already in the infantry club and have gotten shit done, and now you're just combining two chapters together.
To give a more tea-drinking, pale-skinned perspective, the British Ministry of Defence conducted a review into this two years ago, and decided it was a bad idea. https://www.gov.uk/government/news/mod-completes-review-into-women-in-close-combat-roles
Nothing I've said in this thread was sarcastic or tongue-in-cheek. Experimentation was already done, sort of, with the aforementioned CSTs. Women volunteered, were placed in an Assessment and Selection course, and then those selected were trained in a "mini Q course", receiving MUCH more combat training that your average infantryman. In the beginning, these girls showed up and strutted around like they were "elite" and had earned something beyond graduating a school. They were imbedded with Special Forces ODAs, and were dying to get into the fight alongside the men. The SF teams cut them no slack, and told them point blank that if they were going to patrol and carry a gun, they would carry a combat load. This lasted about two patrols maximum for most teams. I don't know of any that continued to go on them. One team I know of had to carry everything except for weapons from their female counterparts mid-way into a two day patrol. The women simply could not finish the patrol, and were endangering the unit. After that, or so I'm told, the chest beating came to a screeching halt. I'm not saying it couldn't work, and absolutely the CSTs serve a purpose, but they are not good at combat. As for the mixed gender units, I believe the best time to perform THAT experiment is in NON combat times.
Fair enough, but it's a little different with gay dudes simply because there aren't all that many of them, relatively speaking--only about 5% of the population, probably less than that in front-line military units. On top of which, maybe my experience with gays in the military isn't representative but virtually all that I've known are soldiers first and gay second, and just as importantly are smart enough not to fuck or try to fuck dudes in their own unit. So there's a lot less opportunity for jealousy, infighting, lovers' quarrels destroying unit morale, etc. As Brian mentioned the military is in the process of significant cuts right now, and if I'm not mistaken even when it was hurting for people in the mid-00s the combat arms were meeting their recruiting goals. That's literally the ONE argument that can be made as to why this could be beneficial for the military, and it doesn't apply right now (maybe not ever). The rest of your post is a rationalization for why it won't be as bad as we all think. That dog don't hunt. Why will it be BENEFICIAL to the MILITARY? Did you miss the link I posted where the CJCS basically says that physical standards will be lowered so as to facilitate the entry of women into front-line combat units?? #1/#4 - I don't really care about these factors, so not gonna try to argue it one way or the other #2 and #5 tie in together. If the Canadian military hasn't lowered its standards, that's probably why its women haven't been dying in disproportionate numbers. However, the Canadian military doesn't have Diane Feinstein and Barbara Boxer screeching about getting females into the 75th Ranger Battalion NO MATTER WHAT. And again, reference the link I posted where Dempsey more or less admits standards will be lowered in the name of political correctness. #3 - The scale is irrelevant, on an individual level the top .00000001% of female soldiers who might be able to hack it as mediocre infantrymen would each still bring far more to the table as outstanding support soldiers. That said, I'm done with this thread unless someone can try to argue why this is actually beneficial for the military and its combat effectiveness. Audrey at least tried, even if the argument she gave isn't applicable. No one else has tried, because the people arguing for this either don't give a shit about the US military's combat effectiveness or are completely ignorant of what infantrymen actually do. Edit: OK, this guy said it far better than I could have (spoilered for length): Spoiler Putting pen to paper, okay fingers to keyboard, to express my thoughts on those arguing in defense of the recent announcement from outgoing defense secretary Leon Panetta to open up combat arms to women. I am doing this more out of frustration then anything. In stating my opposition to this decision I of course have been subjected to all of the obligatory name calling from the liberals and many an indignant female. My frustration stems from the fact that I spent 22 years in the Infantry meaning I have slightly more knowledge and experience in this particular argument then my critics. One can not convey the true meaning of what it means to be a member of the Infantry in 140 characters on Twitter or in some anonymous comment on a blog which gets swallowed up in the cacophony of others voicing their opinions. Today I have also been treated to others who have worn the uniform ranging from truck drivers to helicopter pilots who support the lifting of the ban. While I respect their service they can not equate their jobs in the military to what a grunt does day in and day out. Listening to somebody who served as a hatch gunner on a HMMV and may or may not have gotten shot at while riding around doesn’t just quite match somebody who spends days, weeks, months living out in the environment exposed to the elements with no relief in sight. The things which bind an effective Infantry unit together are all of the intangibles which aren’t taught. When you upset that delicate balance you are inviting disaster. You can not ignore the physical differences, which are obvious to anybody and while that particular aspect has been beat to death I won’t belabor that point here. What I want to address is that unseen bond which forms in combat teams who are forced to depend on each other for their very survival. It is not enough to merely dismiss such concerns by saying service members are expected to act as professionals. They are humans too. As such they are prone to such things as emotions and normal human behavior. What follows next will inflame feminist everywhere, but when you insert a female into a cluster of testosterone laden young males they are going to act like young males in any species on this planet do. There will be fights to establish dominance. Jealousy and envy will infect the ranks. If you are more worried of getting into a firefight because your rival may use it as an excuse to get rid of his competition you have a real problem. Often times the issue of chivalry is raised. Some discount this by saying once the bullets start flying you don’t care about the sex of the person next to you. For those with chivalrous tendencies that will not be the case. Somewhere in the recesses of their mind they will be keeping an ear and eye out and therefore not concentrating on the task at hand. Lastly, in what I call the “Hey Bubba watch this” Syndrome, which can be witnessed at any coed social gathering there is always going to be the guy who does some stunt to attract attention and therefore the eye, he hopes, of the females. Doing such a stunt while on a mission can lead to disaster. You can not regulate this sort of behavior out of existence for to attempt to do so is mere folly. One of my other favorite arguments that has been thrown at me has been that women that live in such conditions would become unappealing to their male compatriots to which I respond have you ever been in a bar at closing time? I would like to see some reporters go ask some of the wives of married service members what they think about their husband sharing a foxhole with some woman for an extended period of time. I don’t think a lot of them would be on board with that idea. Regarding the physical difference, without getting into the weeds on that particular aspect but in keeping in the vein of this missive does anybody think there might be just a wee bit of resentment in the ranks because the female is not expected to carry the machine gun, or radio, or mortar tube? She will still be eligible for promotion provided she meets the other criteria without having fulfilled all of the duties her male counterpart would have been expected to do. Anyway that is what I wanted to say. Go ahead, call me a chauvinistic, misogynist, pig but it doesn’t change the points I brought up for to do so would be to refute the very essence of human nature since they first appeared on the planet. Bottom line, human nature can't be legislated.