Blog #3: WarFighters and Women

Should America send “infantrywomen” to fight our enemies?

Veterans or not, everyone has an opinion about women serving in the infantry – not just in combat units, but in foxholes.

As a former U.S. Army infantry officer and paratrooper, I have learned that the beliefs of many inside the military and in civilian life are as polarized as that currently between the political parties and the President.

The military has evolved dramatically from the World Wars to Korea, Vietnam, and the Middle East. Warfighting has changed, including everything from uniforms, to equipment and tactics, but the essential elements of all-out warfare have not.

For ground pounding Soldiers and Marines, it is a fight to the death. No hype, no reasoning, no hiding.

In the discussion and decision to use women in the infantry, the tendency is to focus on a woman’s ability to satisfy “combat fitness”. I am certain women will be able to meet the same standards as men. Hopefully, they do not change those standards as that would set them up to fail.

We have many excellent, young female athletes who are smart and ready to take leadership roles. I am also convinced they will act bravely as I have seen too many men in combat act cowardly.

So, in my view, the question is not whether women have the courage to kill or can meet the standards for physical fitness, but how many women really want to do it?

Why would they?

Well, the main reason quoted by many females in the military is that they need to punch the combat command ticket if they want to reach higher in their careers and even become Generals. This becomes a career imperative. For many, this is about the glass ceiling.

Hopefully, this career-motivated decision should not put them and their comrades unnecessarily in harm’s way.

Here are some other concerns for our country, regardless of the individual motivations of women in the military and specifically in the infantry (I am not including in this discussion other combat arms like Armor, Combat Engineers, Artillery, pilots, and the like).

And these concerns go well beyond arguing about combat fitness or political correctness.

Unit Combat Readiness: If a unit is called up and sent into combat and any soldiers fall out for whatever reason, the overall unit effectiveness is diminished. Teamwork and unit cohesion is affected.

Women have proven already to be vulnerable to pregnancy while serving overseas. The physical demands on a woman’s body over time, under stress, with a limited diet, water, sleep, and so forth, are still being documented but the litany of ailments is already quite familiar.

At least one Marine female, Captain Katie Petronio, was brave enough to tell her story. She was part of the Lioness Program and did a combat tour in both Iraq and Afghanistan. She was at the top of her game, a world-class athlete, and she advised that contrary to what everyone wanted to hear, a woman’s body is different than a man’s and it cannot take the same level of punishment.

In her words, “get over it, we are not all created equal.”

Over time, carrying the arms, the weight, jumping off helicopters, hiking for miles day after day for months with restricted levels of food, water, and sleep, in all kinds of weather and all while under mental duress, left this one Marine with compressed vertebrae, muscular atrophy with back and leg problems, a balance problem where she could not walk straight, and other issues from not being able to menstruate to significantly lessened stamina.

And as an athlete, she was one of our best.

This is not to say the evidence is conclusive. And many will say it is just one exception. But the signals are compelling.

Then there is the Psychological Readiness of this country. Can you imagine how the U.S. public will react when an outpost that has several female soldiers assigned to it is purposely targeted by the enemy? Once captured, does our public have the stomach to watch on TV in real time what the enemy will do to a woman soldier of the United States in a foreign land? We saw that tragedy play out in Somalia with men captured by the enemy.

How will such realities affect military strategy, especially today when our single greatest threat is from Islamic Extremists and Al Qaeda? We all understand their attitudes towards women. I cannot imagine a more prized prisoner than a female American soldier in the hands of these animals.

Remember Mogadishu? Remember Jessica Lynch, the army private in a maintenance company who was captured in Iraq and later rescued?

Will the public recoil and demand a withdrawal to end the conflict? What will be our National resolve to fight knowing we are putting women alongside men in foxholes?

Let’s consider what Israel does. They put female infantry soldiers on the front lines for defensive positions. This is done to protect the homeland. It would seem that without question, our country should hand a rife to anyone old enough to carry it to defend those who cross our borders with harmful intent.

Short of that, do we really need to fill our infantry ranks with women for offensive, international warfighting at any time? We can certainly do it, but do we need to do it?

Whatever is decided and whoever is sent into harm’s way, they must have our enduring support and admiration. 

They will have mine.