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Thanks to you both for your notes.

@ Fr-Freak: We're in agreement about the rise of political correctness in the military. I'm not going to give examples in public that could come back to bite me or hurt the careers of colonels and generals, but I've heard enough things with my own ears to leave no doubt about the truth of what you said. Sometimes I wonder if generals are thinking when they make certain comments in front of reporters with tape recorders running.

For me, it boils down to this: not every job in the modern military needs upper body strength, and not every woman in the modern world is a shrinking violet.

In an all-volunteer force for which a significant majority of American males do not meet the qualifications to serve, I have no problem with letting women who do meet the qualifications put on the uniform for some duties.

I think it's best to leave it to the senior enlisted personnel, and to the generals who typically pay a lot of attention to E8 and E9 personnel on that subject, to decide how to design the tests to make sure we don't put people, whether male or female, in positions where they cannot perform as needed.

For me, it boils down to this: not every job in the modern military needs upper body strength, and not every woman in the modern world is a shrinking violet.

Difference in upper body strength is only one of many differences between men and women. There are physical differences, there are biological differences, and there are psychological differences. Upper-body strength is the least of our concerns. The fact is that men's bodies and minds are optimized for combat. Women are not. Of course, women are capable of combat, but they will never be as good as men. Adding women to men's combat units will drag the men down. Women who go against men in any serious combat, armed or unarmed, will die.

Anyone who has spent time in a combat zone knows the stress associated with it. It is not just a 10 minute or even 12 hour battle, it is days, weeks, or even months of preparing, digging foxholes, prepping weapons, sitting in forward positions waiting for the hell to begin. And then once the hell begins, you do not sleep, you do not rest, you do not relax. You spend endless hours in the mud, the dirt, the heat or the cold, not knowing whether you'll ever go home, not knowing what end you'll face, and all the while knowing that the one who must keep you alive is YOU. And beyond that, you must keep your fellow soldiers/marines alive. That level of stress, that sort of psychology, where you just might throw yourself on a grenade to save the lives of the few guys next to you, requires a mentality, a world view that is particular to men and that can be accomplished by men. Denying this is to live in a fantasy land. Very few who have lived through this type of thing live in the fantasy land. However, increasingly more of those who have never experienced it do live in this fantasy land, and then they convince themselves that they are qualified to make policy.