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Posted on 02/05/2013 7:24:58 AM PST by Nachum
It’s not all about qualification. I’m speaking as a female Marine Iraq war vet who did serve in the combat zone doing entry checkpoint duty in Fallujah, and we worked with the grunts daily for that time. All the branches still have different standards for females and males. Why? Because most women wouldn’t even qualify to be in the military if they didn’t. Men and women are different, but those pushing women into combat don’t want to admit that truth. They huff and puff about how women can do whatever men can do, but it just ain’t so. We’re built differently, and it doesn’t matter that one particular woman could best one particular man. The best woman is still no match for the best man, and most of the men she’d be fireman-carrying off the battlefield will be at least 100lbs heavier than she with their gear on.
Women are often great shooters but can’t run in 50-80lbs of gear as long, hard or fast as men. Military training is hard enough on men’s bodies, it’s harder on women’s. And until women stop menstruating there will always be an uphill battle for staying level and strong at all times. No one wants to talk about the fact that in the days before a woman’s cycle she loses half her strength, to say nothing of the emotional ups and downs that affect judgment. And how would you like fighting through PMS symptoms while clearing a town or going through a firefight? Then there are the logistics of making all the accommodations for women in the field, from stopping the convoy to pee or because her cycle started to stripping down to get hosed off after having to go into combat with full MOP gear when there’s a biological threat.
(Excerpt) Read more at politicalanimalblog.com ...
Can it be any more obvious that there are physical differences among the genders? Yes, women can serve in combat flying jets or helicopters. They can serve in logistical support units bearing in mind that in many circumstances there are no real frontlines. But insinuating them into the infrantry is a much different matter. Biology is a bitch.
When businesses and markets make decisions we find no women in the NFL, NBA, MLB, etc.
When politicians make decisions we find women in front line combat.
Are we to believe that front line combat is “a piece of cake”? Easiser than professional sports?
The writer is correct on all points and I have no quibble with anything she wrote. One small addition would have been that the military exists for national defense and is not a national social program or experiment. The article certainly carried that sentiment but I believe this needs to be said repeatedly, especially for those who support this nonsensical notion but mostly haven’t Been There or Done That, unlike the author.
If women want to be in combat, peeing and stripping down shouldn’t even be a factor.
Years ago, I worked in a graveyard shift for an assembly plant. There were only six of us, so we got very well acquainted. Our job was to cleanup the unfinished work from the day shift and set up the line so they could go full bore after we went home.
One night, one of the women on our crew huffed and puffed about how women can do whatever men can do. Our foreman turned to her and said "I'd like to see you stand on the edge of a bathtub and pee in the toilet." The look on her face was priceless.
My military experiences predates the end of the draft so I have little experience with women in military beyond the women’s army corps. That said, I think the issue of women in the infantry or frankly on a warship is ridicules. As Clint Eastwood’s character said in the Enforcer: What do you think this is, some kind of encounter group?
Screw privacy, if they want to be there then to heck with it. And why should women even get a choice? level the playing field or admit that men and women are different.
Bingo.
T-Bird45: “One small addition would have been that the military exists for national defense and is not a national social program or experiment.”
That’s simply not true. It might have been true at one time, but it’s pretty clear the modern military exists primarily as a vehicle of social justice.
That’s what I say. Say they are different but that it doesn’t really matter. Just treat them like physically weak men.
The Russians and the Israelis both had a go at women in combat. Both quickly learned it wasn’t practical for all these reasons and retreated.
Of course insular America, seeming to want to know nothing about what goes on in the rest of the world (nor learn from their mistakes), is going to try and reinvent the wheel again.
From your lips to the Executive Branch’s ears...
Colonel, USAFR
“Just treat them like physically weak men.”
They should meet the same requirements as the men, period.
The Army’s physical fitness test in basic training is a three-event physical performance test used to assess endurance. The minimum requirement for 17- to 21-year-old males is 35 pushups, 47 situps and a two-mile run in 16 minutes, 36 seconds or less. For females of the same age, the minimum requirement is 13 pushups, 47 situps and a 19:42 two-mile run. Why the difference in fitness requirements? “USMC Women in the Service Restrictions Review” found that women, on average, have 20 percent lower aerobic power, 40 percent lower muscle strength, 47 percent less lifting strength and 26 percent slower marching speed than men.
I am on the down side of middle age and I guarantee that I can do more chins, pull-ups, and pushups than 99% of these young women. The distance run—well, my left knee is not what it once was. As a former college wrestler, I would humbly submit to a match with selected female recruits in top physical shape too.
There are lots of men that can pass the requirements, but afterwards do not keep up those standards. Not every man in the military is a hero.. Let them compete, if they pass, they pass and if they live, they live.
Sez me, they might have inadvertently proved their opposition's point.
Namely, if a female soldier cannot reasonably expect to protect herself from being debilitated by sexual harrassment ...right here in America, in a bar, just outside of her base's gate.....
How in the hell can she be reasonably expected to handle the cream of the Chinese (Or Iranian, or whoever) Infantry when they com charging over the hill, with full armored, air, and artillery support?
I would imagine, it is difficult enough for the spouse who stays at home with the 3 kids, without having to worry about the other half “sharing a foxhole” (isolation, dependency, close physical contact etc) with the opposite sex day in day out.
Why make things more difficult for military families?
Is it some deliberate attempt to weaken every aspect of the military?
Just introduce social chaos, and the structure deteriorates?
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