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Posted on 09/27/2001 11:12:19 PM PDT by MadIvan

WOMEN are all wimps. Look at Clare Short: she's the only Cabinet minister to say we can't have "lots of planes, guns and ships". In America, Barbara Lee was the one member of Congress out of 535 to vote against handing President Bush unconditional power to take military action.

We've hardly seen Condoleezza Rice, President Bush's national security adviser. It's always Colin Powell, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney flanking the President. It was men who rushed the hijackers on the fourth plane. It is Rudolph Giuliani rather than New York senator Hillary Clinton who has clambered over the rubble. Stella Rimington is blamed for turning the secret service soft.

Women in war should stay at home, tend the hearths, stock up the freezer and entertain us all by going blonde. Even Kate Adie disappeared. The Sun talks about separating "the men from the boys". Male journalists are digging in on the North-West Frontier.

Girls don't understand about weapons. They never played battleships, read Commando or had Action Man. They don't compete at the computer game Age of Empires, or know the dialogue from Zulu. In the past fortnight, men have started lecturing me about boys' toys. "We've got 2,500 SAS," one friend insisted (actually it's about 250). They discuss Stingers and the latest cave-buster missiles. They debate whether atomic bombs can be carried in suitcases.

They're obsessed by all military gadgets. One banker in Canary Wharf has been showing off his parachute, bought in case of a terrorist attack. For the first time in the history of the internet, sex has dropped out of the top 10 search words. The Pentagon is now more popular than Pamela Anderson. Robert Harris wrote on these pages about how men of his generation have been waiting for this moment to see whether they are as brave as their fathers once were. Daughters don't feel that way.

A Gallup poll for this newspaper confirms that women are more nervous about this war than men. Only 42 per cent of women would support military action if it resulted in civilian casualties. For men, the figure is 53 per cent. Among women, 69 per cent say they are "very worried" that their families could become victims of terrorist attacks. Among men the figure is only 46 per cent.

Mothers don't naturally fall into military language - they do think more about the consequences for families. But they should be behind President Bush - because this war is as much about women as men. For the first time, women are involved at every level. The best speech that Mr Bush has given so far was written by a man and two women: his speechwriter, Mike Gerson, Condoleezza Rice and his communications chief, Karen Hughes. Their speech to Congress last week was praised for its statesmanship and lack of cowboy language. "Crusade" and "Bin Laden Dead or Alive" had been replaced by "Justice will be done".

Miss Rice's words have been measured, but no less strong than her male colleagues'. "This is not Pearl Harbor," she said. "There are no beaches to storm and islands to take; this will be a war of will and mind."

Women aren't involved only in strategy. They're on the front line. The youngest sailor in the Gulf, who turned 17 two months ago, is Jodie Jones, who sent a postcard to her grandmother saying: "I'm scared, but ready for action." Lance Corporal Ellen Scott is spending her honeymoon on red alert in the Gulf.

The front line is now also on the high street. Men and women are both equally in danger from terrorist attacks. Many women worked in the World Trade Centre - some were on the hijacked planes. The posters in New York say it all. Krystine is seven months pregnant, Denise has a metal rod in her spine, Myrna's first toe is shorter than the rest. Have you heard anything about them?

As Boris Johnson wrote on this page yesterday, the Taliban's treatment of women is appalling. In the past year, a girl found wearing nail varnish had her nails ripped out, a woman who removed her daughter's burqa after she suffered an asthma attack was flayed to within an inch of her life and a girl was executed for refusing a forced marriage.

Johnson's implication is that Western men should ride to the rescue of these womenfolk, throw them over their saddles and bring them back to civilisation. But surely Western women have even more of an obligation to stick up for these women's right to receive an education, medical treatment and the vote. Under the Taliban, women cannot work, wear make-up, drive, even laugh loudly. They can be stoned to death for having sex outside marriage. This is a feminists' war as much as one for the boys. Clare Short, they need your support.

Some of the bravest women in the world are from the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan. For 15 years, they have campaigned to improve women's lives in their country, help widows and educate girls. One of their founders has been assassinated, others jailed and tortured. Their website, set up by members who have fled to Pakistan, paints a horrifying picture where the Taliban declares it illegal to cage birds or animals, but imprisons women in their homes. "It's like being buried alive inside a grave," a former nurse, now widowed beggar, told a reporter.

Western women should be standing shoulder to shoulder with this nurse. We should be showing solidarity for these women's plight and backing attempts to liberate them from the Taliban.

Mr Bush has two well-defined objectives. The first is to destroy Osama bin Laden, his allies and his network, to prevent them committing more terrorist atrocities. The second is to undermine the Taliban regime and replace it with a less cruel administration, where women aren't flogged and children aren't left to die in refugee camps.

Mr Bush's objectives would help liberate Western women from the fear of terrorism and Afghan women from oppression. We don't have to be gung ho about it, but women should support this mother of all wars.

I am delighted that this lady gets it. Someone wake up the feminists in France and in the States.

Best Regards, Ivan

Today is Trinity Sunday. Centuries ago words were written to be a call and a spur to the faithful servants of Truth and Justice: "Arm yourselves, and be ye men of valour, and be in readiness for the conflict; for it is better for us to perish in battle than to look upon the outrage of our nation and our altar. As the Will of God is in Heaven, even so let it be." - Winston Churchill, 1940

This then, my lords and gentlemen, is the message which we send forth today to all states and nations, bound or free, to all the men in all the lands who care for freedom's cause. To our Allies and well-wishers in Europe, to our American friends and helpers drawing ever closer in their might across the ocean, this is the message-lift up your hearts, all will come right. Out of depths of sorrow and sacrifice will be born again the glory of mankind. - Winston Churchill, 1941

LET US GO FORWARD TOGETHER

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