Female Marine recruits stand in formation following hand-to-hand combat training during boot camp February 27 at Parris Island, South Carolina.
Superb, objective, fair-minded article by Greg Newbold.
In particular – women have been successfully serving in combat for 12 years…152 KIA…over 1000 WIA. Women in uniform have been a courageous, effective, integral part of our fighting forces. Women have demonstrated they are disciplined and brave under fire. Women in the armed forces are trusted to lead.
Women in uniform now serving in every space on the air-land-sea battlefield. Serving at four-star rank. Dominating the talent spectrum in many specialties.
The argument for women at rifle battalion team level is unsound. Makes as much sense as mandating women on all-male professional contact sports teams.
Life in a rifle company is still incredibly brutal, filthy, requires enormous physical energy and upper body strength, and calls for a spirit of personal violence. There is zero personal privacy. Bodily functions take place in close proximity.
Troops are constantly injured from carrying heavy loads and crashing down hills in the dark. They dig like moles to stay alive.
Infantry units live like wild animals during periods of extended combat. Mostly it is a business of self-selected young men. Most of these combat soldiers end up in these units because they actually want to fight.
When infantry units suffer heavy casualties— we routinely dragoon rear area personnel and throw them into the ground-dismounted battle.
Under the new policy—one supposes that we will not solicit the input of women in uniform…we will stick them also on a helicopter at midnight— and dump them into a rifle company to change places with the dozens of mangled and dead infantry soldiers going out on the same aircraft.
Thank God for the Marines’ aversion to bullshit when it comes to fighting.