Female military members sue to serve in combat

[Reader]

Just doing a quick search on how many women are in combat, I found this site by Captain Barbara A. Wilson, USAF (Ret) with some interesting information...site kept up only until 2005:

http://userpages.aug.com/captbarb/combat.html

Recent policy changes on women in combat:

1992

The Defense Authorization Act repealed the long-standing combat exclusion law for women pilots in the Navy and Air Force.

1993

President Clinton signed the military bill ending combat exclusion for women on combatant ships.

1994

Defense Secretary Aspin approved a new general policy to allow Army women to serve with some ground combat units during fighting.

The USS EISENHOWER, a Navy combat aircraft carrier, received its first 60 women.

Navy

The initial embarkation of women on combat ships during FY94 included eight ships. Two of those eight were aircraft carriers, four were destroyers and two were dock landing ships. The accelerated integration plan called for assigning women to a variety of ships including cruisers, amphibious assault ships and all pre-commissioning Arleigh Burke-class destroyers completed in FY96.

Female officers are eligible to serve in all of the Navy's officer communities except submarines (policy currently under review) and special warfare (SEALs). Thus, women can occupy 93.5 percent of the officer billets in the Navy. Enlisted women are eligible to serve in 97 percent of career fields (91 of 94 job classifications). Women are eligible to serve in 95.1 percent of the enlisted billets in the Navy.

A total of 283 female Naval officers serve as pilots (206) and Naval Flight Officers (77). In addition, there are about 127 women in training to fly combat aircraft. 54 women have already reported to combat aviation squadrons. (pre-1999 figures)

Women are now aboard combatant ships, thousands of enlisted women and officers are "serving at sea", and ten Navy women now command ships.

She adds her own personal note:

**Granted I've never been in front line combat but then neither have seventy percent of the men in the military. In my 22 years of active duty I have however - survived two military plane crashes; rescued a sergeant from drowning ; helped remove dead bodies from the flight line after an RB-47 crash; disarmed a knife-wielding troop in a barracks brawl; disabled and removed a would-be rapist from my squadron's barracks; thwarted two bloody suicide attempts; and performed many casualty and mortuary duties too gruesome to mention.

I'll be so glad when the capabilities of women are not being denigrated.....

 

[Reader]

Something more recent:

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/military/july-dec07/women_07-05.html

Women's Combat Roles Evolving in Iraq, Afghanistan

Although U.S. military policy prevents women from taking certain war zone assignments, they are increasingly filling dangerous jobs in Iraq and Afghanistan. An author, Army sergeant and retired Navy captain discuss the changing role of women in combat.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Now, our look at the evolving role of women in combat.

One more casualty of the war in Iraq brought home to Decatur, Illinois, last weekend. In this case, the soldier's vehicle was hit in Baghdad on June 21st by a rocket-propelled grenade. But this death is one of those that makes this war unique, for it was a woman, 22-year-old Army Specialist Karen Clifton.

She is one of the most recent of more than 80 women who have so far been killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, a figure nearly double the number of American military women killed in Desert Storm, Vietnam, and Korea, combined. Some 500 have been wounded, many grievously.

More at link......

 

[Reader]

Marine pioneering effort to move women into combat
12/1/12

SAN DIEGO – Marine 1st Lt. Brandy Soublet is about as far from the war front as possible at her desk in the California desert, but she's on the front lines of an experiment that could one day put women as close to combat as their male peers.

The Penfield, N.Y. woman is one of 45 female Marines assigned this summer to 19 all-male combat battalions. The Defense Department in the past year has opened thousands of combat positions to women to slowly integrate them and gauge the impact such a social change would have on the military's ability to fight wars.


Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/12/0...fort-to-move-women-into-combat/#ixzz2ECD4MBnC

 

[Reader]

Petite but proven: Two women warriors pass elite Army training course

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/201...warriors-pass-elite-army-training-course?lite

While the Pentagon brass and U.S. military leaders are struggling over how to bring women into ground combat training, two young female soldiers have already proven they've got what it takes to join their male counterparts on the battlefield.

1st Lt. Audrey Moton and 2nd Lt. Carley Turnnidge, both West Point graduates, took on the Army's Sapper Leader Training course for combat engineers at Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri. It's one of the toughest combat training courses in the entire U.S. military and the only course of its kind that accepts women. Since 1999, nearly 60 women have made the grade.............

Turnnidge, a high school and West Point soccer star, went above and beyond the call. After failing in tactical operations in her first try, remarkably, she took the course twice -- 56 straight days without a break. In a training swim, Turnnidge had to drag her exhausted male partner back across the lake. Moton vigorously trained to get in shape before she ever got to the course and believes she and Turnnidge actually motivated the men. "They'd think, 'Wait, I don't wanna get beat by a girl.' Well, then run faster," she said. "I'm not going to stop."

While women are permitted to fly fighter jets and attack helicopters in combat missions, Pentagon policy prohibits female soldiers and Marines from serving in direct ground combat roles. In the past 11 years of guerrilla-style combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, those battle lines were essentially erased. More than 130 female service members were killed and 800 wounded. This week the American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit to lift the ban on women in combat......more at link with videos......