<p>Hmm not sure why that posted twice–</p>
<p>The female soldier deserved her medal but I fail to see where her actions required extraordinary physical demands. Let me give you an example, where failure to properly consider physical standards contributed to the loss of four lives.</p>
<p><a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Nichols[/url]”>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Nichols</a></p>
<p>The deputy had no where near the physical traits required to ward off the prisoner and four people died in the incident. Were administrative procedures so poor that they led directly to the incident? Certainly, but the incident may have been avoided if the deputy was required to pass strenous physical standards. Why weren’t such physical standards required?</p>
<p>There are innumerable instances where peace officers and soldiers have been over-powered by their prisioners—most of those overpowered were men. I don’t see your point. </p>
<p>We aren’t asking our soldiers to be super-human, just to be able to perform their duties competently. I have found real world examples that illustrate clearly that, when trained, women have performed admirably world-wide and on par with their male counterparts. A poorly trained man is just as bad as a poorly trained women when under arms. To make the comment that a female officer can’t perform their duties as well as a male officer as was implied in an earlier post is just ignorant. Perhaps our disagreement lies with the mission of the Army vs the Navy. Certainly in these times the chances of a soldier or Marine having to come face to face with an enemy combatant is far more likely than that of the average naval officer or sailor, and perhaps the nature of the training at the two academies reflects this, I don’t know. But I do know that the facts are that women are serving in Iraq and Afganistan IN COMBAT situations and performing well. The proof is staring us all in the face today, right now, in Iraq and Afganistan.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.militec.com/articles/Tristan_Vasquez.html[/url]”>http://www.militec.com/articles/Tristan_Vasquez.html</a></p>
<p>another woman who doesn’t belong in combat:</p>
<p>FORWARD OPERATING BASE FALCON, Iraq — Army Capt. Tristan Vasquez of the 127th Military Police Company isn’t too fazed by the debate over what roles women should play in combat. </p>
<p>The 25-year-old officer from Cody, Wyo., already has a Bronze Star Medal on her résumé for valor under fire during an ambush in northwest Baghdad last August. Just days later, she helped repel an insurgent attack on the Al-Shoula Iraqi Police Station, which brought an additional commendation. </p>
<p>“We joke around all the time and say there are no women in combat,” she said. “That’s all right, though. We know what we do.” </p>
<p>Vince Little / S&S
Army Capt. Tristan Vasquez, 25, of Cody, Wyo., a platoon leader for the 127th Military Police Company at Forward Operating Base Falcon, Iraq, earned a Bronze Star for her actions last August during an ambush in northwest Baghdad.<br>
Vasquez, a platoon leader for the Hanau, Germany-based unit that functions in Iraq under the 2nd Brigade Combat Team of the 10th Mountain Division, is among several women who fill vital roles within the company as it patrols Baghdad. It might not be classified as combat, but for the last 11 months, women certainly worked on the front lines. </p>
<p>“They say it’s an asymmetrical battlefield,” said Capt. Kevin Hanrahan, of Whitman, Mass., the 127th Military Police Company commander. “Women are not supposed to be in combat. The fact of the matter is they are in combat.” </p>
<p>Sitting in the rear Humvee of a three-vehicle convoy that day in August, Vasquez said they were headed to the Al-Gazzilia Iraqi Police Station — one of 19 the company monitors — when her driver noticed something odd. </p>
<p>“My driver, she goes, ‘There’s no cars on the road,’” Vasquez said. “That’s when we had an RPG land in the lead vehicle and another go underneath the middle vehicle. One struck my window right where my head is. Another went over the back hatch. </p>
<p>“I’m very thankful for our armored vehicle. It saved my life, saved my driver’s life and probably saved my gunner from either death or dismemberment.” </p>
<p>Under constant gunfire in the 140-degree heat, Vasquez and others fought for nearly 90 minutes. They treated wounded soldiers and worked to save a gunner trapped under a flipped Humvee. They ultimately freed him, but he later died from his injuries. </p>
<p>Six members of Vasquez’s platoon earned commendations with valor. </p>
<p>“It was so hot, you literally had to stop fighting to drink water,” she said. “It’s amazing what soldiers can do. They’re incredible individuals. We put them under so many different kinds of stresses. They do an amazing job.” </p>
<p>First Lt. Sara Skinner, 27, of Vassar, Mich., another platoon leader, who’s on her second tour of Iraq, received the Purple Heart after sustaining shrapnel wounds to her neck and right arm from a mortar attack in early November. </p>
<p>“It went right through my combat p atch,” Skinner said. “It was not really anything serious. I’ve seen so many people seriously injured that I feel a little weird about getting the Purple Heart.” </p>
<p>“When soldiers go through something like that, it’s usually best to put them right back to work,” she said. “You don’t want them to dwell on things. If they take time off, they’ll become more afraid to go back out; gives them too much time to think.” </p>
<p>First Lt. Amy Clements, 24, of Littleton, Colo., the company’s executive officer, faced similar perils as a platoon leader during the first stage of the unit’s deployment. Each time they ventured outside the wire, threats loomed from possible sniper attacks, roadside bombs, ambushes, vehicle bombs and suicide bombers. </p>
<p>“I faced the same thing they (male soldiers) did for five to six days a week,” she said. “You witness a lot of scary stuff you never want to see again. You hope nobody else has to face it, either. </p>
<p>“As a platoon leader, part of the burden you carry is trying to protect your soldiers — especially the younger ones — from seeing things like dead bodies. They are dramatic images. Stuff like that sticks with you, even the more senior soldiers. Eventually, it starts to get to everybody.”</p>
<p>Irish,</p>
<p>Its not all about strength. Its about leadership and the right people in the right place at the right tme. You clearly don’t get that. </p>
<p>And the skills women officers bring to situations just might be the ones that keep my son from being in a hand to hand senario you posit. </p>
<p>now explain to me why men are better at being preist than women?</p>
<p>LWFB:
"Its not all about strength. Its about leadership and the right people in the right place at the right tme. You clearly don’t get that.</p>
<p>And the skills women officers bring to situations just might be the ones that keep my son from being in a hand to hand senario you posit."</p>
<p>Response:
Now that’s a sexist comment, women have different skills than men?</p>
<p>LWFB:
now explain to me why men are better at being preist than women?</p>
<p>Response:
That’s sounds like an anti-Catholic comment to me and I’m not even Catholic. Why ask me? Perhaps you should ask the Pope.</p>
<p>Shogun:
You can post all the antedotal stories you like. Women have been in combat and they have performed superbly (would a male have performed less superbly under the same circumstances?) and the media ensures that we will hear about each one. Their male comrades, however, have born the brunt of the fighting-- there are no women in the infantry, armor, or artillery. Why? You may think its solely a cultural limitation but it is a cultural limitation which has grown out of biological fact.</p>
<p>Why aren’t women allowed to be navy seals?</p>
<p>“Why aren’t women allowed to be navy seals?”</p>
<p>Im not sure, perhaps because we have never allowed any of them to apply?
It’s one thing to let a candidate try and then fail, its another to ban them from the opportunity at all.</p>
<p>Irish, I’m not posting “stories”. Im posting real life situations. I also never implied that a man couldn’t have done as well in those situations, but that isn’t whats being argued is it? Whats being bandied about here on this board, is that there is a feeling out there still that women can join the military as long as they know and accept “their place”. And yes, if we hear about a woman performing well in combat it must be a media conspiracy, because we NEVER hear about the bravery of men—wow, what an enlightened world we live in.</p>
<p>“Their male comrades, however, have born the brunt of the fighting-- there are no women in the infantry, armor, or artillery. Why?”</p>
<p>good question–based on real experience it isn’t because they can’t do the job effectively, because they are proving that now. Perhaps its because they aren’t given the chance? Wow, sounds like the arguments given when someone first proposed that the Union Army use colored soldiers in battle. The fact is, the military would ok the women in direct combat roles tomorrow if Congress would let them:</p>
<p>"Dozens of soldiers interviewed across Iraq – male and female, from lower enlisted ranks to senior officers – voiced frustration over restrictions on women mandated in Washington that they say make no sense in the war they are fighting. All said the policy should be changed to allow, at a minimum, mixed-sex support units to be assigned to combat battalions. Many favored a far more radical step: letting qualified women join the infantry.</p>
<p>But Congress is moving in the opposite direction. A House subcommittee, seeking to keep women out of combat, passed a measure this week that would bar women from thousands of Army positions now open to them. In Iraq, female soldiers immediately denounced the vote.</p>
<p>“I refuse to have my right as a soldier taken from me because of my gender,” Guay wrote in an e-mail. “It is my right to defend my country. . . . I am well aware of the danger. . . . Let me (us) do our job.”</p>
<p>For many inside Army camps, the disconnect between Washington officialdom and the reality that female troops confront in Iraq was epitomized by President Bush’s Jan. 11 declaration of “No women in combat.”</p>
<p>“That’s an oxymoron!” said Sgt. Neva D. Trice, who leads a female Army search team that guards the gates of Baghdad’s Green Zone, where many U.S. and Iraqi government facilities are located. “If he said no women in combat, then why are there women here in Iraq?”</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/12/AR2005051202002.html[/url]”>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/12/AR2005051202002.html</a></p>
<p>Its about WHO’S QUALIFIED to do the job. Telling someone they aren’t qualified to defend their country because they are a woman and not because they can’t do the job, is absurd.</p>
<p>Its not sexist at all. We all have different skills. There are plenty of studies that show that women in general approach certain situations in different ways than men do. Not necessarily better or worse just different.</p>
<p>As for the preist thing, its not anti catholic, it just why I’m not a catholic any more. Its just if one thinks that women can’t do things just because they are women that is a great place to start.</p>
<p>One might also ask why no women on subs?</p>
<p>“One might also ask why no women on subs?”</p>
<p>Several of the world’s navy’s allow women to serve on submarines.
The Norweigians appointed the world’s first female sub captain in 1998.</p>
<p>As far as the Navy is concerned it’s a matter of money, not ability,</p>
<p>“The US Navy argues it would cost $300,000 per bunk to permit women to serve on submarines versus $4,000 per bunk to allow women to serve on aircraft carriers”. When the DOD already spends that proverbial 250.00 for a toilet seat maybe its not such a good reason after all :)</p>
<p>I left the Navy because it was too hard to be part of a society of warriors without getting to BE one of the warriors. I’d always be a second class citizen. I say this even though my commanders and my shipmates were really enlightened. They respected me and let me do my job (aviation maintenance officer). I was the first female officer in my squadron to work in the maintenance shops, the first to go out on the aircraft carriers to do a real job (detachment maint. officer), not just sightsee or stand watch in the readyroom. My boss was an LDO (mustang) with 27 years in. He treated me just like any other JO and never restricted my opportunities because of my gender. How lucky was that? Still, I couldn’t make a cruise. Rather than get rotated to some stupid non-aviation job overseas, I got out. I’d worked too hard to get good at what I did to be shunted aside when it was time to go to sea in harm’s way. I was qualified. It’s cool that womens’ opportunities have expanded, but it’s too bad that gender still keeps qualified women from being allowed to do a job. Hehe, my best friend from HS was a 5’10" girl with amazing strength, speed, and aggressiveness. She played Bball on the boys team. I think she could’ve served in the infantry easily!</p>
<p>The new Virginia Class subs have accomodations from women and I think the USNA Class of 08 or 09 will let women select for subs.</p>
<p>Also, almost half of the surface nuclear reactor operators are women.</p>
<p>After watching the BUDS training video, it becomes obvious!It doesn’t sound PC, just logical.</p>
<p>Oh, I agree Oregonmom, the training looks ruthless and few are cut out to be Navy Seals—but many men fail to qualify so I see nothing wrong with letting a woman give it a shot as well. There are a number of activities cadets at West Point are given the opportunity to qualify for over the 4 years and there always seem to be a number of the men and women who don’t “make the grade” and a number of men AND women who do (recondo, air assault, etc).</p>
<p>LFWB Dad, thanks for the info on the new subs—looks like the navy is thinking ahead!!</p>
<p>Shogun,
I would concur as long as the current requirements remain unchanged and they are the same for all.</p>
<p>Shogun, I hate this kind of argument because in the end its not about PC stuff etc…, its about how we get the end result of the most awesome military that we can have to protect our country. (And if you are wondering, I do believe that women belong in the military. However, as a mother of both varieties, they are different and thank God they are!) </p>
<p>On a separate note, I am so excited to see my son this week! I can’t wait to hug and kiss that kid.</p>
<p>Vive la difference!!!</p>