Opinion: Panetta made right choice in allowing women in combat
U.S. military leaders formally lifted the 1994 ban on women serving in combat positions. (Photo Courtesy of nydailynews.com)
By AnnaMarie Houlis, Web Editor
U.S. military leaders formally lifted the 1994 ban on women serving in combat positions, Thursday, as they have become an integral part of the military, contributing in unprecedented ways to the mission of defending our nation and have demonstrated a willingness to fight, according to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, reported on Fox News.
Both Panetta and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey approved the change Thursday, while the White House also endorsed the decision separately.
While I can digest the potential consequences of women in combat, and recognize that not everyone can meet the qualifications to be a combat soldier, men or women, everyone should be entitled to the opportunity.
Arguably, United States citizens are apprehensive about women fighting because military bases are notorious sites of rape. Inviting more women to such locations could be imperiling; women are statistically more susceptible to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and a spate of studies have argued that children are more attached to mother figures than fathers and are not passive witnesses to violence—they concentrate deeply on their own thoughts, which could be debilitating for children who feel neglected by a mother’s absence while she is away in combat, or for those who suffer from a causality.
I refute, however.
On the issue of rape, women have already been involved in the reality of war and their bodies have already been used as tools and abused as weapons of societal destruction. They make up 15 percent of the force already, and according to the New York Times, more than 350,000 serve with some 30,000 in Afghanistan and Iraq. During a decade’s worth of conflict, more than 800 female service members have been wounded in either country and at least 139 have died, as noted by AllGov.com. Do we not think women are already affected by war—those whose lives are eternally tainted by the cruelties of the foreign enemy? With women allowed in combat, at least they are entitled to a justifiable reason to be involved in war, instead of merely having been deemed sub-human, feeble victims, or just caught in the fire.
In regards to PTSD, in a 2000 study, “Behaviour Research and Therapy,” Murray B. Stein, John R. Walker and David R. Forde examine data from a community survey of trauma exposure and DSM-IV PTSD to explore factors associated with the higher rate of PTSD in women than men. Women are, indeed, found to be at significantly increased risk for PTSD following exposure to serious trauma, even when sexual trauma — which predominates in women — was excluded. However, this risk follows assaultive violence (mugging or other physical attack) but not nonassaultive trauma (fire; witnessing injury to others), which is the primary source of trauma for soldiers who witness explosions and watch as their friends die before them. Besides, if a woman is willing to risk post-traumatic stress that is a decision she will make as a human being with a mind of her own, as men do and just as the number of people who chose to smoke cigarettes risk lung cancer.
Thirdly, an article written by Stephanie Pappas for LiveScience, “The Science of Fatherhood: Why Dads Matter,” explicates the equal significance of both parents, not just mothers, on a child’s development. I do not intend to argue anything other than a woman’s absence in the home is no more or less significant than a man’s. Within the last several years, psychologists are recognizing the influence (and sometimes higher influence) of fathers on their children, and scientists are increasingly diverging from the initial curiosity of a mother-child relationship and instead focusing more heavily on father-child bonds. Ronald Rohner, director of the Center for the Study of Interpersonal Acceptance and Rejection at the University of Connecticut, has detailed findings that behavioral problems, delinquency, depression, substance abuse and overall psychological adjustment are all more closely correlated to dad’s rejection than mom’s in May in the journal Personality and Social Psychology Review. Pappas quotes, “Knowing that kids feel loved by their father is a better predictor of young adults’ sense of well-being, of happiness, of life satisfaction than knowing about the extent to which they feel loved by their mothers.”
Then, of course, there are reasons expounded through some media, arguing why women should not be allowed in combat that is actually nauseating, and I begin to question the sanity of our society. These are reasons of physicality, women taking away from the “fun” of the military, women losing more duty time due to medical issues and the concern that men soldiers protecting women soldiers will be deemed as chivalrous instead of duty, which in turn can place national security in danger…
Although typically, women may be physically smaller than men, this does not denote utter ineptness. Implementing a physical fitness standard that applies to both sexes is a simple solution. But what disgusts me is the thought that women serving on the front lines could put men in danger and America’s national security in jeopardy because men might “leave the infantry in droves because they no longer see it as a tough, elite calling,” as questioned in “Women in Combat: Will that Mean it’s Less Safe for Men?” published in the Christian Science Monitor. First, I cannot fathom how the decision to deploy women on the frontlines has been so misconstrued that anyone could be concerned with its effect on men’s safety. Women serving is irrelevant to men’s safety (if anything they serve increased protection), but somehow in our patriarchal society, we have turned it around to discount women’s human rights and consider solely men’s wellbeing. I understand that it is critical we maintain the rigorous physical standards for our elite special forces, but allowing women in combat should not sacrifice operational effectiveness in the name of inclusiveness as long as physical standards are applied. It will do so only if men, themselves, choose to leave the infantry because they do not believe it is “tough.” And do we really desire that kind of selfishness in our military anyway? One should not join the military for reasons of asperity, but rather he or she should join for the will to fight for his or her country whatever it means.
This expands to my second point of irrationality. In the same article, a senior Marine Crops officer is quoted. “I think some men will leave the infantry,” he said. “You’ve got to ask yourself why most young men join the Marine Corps, especially that group that wants to be infantrymen…[an answer is often to] shoot stuff and blow things up…So some percentage of those guys would be like, ‘it wouldn’t be as much fun.’” I’m not sure which is more disturbing: the reason men join the military is all too often to shoot stuff and blow things up, or that they would quit because women would take away from the “fun” of it— the fun of it? We wonder why we have school shootings, movie theatre massacres and mass murders in malls. One does not join the military because shooting things is “fun.” Whoever feels that way should consider joining a mental health facility before they considering enlisting.
The third reason against women in combat that I just cannot grasp is the concern that men soldiers aiding women soldiers might be considered chivalry instead of duty, which then poses a threat to national security. I understand the concern that acts of facility might and most likely will be ridiculously observed as chivalrous, but what I cannot comprehend is what’s wrong with our society that this type of thought even coincides with the degree of intellect that does exist among us. Also quoted in the CSmonitor.com, University of Virginia School of Law Professor Anne Coughlin said, “If a male soldier is protecting other males he gets the Medal of Honor, but if he does it for females it somehow becomes an act of crazed chivalry that places national security in danger.” We must change our mentality as a society in its entirety before we can effectively and efficiently integrate women in combat positions.
Finally, the worry that in combat units where concentration and mutual trust are essential for survival, women would lose more duty time due to medical issues, such as pregnancy, and their absence would be especially destructive is mindless. It is likely that a number of women is war do not have sex lives—in fact, even with a simple Google search, it is evident that most pregnancies occurred in war are results of rape. All search quests for any iteration of “percent of pregnancies at war” generate links on the subject of rape. And those who are sexually active by choice, have the potential to be impregnated and request leave, are certainly surpassed by the number of those who request leave for the accumulating array of incidents including disease, flu, depression, suicide and physical impairments, et cetera.
Despite all of this, with today’s war on terror, front lines on the battlefield are essentially nonexistent and rather illusory as every unit regardless of size or mission has and could facilely engage with the enemy. Thus, rather than stirring irrelevant debate, as the law to prohibit women’s direct participation in combat is now in fact defunct, I’d like to see the media, particularly those top tier, more actively inducing methods of further progression and forward-thinking.
