Few women want combat jobs
This is not my shocked face as I read the article sent to us by Ex-PH2 in regards to a survey taken by the Army and published by the Associated Press which reveals that women might not be inclined to join the military so they can function in combat roles.
Less than 8 percent of Army women who responded to the survey said they wanted a combat job. Of those, an overwhelming number said they’d like to be a Night Stalker — a member of the elite special operations helicopter crews who perhaps are best known for flying the Navy SEALS into Osama bin Laden’s compound in 2011.
Last year top Pentagon officials signed an order saying women must have the same opportunities as men in combat jobs and the services have been devising updated physical standards, training, education and other programs for thousands of jobs they must open Jan. 1, 2016. The services must open as many jobs to women as possible; if they decide to keep some closed, they must explain why.
I’m pretty sure that the result of this poll won’t influence the social scientists one whit – they’re determined to increase the number of women killed in combat in the next war as well as their male battle buddies. I expect pressure will be put on recruiters to influence new female recruits to join the combat arms specialties, and because they really don’t want those jobs, they’ll begin failing in large numbers which will make Big Army to lower standards in order to accommodate their political masters.
When have I been wrong in this discussion so far?
Category: Big Army
Shocked, shocked I tell you! Was talking to a friend yesterday and we bemoaned the fact that we (DoD) have to expend time, energy and money to prove that these attempts at equality of outcome are, in the end, really not good ideas…
So, essentially, the administration is creating a solution to a non-existent problem.
Suprise, Suprise Suprise! Says no one……. Cept Gomer
The women who actually want combat positions also said they do NOT want the standards lowered. So much for PC addicts, eh? It’s not quite the same thing as silly me wanting to go into a combat camera group, but only AFTER I had talked to in-country vets who told me what a hellhole Vietnam was in very blunt terms.
When have you ever been wrong about this? Uh… hmmmm… uh, well, ummm… Not. Ever.
I’m not sure why anyone is getting their panties in a bunch over this stuff anymore. If Hagel gets his way we won’t have a military left that can fight any war
William Teach: well, there’s precedent for this Administration doing eactly that. See ObamaCare.
Ex-PH2: what the people actually doing the job want will be irrelevant. If standards are maintained, the number of qualified female candidates actually passing those standards in some fields will be quite small. If this is unacceptable to those in charge, those standards will be “re-looked” until the standards are “made correct” and the desired result is achieved – military effectiveness and common sense be damned.
It’s just DC liberals doing what they do best, taking something that IS NOT broken and “fixing” it until it’s FUBAR!!
“The services have been devising updated physical standards…”
And updating is a code word for lowering standards. This is liberal mindthink at its best, if the standards are too tough they are obviously wrong. Ratchet them down until the proper number of females pass them.
I don’t see this as a problem. With Chuck Hagel’s budget shenanigans the hollow military can be filled with women in combat arms MOSs, all other positions can be filled with all of the LBGT who are rushing to enlist since the repeal of DADT. Surely all y’all have seen the stampede to the recruiter’s offices haven’t you?
Here is a dirty little secret I was told years ago. In the Army, the MOSs that have both women and men, X number of slots in those MOS schools are reserved for females. I was told this was done for logistical reasons and it was done to make sure a “fair” number of those slots went to females. It was the same when I went to PLDC, one and two slots in every squad were reserved for females, so the order of merit list almost didn’t matter.
Like Jonn noted above, imagine the Army is trying to fill a 11 series OSUT class, and they have 20 empty seats, and they are all reserved for females. What’s going to happen? Recruit command going to be hammering recruiters during those daily conference calls to put some lipstick on that pig and get more females into the Infantry? Will the computer program that kicks out MOS choices start targeting females with low ASVAB scores and only offer them 11X and one or two other choices?
Andy, when I went to PLDC I was told there were no such thing as quotas. After the hight and weight and APFT weeded people out and all of us primaries had a slot the first people they called out of the secondaries group was all females. No quotas my ass.
HAHAHAHA!
The combat jobs they DO want involve sitting on their asses in a helicopter, and then flying back to base camp, rather than any sort of physically hard job for weeks and months at a time on foot. Such Warriors they are!
Classic.
Not even Gomer Pyle was surprised.
Here’s what I see happening: if they don’t fill the quotas with volunteers, they’ll ask for volunteers. Everyone takes one step backward, and those who are dumb enough to not take one step backward get to go to combat training, whether they want it or not.
So I’d say, just suck it up and deal with it like adults and let the Army/DoD figure out that if some dumb fuck like me asks to be in a combat camera group, I should go there, with proper preparation for the combat field, of course.
“When have I been wrong in this discussion so far? ”
You haven’t, and neither have I.
I was struck while watching the Olympics slopestyle skiing that if anyone ever wanted to see the differences between men and women, that was the place: the most elite, proficient athletes in the world, and no woman was doing anything remotely equivalent to the most mediocre no-medal male. The women slowly rotated in the air and the judges gushed when they landed well after two slow turns, while the men spun like whirling dervishes. Very radical difference.
Golly, women don’t want to be 11Bs… but why?! 😉
On the physical side of things, I just don’t see how women in a. Combat MOS can work. Take a 11b MOS for example. Put a 50-60 lb. ruck sack on a woman, then add on a assault rifle, another 8lbs. Then add another 5-10 lbs. of various ordinance. Mix in 95-100 degree heat. I just don’t think it’s the right thing to do.
Another thing, say your on patrol, and have to take a piss. What’s a guy do? He stops, opens his fly and does his business. Not that easy for a women.
I’m not being a chauvist here. It’s just common sense. Just sayin.
The article content (author) attempted to minimize what the article was saying.
Loosely translated, the way I read it, or at least as it was presented, was somewhat dismissive of the survey.
Go figure.
OK Im going to catch hell for this but going to say it anyway.
Equality of the sexes cant ever be regulated or legislated. Its evolution.
Men and Women are different for a reason.
30% who said they wanted to go Combat Arms said they want to go to 160th SOAR. Anybody want to bet Green Platoon standards will be “re-evaluated”?
I say send all female enlisted soldiers into the infantry. If they can hack it, well and good. If not, Adios. Evertbody gets one tour in the combat arms. if they survive they can pick a new MOS. I figure that about thirty days into this scheme the equality police will give up on this stupid scam. During the 60’s the draftees got little or no choice in MOS. They could choose any MOS as long as it started with 11. In a 300 man boot company there were only a handful not sent to Infantry AIT. Once you sign on the bottom line you are at the convenience of the government. Starting Friday no more guarantees. Simple, next.
@23.
Great point.
Time to tell a secret about myself. I could never be a grunt I lied my ass off to enlist. The MOS I chose would not endanger my mates. I have flat feet . I singed a 4 year contact for aviation. Now the Corps can get the maxium use of me. Knowing one’s limits is very (life) important not just to you but to your fellow servicemen. I cannot see a combat MOS that a woman can do day after day. Ladies ,please name one? Dragging a 200 lb KIA or WIA required great strength and help from the Corpsman or gunner. How about the loading and unloading of mortar rounds. The list goes on Joe
Here’s a thought: assemble a trial group of females to train and deploy with any Army or Marine infantry unit for a couple months. Don’t let them quit or pawn their loads off on anybody. Then move them over to a tank company, make them turn some of those big-ass wrenches on an Abrams for a while. Then let them try their hand at artillery, see how many 155 rounds they can handle in a day compared to a young man’s output in one hour.
Here’s the kicker: this trial group will consist of Valerie Jarrett, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and a few other carefully-selected females. If they are such experts, lets see them prove it.
@26-Line ’em up and let’s get to it. Throw in Maxine Waters, too.
I nominate Diane Feinscwein and the First Sasquatch to join them!!
I can’t remember her name, but she was a congresswoman from Colorado in the late 70s (maybe early 80s) that got women into combat aircraft – anyone remember her name?
Also, remember all the problems the Navy had with carrier quals at the time?
Wrench, I think Pat Schroeder is who you’re referring to, another liberal do-gooder that was always full of herself!
@30 – Proud Yep, that’s her. She was particularly “friendly” to the military during her tenure.
I can tell you in all my years I never met a Wpman Marine who had a grasp of what the Infantry, or that Matter Combat arms did that had any desire to be in a combat arms MOS.
Guess what…most MEN don’t want combat jobs either!