- Or at least he and Obama’s concept for the US military does
- Special Forces proceeding with integration
We get that women can dress the part of front-line infantry
It has been a concern of ours but perhaps former active duty Special Forces members here in the Quad Cities with theater experience have an opinion on this topic. Perhaps they can summarize or lead us to what their fellow SF operators are saying about this.
We have one, but theirs is, in our view, far more meaningful and important. And we’d like to get it and post it for all of our readers.
Excerpts below are from an article which describes some major changes to the standards by which aspirants earn membership in America’s most elite fighting forces.
The overriding issue seems to be whether these changes are necessary to reflect “the military’s need to adapt to evolving security threats from Russia, China, Iran and other foes”.
Or… are they aimed at making it “easier to pass the qualification course as a way to boost lagging recruiting numbers and ensure that women will eventually qualify”.
This article seems intended to allay fears of critics who say that the “Green Berets will become weaker and dangerously less capable than ever before.”
To us, it seems that an objective of the Obama Pentagon continues to thrive under a Trump administration which seemed committed to reversing what it thought was a very dangerous idea to the detriment of a strong military. That was the notion that integrating women into the nation’s most elite, front line combat forces would enhance “unit cohesiveness” and “strengthen our military capability”!
We believe that this was a wildly wrong-headed concept…and early returns seemed to confirm that.
How integrating women into front line combat units would “improve unit cohesiveness” may have been, to us, one of the most stupid ideas to have come out of an Obama “defense establishment” rife with stupid ideas. (Recall, for example, the use of “green fuels” to power our Navy’s warships, resulting in astronomical cost increases while military budgets were being drastically reduced?! Or, worse, how about the “increased unit cohesiveness” and “improved readiness” achieved by integrating women into Naval warships, including submarine crews. “Cohesiveness” and “Readiness” improved so much that pregnancies among female crew members resulted in drastically reduced readiness in the Navy overall ! )*.
We have footnoted below several news sources we would urge readers to review. Some are from sources most likely to support Obama Administration views (NPR, TIME). Nevertheless, the articles, contemporaneous with the Pentagon’s actions, tend to reflect the silliness and early failures of the Obama efforts to what we would describe as its “social experimentation within the military”.
Maybe some V’pac readers have a different view, or an insight based on personal experience.
Please share your views on this vital topic. Contributors will be anonymous if they wish. VeritasPac Editors
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By Lolita Baldor https://www.apnews.com/de165494a09d4e7bb022bcdd7a150f7f
“The changes that are beginning now have led to resentment among some Special Forces that the brass wants to make it easier to pass the qualification course as a way to boost lagging recruiting numbers and ensure that women will eventually qualify. The fear, such critics say, is that Green Berets will become weaker and “dangerously less capable than ever before.”
CAMP MACKALL, N.C. (AP) — Deep in the dark North Carolina woods, a small white light flickers in the heavy underbrush. It’s after midnight and a soldier is taking a risk by turning on his headlamp to find his way.
The overnight land navigation test is just one hurdle in the grueling, monthslong course to join the Army’s elite Special Forces, and using the light violates the rules. Just the night before, at least 20 commando hopefuls had either committed a disqualifying failure or given up in the drenching rain.
“We got a light!” barks an Army instructor from the front seat of his truck as he patrols the woods. Almost instantly the tiny white beacon goes out as the soldier spots the truck headlights and tries to escape detection.
For the nearly 200 candidates scrambling through Hoffman Forest at Camp Mackall, the struggle to become a Green Beret is real. But Army commanders are making sweeping changes to shorten and revamp the course. The aim is to meet evolving national security threats and to shift from a culture that weeds out struggling soldiers at every point to one that trains them to do better.
The changes that are beginning now have led to resentment among some Special Forces that the brass wants to make it easier to pass the qualification course as a way to boost lagging recruiting numbers and ensure that women will eventually qualify. The fear, such critics say, is that Green Berets will become weaker and “dangerously less capable than ever before.”
Army leaders insist the changes reflect the military’s need to adapt to evolving security threats from Russia, China, Iran and others foes. They say the nearly two-year course had to be shortened, so some training will be done when soldiers get to their units, where it can be tailored to the specific needs of the region.
“Today’s qualification course is for exactly the type of Green Beret we needed for 2008. It is not what we need for 2028,” said Maj. Gen. Kurt Sonntag, who until recently was commander of the Army Special Operations Center of Excellence, which includes all the Special Forces training. “We need to reestablish our forte, which is our ability to work with partner forces, developing their capabilities to provide an advantage for them and the United States against our adversaries — North Korea, Iran, and China and Russia.”
*https://www.stripes.com/news/navy-seeks-to-combat-high-rate-of-unplanned-pregnancies-1.203122 (This article suggests that a high percentage of women serving on a Naval vessel can result in a negative effect on military readiness when unplanned pregnancies increase sharply, as they have in recent times. )
* https://dailycaller.com/2017/03/01/exclusive-deployed-us-navy-has-a-pregnancy-problem-and-its-getting-worse/ ; (EXCLUSIVE: Deployed US Navy Has A Pregnancy Problem, And It’s Getting Worse: That number is up 2 percent from 2015, representing hundreds more who have to cut their deployments short, taxing both their unit’s manpower, military budgets and combat readiness. Further, such increases cast a shadow over the lofty gender integration goals set by former President Barack Obama.)
* https://www.npr.org/2015/09/10/439246978/marine-corps-release-results-of-study-on-women-in-combat-units (“The Marine Corps just released a year-long study testing whether women can survive the rough, grueling world of ground combat. The details are stark. All male units outperformed mixed-gender units across the board. Here’s the decision Marine leaders have to make now – ask the Pentagon to still bar women from ground combat or push for tougher physical standards to let them in.” )
* https://time.com/4135583/women-combat-marines-ash-carter/; ;Women in Combat: Why the Pentagon Chief Overruled the Marines
“Carter’s bottom line echoes what advocates of opening up front-line combat jobs to women have long argued: that while the average female soldier or Marine may be weaker and slower than her male counterpart, outstanding women can out-perform average male military personnel. The defense secretary, who never served in uniform, relied on the advice of former Navy officer and current Navy Secretary Ray Mabus—who is the Marines’ civilian overseer—for cover in steamrolling the Marines’ recommendation against women serving in such combat assignments.”
