Romanticized Notions of Warfare and the Military

Recently I got involved elsewhere in what I will loosely call a discussion about the military, specifically about women who serve in the military. Having done so myself some years back, I have an interest and some knowledge about this subject.

The interchange was based on a couple of points raised in reaction to the Baylys' Memorial Day slam against women in the military (see the entry below this one).

I ended up dealing with some highly inaccurate, romanticized notions of what warfare and military service entail. There is, for one thing, the idea that there are or can be secure, segregated sleeping facilities for men and women. While that is a given in permanent and secure deployment situations, it cannot happen when the mission involves extended movement or when the unit is taking hostile fire. As I tried to explain, sleep happens when and where it can, fully-clothed, and if anything, illicit or felonious interaction between male and female is less likely than in those supposedly secure, segregated quarters. In other words, the mission overrides the need for sleep, or at least seriously intrudes upon it. You catch a few hours here and there in the vehicle, your improvised cover (be it standing or dug-in), or wherever/however, in uniform, your weapon at the ready, instantly alert. Sex is NOT on your mind, whether you're male or female, or if it is, it's one of those fleeting thoughts that does not get acted upon.

But no. There must be secure, segregated sleeping quarters in ALL circumstances, with the added "precaution" of removing any women from combat, where incidents of sexual assaults are an increased risk. Right. Remove the women, that will solve the problem. More of that romanticized idea that sexual assualt is primarily about sex. More resignation to the idea that it's normal behavior for men to assault women (sexually or otherwise), so remove the threat by removing the potential victims. Oh, but no! Just remove the women in addition to clamping down on the men who commit the crimes, because "many" of them do.

I was chastised for daring to say that I believe such an opinion does a disservice to men and women in uniform. Well, I still fervently believe that it does. We continue to cast military personnel in the guise of the last way we saw them prior to their enlistment: as hormone-plagued teenagers who will "hook up" if we give them the slightest opportunity. We discount the idea that they can and do mature (very quickly!) past that spoiled, immature teenage state into disciplined adults who are not "distracted" by the presence of the opposite sex. We either want to say that the right to defend their country should be denied to women altogether, or we somehow want to create artificially "safe" situations in which women will never be threatened by sexual assault or by war wounds or, God forbid, death in combat. It's based on a myth that is absolutely unfair to the good, law-abiding personnel who serve in our armed forces.

That's where another romanticized misconception is revealed. "Combat zones" are essentially the entire theater of conflict in modern warfare. There are no longer "front lines" and secure "rear areas." And as plenty of National Guard and Reserve personnel have discovered, if you enlist, you are subject to active duty service in an area of conflict. Probably several tours' worth of service. If you volunteer to serve, you volunteer to put your life on the line. Thankfully, most who do volunteer know this, even if the civilians back home refuse to recognize it.

The fear-driven "what-ifs" came up in this "discussion." What about if we fight a "real" war (apparently Iraq and Afghanistan aren't real enough), because if we do, the enemy will set up brothels of POW women if we don't wake up and stop allowing women to serve in the military, or we don't at least keep them in "safe" places. By all means, we must radically change military policy in order to plan against the most improbable and horrific fantasy that a civilian can conjure up! All I can say about such a ludicrous idea is that it's a good thing some civilians don't have a say in policy-making. It's obvious the man who put up this "proof" that women don't belong in the military, has never been trained in the military. Personally, I hope someday he (and people who think like he thinks) is in a position for a military woman to protect him. Because he's the civilian, for all his grandiose talk about the inadequacies of women to serve in the military.

Along those same lines, he brought up the "unfairness" of the different score requirements for men and women for military physical fitness evaluations. He apparently thinks that it is a military necessity to be able to do 70 push-ups. (Hint, fella: not all military men can do 70 in two minutes.) That's a critical military task, right? He appears to be unaware that it's called "physical fitness" for a good reason: the physical fitness tests measure an individual's PHYSICAL FITNESS. I'm well aware, despite his false charge, that men and women are built differently. One of those differences is in where the strongest bones and muscles in the body are located. It doesn't take a genius to recognize (and most human beings seem to appreciate) that a man's greatest bone and muscle mass is in his chest and arms, while a woman's is located in her pelvis and thighs. Men are built so as to make it EASY to do push-ups. A woman who can do, say, 50 push-ups in two minutes is actually far more fit in terms of her upper body, than a man who can do only 50. The requirements for sit-ups, the PT critic failed to mention, are roughly equal for men and women. Is he going to cry "unfair" about that, too? Of course not. And given a woman's slightly smaller lung capacity and shorter stride, the time requirements for a two-mile run are slightly faster for men than for women. The point, of course, is that the military has for years now tested and refined its test parameters in order to ensure that an easy-to-administer, low-equipment physical fitness test actually does, accurately, test a military member's physical fitness. Having been in a test unit for the first establishment of the three-event test for Army women (it used to be a silly seven-event test reminiscent of junior high gym class), I do know a little of the history and the rationale behind the three-event test as it is administered to military women. And believe me, a woman who "maxes" her PT test is an extremely fit individual, just as is a man who "maxes" his. And there's little mercy if you don't make the minimum on a PT test. Bottom line: If you want an army of push-up doers, you will require men and women to do the same number of push-ups. If, however, you want a physically fit army, the current PT standards are an excellent measure of that fitness.

Other silly things got said, but I'm tired of this. I couldn't qualify for military service anymore even if they did want me (and to date, I've received no recall letters). I happen to honor the men and women who set aside their dreams in order to serve their country in uniform. I respect them immensely for going where they're sent, doing what they're superbly trained to do: protect freedom and engage the enemies of freedom. I don't care if a military member is male or female, as long as he or she has been trained well and obeys the law. And if ANY servicemember breaks the law, I expect (as should any loyal American) that he or she be prosecuted. There is no place in the American military for the "boys will be boys" blind eye expectation that sexual (or any kind of) assault against fellow members or civilians is regrettable but inevitable. We DO do our forces a disservice to state that it's better to remove women from combat zones because the men are just too likely to commit crimes against them. Military service is not safe. Criminals are criminals. War is war. And misogyny is misogyny, and has no place in the armed forces or anywhere else in civilized society.

Final statement: I believe in the ideal of peace in this world. Most military personnel pray fervently for peace, because they know they will pay the price when we fall short of that ideal. And because we, as a society, have made it our policy to fall short of that ideal, we need the best and most capable personnel we can get to volunteer for our armed forces. We don't need the rhetoricians hearkening back to a time that never really was, telling us our woes would be lessened if we just prohibited women from serving in the military. (They don't know how perilously close the U.S. came during Korea and Viet Nam, for instance, to DRAFTING nurses. No women, except when we couldn't get the job done without them, I suppose.)

But that's the thing about America, and one of the things that our military protects for us: the right to expression of our opinions without fear of governmental retaliation. While the Patriot Act does threaten that right, still by and large, we have it, and do we ever exercise it! And my opinion is, whatever we bloggers say or how odiously we say it, we need policy-makers who rely more on logic and law than on emotions and religious proof-texting to regulate our military. Women ARE doing the job, and doing it well. And if they're uniquely threatened by unlawful behavior, then eliminate the unlawful behavior, not the women. We can't afford to lose good military personnel, especially not to the "friendly fire" of criminal assault.

Mindless Braying

Some time back, I mentioned the braying of a couple of non-veteran so-called men of God who declared women unfit for military service.

At that time, I declined to give their blog further traffic by linking to their mindless writings (see the title of their blog if you think this characterization is harsh).

But now, on Memorial Day no less, they open their mouths to bray mindlessly yet again against female veterans.

"Gentle"men, the right for you to spout your historically uninformed, reactionary, religiously-popular yet biblically proof-texted nonsense was won for you by men and women in uniform. Your obvious disrespect for the women who have served and continue to serve our country in uniform is your constitutional right to express. This, however, was not the day to express that profound disrespect, especially given your failure to post any evidence that you honor even male war dead. I realize it's asking too much for you, who never wore the uniform, to honor female veterans and heroes; in fact, it would be lying for you to do so, after your anti-woman rhetoric so many times over on your blog.

God forbid that this country, especially your community, should ever be threatened such that you would have to accept protection from a woman in uniform. She would honorably extend that protection to you, as she would to any other citizen. If such were to happen, perhaps you would finally understand that it is not the gender of the warrior, but her selfless sacrifice--a sacrifice you declined ever to make--that would be the important factor in your protection as civilian citizens of the United States of America.

I am proud to be an American, and proud to be a veteran. I am, however, ashamed of you, as fellow civilian citizens and as brothers in Christ. Would that you had the grace to be ashamed of yourselves for your misogynistic attitudes and the horrible timing of your disrespectful, dishonorable rant. Keep your so-called "compassion" to yourself. You owe all the veterans who protected your freedom, your profound gratitude and respect. If you couldn't be bothered to express these, then you ought to have had the grace on Memorial Day to keep to yourself your self-serving rant against the women who served.


Edited: The Baylys' dishonorable, disrespectful diatribe against female veterans (written to blast certain Presbyteries that support the law of the land that provides for women to defend their country) still stands. However, they did add a short entry purporting to thank those who served and are serving, as well as the families of those who gave their lives, late on Memorial Day evening. To these, they say they are "deeply grateful."

What Hubris!

Warning: What follows will most definitely constitute a rant.

What hubris does it take for church leaders who declare themselves guardians both of the patriarchal traditions still common in many corners of Christendom, AND of what they call biblical manhood, who have always been civilians themselves, to disparage those military veterans who are women?

Just who, I wonder, had the courage and the spirit of self-sacrifice to spend years of their prime young adulthood in service to their country? Not these sanctimonious, self-appointed judges of what they neither understand nor have experienced personally.

Where were they and what were they doing when I wore the uniform? Oh, yes, doing the "manly" thing: marrying and fathering children, while presuming to dispense religious wisdom to the hapless who consented to their leadership. What were they studying while I delayed my education in order to become a weapons expert? Based on their current rhetoric, presumably they studied how to talk a walk they have little experience making on their own steam. While I served in two infantry divisions and endured field conditions in three countries and four states and while I participated in the first Inaugural celebrations for President Reagan in sub-freezing January 1981, these bastions of cheaply held convictions were building their little religious empires. When Gramm-Rudman kept me from being paid on time in order to be "accountable" to the taxpayers, these so-called gentlemen's parishioners were paying them quite well.

Did they ever meet both men's and women's physical fitness standards while both were being studied, all while also learning how to be a soldier at the age of 18? Did they go from never having held a weapon to becoming a rifle expert? Did they qualify to hold three different military occupational specialties? Did they obey orders from openly unlawful and sadistic superiors and have the courage to report the one order they could not ethically obey? Did they find the grace and dignity to ignore the blatant bigotry of those, like themselves, who would never enter military service, yet who dared to lie about their morals and lifestyle simply because of their gender? And did they ever have to manage to be a Christian in uniform and maneuver with integrity through the tensions between the two loyalties?

No, of course they didn't. That's why it's pretty easy to laugh at the stupidity revealed by their petty, graceless, ignorant opinions about female veterans and those women currently serving their country in uniform. Gentlemen (and I use the term loosely), these women, like their brothers at arms, serve and have served to preserve your freedom to demonstrate your bigotry for all the world to read. Bray on.