Women and war Essay Example

Women and war Essay Example Women and war Essay Women and war Essay Currently, there are about 14% to 15% of women serving in the US armed forces. Some of whom are participating in flying helicopter gunships, assisting in propelling nuclear-powered warships, gathering intelligence, communications and signals, ordinance, engineering and myriads of logistic works (Skiba, 2001). Back in 1970, only 1.4 percent of women were serving in the military forces. Five years later the percentage tripled to 4.6 percent, doubling to 8.3 percent during the 1980’s and had steadily risen to 10 percent by 1985. By 1990, records showed that the number of women working the military has already reached to 11 percent and the statistics is continuously increasing year after year (Government executive, 1994 cited in Willens, 996). Although the history of women in combat could be traced during the time of Joan of Arch, who at the age of 17 led the French squad to battle the troops of the English, the professional military status of women was not fully recognized until 1948. It was President Truman who put in effect the â€Å"Women’s Armed Services Integration Act† which allowed women to become a part of a force dominated by males. Although women were able to penetrate the all-male forces, they were still prohibited to fly combat aircrafts and naval combat vessels (Spring, 1994 cited in Willens, 1996). However, the rules that prevented women from taking part in flying combat aircrafts and participating in combat vessels drastically changed in the early 90’s right after the Persian Gulf War. The Congress enacted the National Defense Authorization Act of 1992-1993 which invalidated the laws concerning female combat exemption. The Administration of President Clinton reinforced the said act when they opened combat positions that were once prohibited to women (GAO report, 1996 cited in Willens, 1996). By October 1, 1994 a policy was issued by the Department of Defense which abolished the â€Å"risk rule† where women’s specialties were measured. The policy set by the Defense Department was strongly supported by the department’s secretary, Les Aspin by putting forward an extension of the changes on April 1993 that allowed women to participate in flying aviations which include attack helicopters. The policy also stipulates that no other jobs in the military will be closed to women just because the said jobs were dangerous. However, the policy was not able to address a direct policy for women to participate in other military specialties such as the Special Forces Units or ground combat fighters. At present, women are still excluded from ground combat based from the official policy of the Marine and Army Corps (GAO report, 1996 cited in Willens, 1996). Likew ise, the Navy barred women from penetrating coastal patrol crafts and submarines due to the privacy reasons of the crews. As such, they are also prohibited to become a part of the SEALS, a team specializing in warfare (Skiba, 2001). Despite these limitations, women became an important part of the military, demonstrating that they could perform various missions in any circumstances and the military has become reliant on the vital role played by women during missions (Abbott cited in Skiba, 2001). Granting women to be a part of the military forces and be able to participate in critical missions became an important factor in the retaliation set by President George Bush against terrorism. Right after the September 11, 2001 attack, despite the law governing the standard that women are not permitted to be on ground combat units, women could now be compared to male units that are in the war frontlines and are very close to becoming a part of the combat support. Women managed to be in the positions such as intelligence analysts, crewmembers of the gunships, bombers and fighter pilots, soldiers for psychological operations, supply officers, honor guards and some even rise to the ranks that are especially assigned to men (Stone, 2002). Prior to becoming a faction of the military, women had undergone series of issues that raised arguments whether the military should still maintain women in the forces and whether to put them in the frontlines of wars. One of the major issues faced by women during service is the idea of becoming prisoners of war. In a greater scale, the probability of becoming victims of sexual molestation and rape is much higher among women than men if they were placed in the frontlines. One event that catapulted people to question the presence of women in service is the case of Private Jessica Lynch. Lynch was a part of the 507th Ordinance Maintenance Co. which was ambushed by Iraqi’s during the height of war against terrorism. The event caused the death of 11 of 33 soldiers. Seven of them were held captives while nine were injured. Medical records of Lynch showed that the soldier had broken bones and was â€Å"a victim of anal assault† (Gibbs, 2003 n.p.). Together with Private Lynch d uring the ambush was her colleague Spc. Soshana Johnson who was also held as a captive at a different location. Barely an hour before Johnson was held captive by the Iraqi insurgents; she was shot in both ankles and was later on videotaped for an interrogation which was broadcasted worldwide. Johnson and the others were held captive for 22 days until the Marines were able to rescue them (CNN, 2005). Due to these events many people who were already skeptical about putting women in the frontlines continues raising questions whether women should be subjected for such combats. Yet, despite of what had happened many still argues that women who are pursuing to become a part of the military are already aware of the consequences long before they have finally decided to enlist themselves (Minerva, 1994 cited in Willens). Given all of the odds, many women are still striving to fight for their rights to be in the frontlines, and as for the case of Lynch and Johnson both became heroes and inspi ration for many women who wanted to pursue their duty and their dreams. Another argument put forward by the opposition against women in combat is their physical strength and endurance. Along with this is the question whether women would be able to respond well on the gravitational forces of handling an aircraft. It is a fact that being in the military requires an individual to be physically fit because of the physical demands of the job. Undeterred by this argument, many experts proved that some women have the physical strength and endurance to be on the service (Army Times, 1996 cited in Willen, 1996). As for the case of combat aviation, there were no evidences that women cannot handle such action. In fact in the present war against terrorism, public affair officers who were ones promoting stories about how women struggle in the military are now discouraged to isolate women anymore (Stone, 2002). Until 1967 women were not subject to any promotion higher the colonel rank. Yet President Lyndon Johnson was the one to finally abolish the promotion restrictions by putting in effect the â€Å"Public law 90-130† stipulating that women were free to be promoted in all ranks. From then on many women in the military have risen in the ranks which proved that they are on the same level as men in the task of defending America (Waychoff, 2004 n.p.). This was true in the case of Lt. Gen. Claudia Kennedy; a three-star general in 1997 and was known as the army’s highest ranking woman and author of â€Å"Generally speaking.† Given the consideration that majority of the military p opulation is still comprised of males, women are now almost doing the same jobs as their male counterparts. More women are now poised near the combat zones (CNN, 2001). According to Senior Airman Madelyn Waychoff (2004), every year the number of female fighter pilots is increasing. In 2004 alone, sixty women have been flying fighter jets across the boarders of the enemies and they make up 1.9 percent of all the active-duty fighter pilots during that time. Records indicate that there are more women flying every year. In line with this, there are also several women who took the same risks as that of men during the upheaval of war against terrorism in Iraq and Afghanistan. Some military analyst claimed that the shortage in the troops deployed in the said areas were the very reason why despite of the prohibitions of women taking part in the ground combat, many women engaged themselves in direct offensive action against their enemies. To quote the former congressional Rep. Pat Schroeder (2005): â€Å"These rule no longer make sense because no place is safe in Iraq, the whole place is literally a frontline† (Schroeder, 2005 cited in Ginty, 2005 n.p.). Since the September 11, 2001 attack in the USA, 98 women have already been killed during the time of their service in defending America (CMR, 2008) while others acquired permanent injuries and have sustained wounds from combat. These statistics have surpassed the previous records during the Gulf War where 216, 000 women were enlisted and only 16 were killed (Ginty, 2005). Thus, these records points out that the physical strength of women as well as their endurance should not be undermined by their gender. Another issue faced by women in the military is evident in the impact of their jobs among their families and among the women themselves. According to Amy Blaidorn (2007), an active Navy Lieutenant, the greatest sacrifice that a woman in service does is the time spent away from the family during deployments. Yet she still continued to pursue her work be cause according to her she wanted to make a difference in the lives of other people and that she voluntarily enlisted for the military. Just like Blaidorn, many other women are actively participating in the military, most of whom are wives and mothers. According to a recent army report, the second stressor among female active service members is the separation from family. The multiple deployments became a concern for the whole military force and although there is a continuous means of addressing such issue, the repeated deployment during the heightened time of war continuously impact the family of the service members in a negative way (McChrystal, 2007 cited in Military and Veterans affairs chaplains, 2007). There are many cases that when the service member returns home after a long deployment, she would have to face another battle concerning her marriage and family (Waddell, 2007 cited in Military and Veterans affairs chaplains, 2007). The main problem comes from post-traumatic stress disorder that affects both the families and the service members. After long time of being away from the family, the most notable change that could be seen among the service members is that they are never the same person anymore. Likewise the family she left is not the same family in every aspect. Thus, these changes become a complex issue within the family (McChrystal, 2007 cited Military and Veterans affairs chaplains, 2007). In addition to this, deployments also post a challenge on the authority at home because during the time that the women are away, the male gets used to making all the decision by himself (Kay, 2007 cited Military and Veterans affairs chaplains, 2007). Infidelity and the pervasiveness in the use of pornography have become rampant in times of separation. According to documents, during the time of active deployments to Afghanistan and Iraq in 2001 to 2004, the rate of divorce among active service members drastically increased. Meanwhile for unmarried women in the military, the duty oftentimes serves as an impediment for building relationships (Military and Veterans affairs chaplains, 2007). Despite the family conflicts caused by multiple deployments in the war against terror, the commitment level of women to serve in the military shows higher proportion. Based from the survey findings presented by Penny Pierce and Lisa Lewandowski in an APA convention, surveys concluded that 51 percent of the military women were â€Å"very likely† or â€Å"extremely likely† to continue their service in the Air force while 18 percent of the participants were â€Å"likely† to re-enlist themselves in the service. According to the researchers the intentions of the women to re-enlist in the military depended on the attitudes of their significant others (Pierce and Lewandoski, 2007 cited in Nauert, 2007 n.p.). Based from the findings presented in the study, it is apparent that women have become participative in the military right after the prohibitions against their participation were lifted in some ways. Due to this, women played a vital role in the war against terrorism. They managed to penetrate the once all-male force and were able to ascend in positions that were once assigned to men. However, due to the heightened war in Iraq and Afghanistan which require them to be deployed in critical missions, several issues were faced by these silent warriors. Although there are still governing bodies that limit women to totally engage themselves in ground combat placing them in the sidelines, these areas that are considered to be unsafe does not apply the laws anymore. The battleground for the war against terrorism has become a place that literally became the frontline exposing the lives of women in jeopardy. Likewise, they became subjects of war captivity that inflicted them permanent injuries that may not be physical at times but are more likely to affect them emotionally. Furthermore, the issue within their families is another factor that should not be disregarded when speaking about the women in service. The pain they acquired from war is incomparable to the pain that they have to endure during the times that they have to return home and eventually see the changes that the war had brought on their families and after a short period of stay they would then have to leave again in order to defend the country. Still, despite of all these challenges they have managed to pull their responsibilities together for their country and for their families. They are dying, losing their vital parts, firing their weapons, piloting jets and in a greater sense they are true American soldiers that have served the country with pride and honor.