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The title of this thread was Women, Military Readiness, and Int'l Security until today, 23rd October 2013 and has been changed to Women in Military Service & Combat (not just USA). Seven other threads, mainly SWJ Blog, have been merged in too. All prompted by a BBC News report on a Canadian women infantry officer, which will be the added soon (ends).
This appeared in the New York Times yesterday as the Marine Corps looks to study the impact of women in front-line units. Not a new debate really. More interesting is the conversation about gender relationships, security, and military effectiveness.
First, gender equality:
So, basically, gender security is a legitimate concern when predicting or resolving conflict. However, is female participation in the armed forces or in combat a substantial factor in a country's ability to favorably prosecute conflict? Is there a distinct female temperament, and what impact will it have as women enter into combat and strategic leadership roles in the armed forces?Originally Posted by What Sex Means for World Peace
This article provides a once-over-the-world review of women in armies around the world, while this 2009 UK MoD report goes into more detail of the applicable literature up to that time. This article points out that female youth obesity has grown slower than male youth obesity; so while both genders have shrinking eligible recruits for military service, females are less likely to be ineligible on the basis of weight (it also linked obesity with region and education, which is another conversation about military recruiting demographics and recruit eligibility).
Of course, there are objections about female temperaments, male temperament towards women, and female physical make-up and capacity but I have not seen a study yet linking female participation in combat with a unit's inability to conduct a combat mission or a country's ability to win a war. This article references US, Canadian, and Danish military reports that indicate the presence of women do not undermine unit effectiveness (and presumably, the overall war effort). That article was written in 2003, so I am curious what new evidence is out there, given the GWoT experiences, against the practicality and effectiveness of women in combat.This would seem to be the standard of proof, given that in war, only victory matters.
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