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| Ukraine, fighting for its life, has no problem sending women into combat |
The Mangled Mussolini’s fake masculinity and real misogyny has always driven him to surround himself with like-minded cretins such as the unlamented Matt Gaetz. His choice for Defense Secretary is a classic in the same mold: inexperienced but telegenic, and with a possibly pathological dislike of women.
He has also been flagged as a possible insider threat, and there is a newly released report of his alleged sexual assault of a woman — not a minor, however. But right now it’s his insistence that woman should not serve in combat that has ignited a firestorm at home and abroad:
Pete Hegseth’s remarks about women in combat are met with disgust and dissent
“I don’t even know how to express the disgust,” said a current U.S. Army colonel, who spoke to NBC News on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retaliation. . . .
The combat arms officer said it would be “shameful” as well as harmful to recruitment and retention efforts if the U.S. changed its policy.
“We already have enough issues,” she said, pointing to sexual harassment and assault as major examples. “I could see how it could hurt a lot of potential on who serves and who stays serving, if policies like that change. It would be like taking back our ability to vote.”
(That last sentence is unfortunately a harbinger of future possibilities.)
Then there’s Trump’s one-time Chairman of the Join Chiefs, who — unlike Hegseth — actually has manged the military and has had to deal with all these issues: Mark Milley disagrees with Trump's pick on women in combat
“Don’t lecture me about women in combat,” Milley said at a national security innovation event hosted by the Pallas Foundation. “Women have been in combat, and it doesn't matter if that 7.62 [caliber round] hits you in the chest. No one gives a shit if it's a woman or a guy to pull that trigger, you're still dead.”
Juliette Kayyem’s piece in today’s Atlantic leaves no doubt that Trump picked Hegseth because of his views on women: What Pete Hegseth Doesn’t Get About Women in Combat:
Donald Trump’s choice for secretary of defense, the former Army National Guard major and former Fox News host Pete Hegseth, has no clear policy or management experience that qualifies him to run the Pentagon. What he has instead is a reactionary streak—one that’s evident in his view that women should no longer have combat roles in the military. In his recent book The War on Warriors, he implies that women service members who have received military honors for their bravery were decorated because of “an agenda.”
Also today, our NATO allies chimed in with their own disgust at Hegseth: US allies repudiate doubts about women in combat
“After 39 years of a career as a combat arms officer and risking my life in many ops across the world, I can’t believe that in 2024 we still have to justify the contribution of women to their defense and to their service in their country,” Canadian military chief Gen. Jennie Carignan said at the Halifax International Security Forum on Saturday.
and
Other military officials were even more blunt than Carignan. “If we are not willing to use half the population on something so important, then we are stupid,” Royal Netherlands Navy Adm. Rob Bauer, the chair of NATO’s Military Committee, said at the conference on Friday.
Now, despite efforts by the misogynistic malignant malingerers to erase history, women have not only performed well in combat since the Obama administration lifted the last barriers in 2015 (see this CNAS 2020 report), they have been doing so for hundreds of years. I’ve been reading Philppa Gregory’s book Normal Women: Nine Hundred Years of Making History, and it is full of examples of Englishwomen (she concentrates on England, her area of expertise) defending their castles while their husbands were off on crusade, and not just going into combat but leading it: A main example was the Empress Matilda (1102-67), who led her troops into battle for six years, and when she was defeated (temporarily), it was by another woman, Matilda of Boulogne.
A final counter to Hegseth’s mythology is the current war in Ukraine,
in which Ukraine is literally fighting for its survival as an
independent nation with its own culture. Ukraine has entrusted its very
existence to women soldiers as well as men: Heading platoons, repairing machines and doing twice as much: How the war has changed the lives of Ukrainian women:
Most of the men in Oksana Rubanyak’s platoon are at least 10 years older than her. Before the war, having a young woman in charge of an all-male Ukrainian military unit might have given the troops pause. But as the platoon prepares for a frontline deployment at a time Ukraine is desperately trying to hold off Russian advances, things like gender and age no longer matter that much, Rubanyak said.
It’s a huge change compared to when she first joined the army two years ago.
“Women are recognized, women are promoted to combat positions, to officer positions. These are no longer just medical or headquarters roles,” she told CNN in a phone interview. Female soldiers are now participating in assaults, she said. “And I am very happy about it.”
Sadly, it doesn’t look like Hegseth’s views on women in combat will sink his nomination. It is possible that his total unfitness for the job, on top of those sexual allegations (see above) might do so; after similar and credible charges sank Gaetz, it may be that Senate sharks smell blood in the water.
GOP Senators may not mind putting an incompetent in charge of Health and Human Services and certainly not in Education, but their ability to remain in office depends in large part on the number of military dollars they can snag for their states, plus Defense is the one department they always want to strengthen (in appearance at least).
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