Women in combat roles? What do the politicians want, 50% females in the armed forces?

Are they mad? Political Correctness is now even running rampant in our defence forces.

A recent report in the News Ltd. papers stated that of the 3,100 women currently serving in various roles in the Australian Army, only 2 had taken up the highly publicised opportunity for them to join the infantry, so that they may one day serve in possible frontline combat roles.

Despite this, top military brass talked up the emergence of women in the Australian Defence Force at a recent Senate hearing. There’s no doubt that in recent years there’s been a massive push to increase the number of women in Australia’s armed forces. Affirmative Action policies have been implemented to advance women in their Defence careers (at the expense of perhaps more deserving men). Unfortunately, Cultural Marxist rot is now infesting the ADF, just as it is in many other institutions in Australian society.

Given the nature and culture of the military, and given that men are by nature much more aggressive than women (and therefore simply better suited to fighting in wars), surely it’s not unreasonable to expect that our defence forces would be heavily male-dominant. And surely it’s in the national interest that this indeed be the case.

According to the Defence website, “There are currently over 10,000 women enlisted in the ADF, either as full-time or part-time members.”

The current percentages of women in the ADF by service are:
Navy – Approximately 18%;
Army – Approximately 12%; and
Air Force – Approximately 17%

Despite the massive push to get even more women into the defence force, only 14.4% of new recruits into the defence forces are female. But according to Australia’s current Defence Secretary, Dennis Richardson, it’s still not enough!

“We are not where we ought to be”, he stated.

What does that even mean? Does he expect that our defence forces should be 50% male and 50% female?

It’s simply staggering that a senior Defence bureaucrat could express such stupidity. Whilst women may indeed have a role to play in some appropriate areas of our Defence Forces, the rampant push to feminise the armed forces by specifically seeking to recruit more women, to put them into combat roles, and implementing affirmative action policies within the military, is sheer lunacy. It may be what radical feminist ideologues may require, but it certainly isn’t what Australia requires.

References:
Frequently asked questions: Women in Defence”, Defence Jobs (Department of Defence)
ReferenceArticleTitle”,
Defence Force recruiting strives for gender diversity”, Navy Daily (Department of Defence), 26 March 2014 (SBLT Bianca Wise)
Army launches new recruitment drive for women”, Minister for Defence Science and Personnel (Warren Snowdon), 14 March 2013
Only two of 3100 women army soldiers join Infantry in military frontline”, Courier Mail, 4 June 2014 (Ian Mcphedran)
Defence to set targets for more women”, Nine News, 22 August 2012 (Max Blenkin, Sophie Tarr and Stephen Johnson)
Women on frontline ‘realistic’, says Defence Minister Stephen Smith ”, Courier Mail, 12 April 2011

Comments

  1. The media treatment of this important issue inspires levels of anger in me that border on lunacy. It’s nothing to with the debate itself, but the laziness of the reporting, which show so little homework done on the various key factors and considerations center to a proper debate. The media have joined the general public in making excruciatingly obtuse claims about the fundamental factors, which support their view point.
    It seems they see it redundant to seek out experienced, knowledgeable talent to provide some credibility to the debate.

    **(I must add at this point that I spent just shy of ten years in the Aus Regular Army as an Infantry Officer; followed by a career as a journalist)**

    One of the most insulting assertion made by those NOT in favor of removing ADF gender restrictions is that ‘if your a woman soldier and they catch you you’ll get raped heaps’.

    So many things wrong here – I’ll attack just three.
    – Our last major ‘foe’, the Afghan Insurgent in its various guises, had a particular penchant for their creative methods of dispatching any ISAF soldier they could get their mitts on. Intelligence briefings in the early days of the conflict referred back to their treatment of captured Russian soldiers. They had some corkers, but skinning the unfortunate soul alive, before trying them to a boulder, out in the open for the local fauna and womenfolk to complete the job.
    BUT; if the hapless Russian happened to be a pilot, from a downed aircraft presumably (Regan gave them Stingers, remember?), the hatred was so great for these men who caused such indiscriminate slaughter, the gloves came off. I won’t describe what ‘hot-saucing’ is, but if it makes the skinning seem humane, you would assume the utmost in depraved savagery.
    But, that was just the execution of the POW’s. The mujaheddin (and now the Taliban insurgent) customarily used to systematically rape male prisoners as a final act of defiling the vanquished infidel. That could involve anything up to 40-50 soldiers.
    I don’t doubt female soldiers would experience a similar fate, but please don’t suggest any disparity between each gender’s suffering at the hand’s of a ruthless enemy who employ medieval barbarity.

    Stop saying women have been serving ‘on the front line for years’, because in Asymmetric Warfare there are no ‘Front Lines’.
    Facing the occasional stray incoming mortar/rocket from makeshift launchers at the FOB does not mean you’re a frontline soldier. Sure, there’s danger of harassment fire, but the chances of buying it from a stray 107mm unguided Chinese rocket from the 1950’s was estimated to be on par with a 1st division Powerball win.
    In perspective, a deployed Battlegroup, with its various supporting elements number up to 3000 soldiers. That force is centered around an Infantry Battalion and its four Rifle Companies, each made up of around 110 infantry soldiers and a handfull of officers. The Infantry (AKA Riflemen, Grunts, or as they refer to each other – gunslingers) are the pointy end. They engage the enemy directly, using violence of action to close with and kill. They spend the majority of their tour off duty out at the various patrol bases. They are routinely engaged by enemy fire, conduct daily fighting patrols on foot, risking the IED’s which are the biggest cause of ISAF casualties. There are currently no female riflemen in the Regular Army’s Infantry Battalions.
    So, you could generously estimate that only 1/6 of deployed Australian regular soldiers in Afghanistan take part routinely in kinetic operations, involving direct action to kill enemy. This doesn’t take into account the soldiers of the SOTG – the special operations task force, who also are all men.

    Israel doesn’t allow women to serve in all units of the IDF. It’s about 83% of roles that are open to them. I won’t go into details, because in on Wikipedia even.

    So, three points out of a couple of dozen more glaring inaccuracies.

    It’s an important debate, so give it the attention to detail it deserves.

  2. Sorry I am a wee bit old fashioned about this subject, I love women and I wouldn’t want them to be subjected to any kind of combat duty, if they want to well they should be able to if they are physically and mentally able to deal with it.
    What the hell has a percentage to do with it?
    These soldiers are paid to protect us and that is what they should do.
    If a woman is just as capable as a man, well good on them for holding their own.
    There are lots of men out there that aren’t worth a pinch and would drop their weapons at the least provacation. Eg.Iraqian army.
    My mother is a woman and she went through WW2 and she is 96 and still fighting.
    Eddy.

    • Eddy

      I agree with you about not wanting to see women in the front line.

      There has been so much propaganda over the past couple of decades that a woman can do what ever a man can do……….pure garbage. I’ll believe that when I see the first female heavyweight (or any weight even) boxing champion, or NRL player or similar.

      ……………………………………………………………..
      “If a woman is just as capable as a man, well good on them for holding their own.
      There are lots of men out there that aren’t worth a pinch and would drop their weapons at the least provacation. Eg. Iraqian army.”
      ………………………………………………………………
      That is the question, isn’t it? Men are generally stronger than women, but some women are stronger than some men, though the strongest men are *always* stronger than any women.
      Same goes for many other attributes too, it’s just a male/female thing, all biological and not ideological.

      cheers

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