Women in Combat Arms/ SOF Discussion
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Agreed. However, society would likely not be too terribly accepting of women sufficiently tough enough to pass the IOC.
Not to mention the shit she/ they will have to endure upon completion. "Dyke" would probably be the kindest thing said.
The female integration into combat conversation has been in yakked yack since the 1970s. The main argument presented is there are women who can pass the course and there are lots of guys that fail the courses. Both honest, correct, and accurate talking points. Seldom entered into the discussion is there are 13-14 year old boys and girls that can pass the courses and the inconvenient fact that in many 3rd world cultures 13-14 year olds are conscripted into combat one-way or another. Also seldom entered into discussion is many do not voluntarily enter into military service to be combat infantry in the ditches and charging up hills on the front lines.
Then of course there is always the fitness testing hubaloo, especially now that consideration is being entertained about introducing career occupation-specific fitness standards. Suddenly many of the guys who identify themselves with being high speed are even quaking in their boots and opine the current Army Fitness test is sufficient.
Unfortunately avoided in the conversation is many enter serving a military obligation for the entitlements and benefits more so than to be the one digging the ditch and foxhole on the front lines and engaging the enemy or to be the one charging over hill and dale to engage the enemy. Also avoided in the conversation is the nature of military fighting force structure is not to be ready and willing to die for your country, but rather make the enemy SOB die for his or hers. Killing the enemy is combat effectiveness and a certain level of physical human performance capability that merges into small tactical team and fighting unit combat capability to increase potential for killing the enemy SOB rather then the enemy winning the fight by decimating the small tactical team or the fighting unit.
Fighting unit capability is also known as individual combat readiness which merges into what is known as unit combat readiness. A unit populated by a large number of individual on medical duty limitation and medical duty restrictions lacks unit combat readiness. It is concurrently combat ineffective and combat inefficient. It is a unit of poor bastards ready and willing to die for their country rather than the unit imposing hurt on the enemy so the poor SOB enemy dies for their country or cause.
Then of course there is always the fitness testing hubaloo, especially now that consideration is being entertained about introducing career occupation-specific fitness standards. Suddenly many of the guys who identify themselves with being high speed are even quaking in their boots and opine the current Army Fitness test is sufficient.
Unfortunately avoided in the conversation is many enter serving a military obligation for the entitlements and benefits more so than to be the one digging the ditch and foxhole on the front lines and engaging the enemy or to be the one charging over hill and dale to engage the enemy. Also avoided in the conversation is the nature of military fighting force structure is not to be ready and willing to die for your country, but rather make the enemy SOB die for his or hers. Killing the enemy is combat effectiveness and a certain level of physical human performance capability that merges into small tactical team and fighting unit combat capability to increase potential for killing the enemy SOB rather then the enemy winning the fight by decimating the small tactical team or the fighting unit.
Fighting unit capability is also known as individual combat readiness which merges into what is known as unit combat readiness. A unit populated by a large number of individual on medical duty limitation and medical duty restrictions lacks unit combat readiness. It is concurrently combat ineffective and combat inefficient. It is a unit of poor bastards ready and willing to die for their country rather than the unit imposing hurt on the enemy so the poor SOB enemy dies for their country or cause.
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Exactly my thoughts. People want to go get some.....until they have to train up to get some.
I've spent quite a bit of time searching for the article I'm going to discuss, but to no avail. I'll probably have to go to the campus library to find it, but that can come later on. I digress...
Not long after I had scheduled my trip to MEPS, I read an article about females meeting the male fitness standards in the military. Bear in mind, I went to MEPS in December 2000, so the inequality of standards was an issue even then, and the timing of the article's release was what really lodged it into my mind. The US Army, sometime between 1998 and 2000, took a group of average females and trained them to the point where they could easily meet the same physical standards as their male counterparts before actually sending them through to basic training. This little social experiment was cut short because while several people in a position to care about this were happy to see that it was possible, they were absolutely horrified that the women had developed a more masculine physique in the process. Their level of displeasure with that was so great as to bring early termination to this project, and the article reported that fact.
Given, this was damned near twenty years ago, and body transformation contests were still a novelty (Body For Life was only holding its second or third competition cycle by then), so it could possibly be that they looked like fitness models. The article didn't provide before-and-after photos, so I have nothing but speculation to go on as to just how dramatic the physical transformation was in the Army's test subjects. Still, even to this day, females who are heavily muscled up are not looked upon as generally attractive by the general population.
To try to put it into eye-pleasing terms that the average person can understand, I'm gong to use the females in WWE as an example, past and present. Take a look at the female wrestlers today. We can all agree that they are in excellent physical shape, have a healthy level of cardiovascular fitness, and are generally viewed as smokin' hot. Do you think they could pass the IOC? Probably not (DISCLOSURE: I don't watch much wrestling, and my roomie watches the WWE Divas reality TV show, which is the only reason I know who any of them are these days). There might be one or two who could give it a fighting chance, but all the way through? Doubtful, although I could be wrong.
You want to see a female in the WWE who physically might have stood the best chance at going the distance? That would be Chyna. She had the heart, the mentality (and the steroids) to train just like a man, and guess what. She looked like a man. She didn't get the offer to pose for Playboy because they thought she was hot, she got it because she was a cultural anomaly, a phenomenon that people could not draw their eyes away from, and even then Hugh Hefner didn't make the offer until she had some work done to look at least a little feminine. Do you think females today have the kind of intestinal fortitude to cope with becoming a spectacle because they were in adequate physical shape to complete the IOC? Hell no.
I won't even get into how society would accept a female with the mentality to pass the IOC, not as a conqueror in the name of social justice, but as a woman who can think like the infantry.
Hopefully you can find the article. If I recall correctly the intent was to do away with gender separate weight and fitness standards and modify the United States Army Physical Fitness Test (AFPT) to one standard for enlistment and retention purposes. It is correct women were found that met the male standard for enlistment but unfortunately even within this group there was a significant percentage unable or unwilling to sustain the male standard for the duration of an enlistment or several enlistments.
Regaining fitness to the male standard also proved to be difficult after a pregnancy or a second pregnancy to term. This is actually reflected in current policies pertinent to time given to pass the AFPT after a to term pregnancy.
Also during the years prior to, during, and subsequent to the US Army lacked gender neutral occupation-specific and initial basic qualification course fitness criteria as required by Public Law
Public Law 103-160, Section 542.
The touted Basic Airborne Course fitness standards are not gender neutral as there is a female standard that differs from the male standard.
The touted Ranger School fitness standard and the RASP and SFQC fitness standards are also not gender neutral as that fitness standards have never been validated and submitted to the US Congress IAW Public Law 103-160, Section 542 as being gender natural.
Only a few hazardous duties have actual gender-neutral fitness standards and these duties are U.S. Coast Guard Helicopter Rescue Swimmer duties and U.S. Navy Helicopter rescue swimmer duties. Neither by the way are considered a combat duty. However if female gender fitness capability to sustain higher fitness levels for duration of enlistment or for a career of performing such duties is going to be asserted, than retention of females having fitness to preform these duties for a full enlistment or several enlistments (career) ought to be thrown into discussion to back up assertions.
Even the Air Force lacks gender-neutral occupation-specific fitness standards for 99% of its occupations (AFSCs) that is in compliance with Public Law 103-160, Section 542. Of these AFSCs only two were in compliance with Public Law 103-160, Section 542 before it was even conceived of and written.
As far as female muscular body transformation go, best research the prevailing use of steroids to get that male muscular look and the heath problems such use brings with to the body as it ages past 30 years of living.
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Were there women who did it naturally you think to train to a male's physique?
Absolutely! Have a look at the natural bodybuilders. They train to the kind of physique that could pass the IOC. However, bodybuilders don't really do a whole lot of cardio, so while they have the musculature and strength to get through it, they may not have the stamina and endurance.
The Army took the females and just PT'd the hell out of them using an exercise program that increased their strength AND cardiovascular endurance, using facilities and staff already in place for their fitness program for enlistees who failed their initial PFT that they had to take within the first three days of arrival for BCT (those special subjects spent their days either in the weight room or on the track until they were able to pass, and then began basic training). Hell, it wouldn't surprise me if at least one person who first implemented that study hadn't studied the hell out of Mark Rippetoe or someone else preaching the same gospel.
Certainly, use of steroids by military service members was already a big no-no that was tested for. However, I doubt very few if any got the male looking muscle bulk and cut.
Brill
SOF Support
I went in Sep. '93. I know they change up the requirements, but then we didn't take a PT test and the pull ups were to eat, not a requirement. If you could only do 3 you went to the back of the line until you could do two more. The penalty was simply less time to eat. The females had a silly bar about 3 ft. off the ground where they stretched out underneath it and did "pull ups" from there. We had one or two female Marines who wanted to do pull ups (they actually could knock out 5 while a lot of males could not) and were denied by the Black Hats; they were made to go to the little bar. Kudos to them for at least trying, none of the others would. Runs were 9 min. miles and they still dropped you if you fell out.
I know the standards have changed, PT tests are/ were required, but it certainly isn't what it used to be.
Reference Army FM 35-20 Physical Training Women’s Army Corps, February 1975, Para 213. Airborne Trainee Physical Fitness Qualification Test for Women:
No scoring table, just minimums of (FYI no scoring table for men either at this time or prior to the now used APFT):
Incline Chin ups – 7 repetitions
Knee Bender -50 within a two minute period
Modified Pushups- 22 repetitions
Modified sit-ups- 20 repetitions
An endurance run of 1 mile in 10 minutes or less.
I went through BAC in February 1974 and the drop was only 25 pushups, much less than the 50 pushup drop encountered at the PJ Indoc course prior to being sent to BAC. I also seem to recall 10 chin-ups being the standard. Shouldn't be to hard to find the Army (male) fitness FM in use during 1975.
No scoring table, just minimums of (FYI no scoring table for men either at this time or prior to the now used APFT):
Incline Chin ups – 7 repetitions
Knee Bender -50 within a two minute period
Modified Pushups- 22 repetitions
Modified sit-ups- 20 repetitions
An endurance run of 1 mile in 10 minutes or less.
I went through BAC in February 1974 and the drop was only 25 pushups, much less than the 50 pushup drop encountered at the PJ Indoc course prior to being sent to BAC. I also seem to recall 10 chin-ups being the standard. Shouldn't be to hard to find the Army (male) fitness FM in use during 1975.
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TLDR20
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When did you go? I had to do pull-ups in 2006.
It boils down to playing fucking stupid games with serious shit. This isn't a fucking contest. It isn't equal rights or diversity or glass ceilings. It's humping your share of squad organics up and down fucking mountains or swamps or jungles and getting to the objective ready to fight without anybody else having to cover your ass and hump your shit.
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Brill
SOF Support
2011 and I wasn't the oldest either!
There was a SGM that had WAY more gray hair that me. Aside from the APFT, we only only ran to the rigger shed and even then females fell out but jumped anyway.
TLDR20
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2011 and I wasn't the oldest either!
Cherry
Speak for yourself, I went through BAC in '98...
pardus
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Out of curiosity, how many jumps would you do, say per year, on average?
TLDR20
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4-8
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