Women in the Combat Infantry

We cannot pinpoint the moment when the American people came to their senses and recognized that political correctness was ruining the country. At one time it had all seemed like an innocent game. Let’s pretend that men and women are the same, that the difference between the sexes was a patriarchal plot, a social construct.

It became less innocent when the thought police started tyrannizing everyone’s mind, forcing them to use made-up pronouns and never to say the least disparaging thing about any member of the distaff sex. Since most of us prefer not to say disparaging things about anyone, it seemed acceptable.

But then, political correctness might have reached a tipping point when the courts decided that a he who thought he was a she had to be allowed into the girls’ locker room in high school. Or was it the moment when the politically correct ideologically driven Obama Defense Department decided to ignore all the relevant science and to integrate women into military combat infantry units?

Travis Scott argues against this policy in The Federalist:

Irrationally, government officials in the Obama administration have opted to ignore all available scientific data to forward their own politically correct agenda. This suggests they didn’t care what the science said to begin with. It means they are willing to degrade the quality of the military’s effectiveness to artificially advance women who can’t compete by the same standards, and by doing this they are knowingly putting our soldiers at greater risk for injury and death. For this, their actions are condemnable before God and all the men of their country.

Of course, we did have the word of doddering Joe Biden that more women in the military would make the armed forces stronger. Biden said it at this year’s West Point commencement ceremony, but seriously, how stupid do you have to be to believe such a thing? Do you honestly believe that nations the world over have, from the beginning of time, been sending, whenever possible, all male armies into the field because they are afraid of the awesome power of women warriors?

When it comes to the combat infantry the question becomes: do you want to bet your life and the life of your family on a dumb idea? Do you want to risk everything you have in order to spare some ideological zealot a bout of hurt feelings?

Scott argues the point:

Many people who would oppose these moves have difficulties voicing their views or thoughts about the subject, because it’s not possible to do so without receiving hellish backlash from media outlets or political pressure. This orchestrated effort of political correctness is so influential now that even grown professionals have a hard time relaying facts to the public, because offending someone can cost your career. This is being done even at the potential cost of Americans’ lives, and it is no longer sufficient to stand idly by and let it happen.

In some way, it comes down to biology. Yes, I know that the forces of political correctness have pounded our brains with the notion that men and women are the same. Their willful ignorance of reality is not a reason to start losing wars or to start having our opponents take us less seriously.

You see, Darwinian scientists understand full well that women are constitutionally weaker than men. It is settled science. Women are less aggressive than men. Women do not react to trauma and threats the same way men do. The list goes on, and Scott details all of the arguments, but, at the end of the day, size matters, muscle mass matters, testosterone levels matter, bone density matters, aggressiveness matters.

And, of course, science matters. Those who pretend that the Democratic Party is the party of science should hide their heads in shame for ignoring the science that tells us unambiguously that men and women are not equally suited to military combat.

In Scott’s words:

If women have higher injury rates than males; are less effective combatants; or their presence might distract male soldiers from being as effective as they would be in an all-male environment; or a woman being injured and killed in combat has a more dramatic effect on soldiers’ morale, then putting women into combat is a bad idea. Simply put, implementing bad ideas into military policies will ruin the effectiveness of that military. It could get more people hurt and killed, and jeopardize the nation’s safety. People who knowingly implement bad policies that put people’s lives at risk and our nation’s security in jeopardy should be held accountable.

If you like, Darwinian theory offers an explanation. Scott does not say that this argument comes from Darwin, and should count as science, but it does and it should:

It has long been tradition that women never enter combat because having women slaughtered is a sure way to endanger the entire society, since low ratios of women inhibit the creation of the next generation more than low ratios of men. Also, putting women on the battlefield changes the psychology of every male soldier for the worse, period.

As for the biological differences between the sexes, Scott summarizes some of them:

The differences between the sexes affect all kinds of major and minor components about our bodies. Men have stronger bones than women, as well as stronger tendons and ligaments. Males have more muscle fibers, and because of this have greater muscle mass. Men have about 40 percent more muscle mass than women. Things like calorie intake also affects the sexes differently: men tend to convert extra calories into muscle and energy reserves. Females tend to convert them into fat deposits.

And naturally, as some women have pointed out, the female body suffers far more problems from extended aggressive behavior than does the male body:

Women who physically exert themselves too much over extended periods of time will be subject to muscular atrophy and other biological complications. This is why we should not throw them into activities their bodies were not made to accommodate. Even if you had a female miraculously pass a male Marine physical fitness test, or complete a special school in the military, this would be a temporary, even eccentric victory.

And also:

If extreme physical activity is sustained for long periods of time, a woman’s body will eventually deteriorate in ways in which the bodies of her male companions would not. This alone, even ignoring injury rates and other physical shortcomings of women, would put a mixed-sex military unit at a severe disadvantage in the battlefield, risking the lives of everyone involved, as well as possibly compromising mission objectives.

Obviously, we see something similar in the world of athletic competition:

… if low-grade danger zones like sports arenas have not deemed women capable of competing well against male opponents, why have we decided to allow them into combat zones, which are drastically more hazardous and complex? If you don’t expect a woman to be allowed to receive tackles from a 200-pound man on an open field, there is little reason to place women on an infantry squad.

Strangely enough, our current national conversation about sexual abuse and rape culture shows that women need special protections to keep them safe from stronger males. One doubts that the national conversation is the best way to ensure women’s safety, but how can putting women in the combat infantry  be a step toward keeping them safe from aggressive males? The cognitive dissonance is blaring.

In Scott’s words:

Where once it was a reprehensible act to even slap a woman, now we are now lining up our daughters to cross overseas to be beaten, raped, and killed by jihadis.

He adds:

If our moral tendencies dictate that women should be universally exempt from violence in the civil world for biological reasons, what grounds do we have for sending females out to fight overseas?

Many people have argued that in some parts of the world women have fought alongside of men. Yet, they have never excelled at warfare. A nation that sends women into battle has reached the limit of its desperation. Most nations prefer to send boys ahead of women.

Scott continues:

Yes, historians have shown that there are instances and parts of the world where women may have had the opportunity to be trained to fight in warfare alongside men. Yet women have never excelled at fighting and warfare compared to men.

But, you will be asking, what about Israel? John Luddy wrote the following for the Heritage Foundation:

For example, it is a common misperception that Israel allows women in combat units. In fact, women have been barred from combat in Israel since 1950, when a review of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War showed how harmful their presence could be. The study revealed that men tried to protect and assist women rather than continue their attack. As a result, they not only put their own lives in greater danger, but also jeopardized the survival of the entire unit. The study further revealed that unit morale was damaged when men saw women killed and maimed on the battlefield… Few serious armies use women in combat roles. Israel, which drafts most of its young women and uses them in all kinds of military work, has learned from experience to take them out of combat zones. Tests show that few women have the upper-body strength required for combat tasks....