While it never really leaves the media, there is another surge of interest currently doing the rounds regarding females joining front-line military units and engaging in combat operations alongside their male counterparts as equals. US Ranger training is the latest unit to hit the headlines across the pond while here in the UK, the RAF Regiment has announced that it is opening its ranks to accept female candidates.
Interestingly enough, the Royal Marines went through a very high profile experience some years ago when the first female soldier successfully completed the All Arms Commando Course. Now, despite media assertions to the contrary, this course was already open to both sexes but due to the arduous nature of the physical demands, had never really been inundated with female applicants.
Naturally, when it became public that several women were attempting the course, the media went into hyper-drive. The female candidates were immediately labelled as ‘G I Janes’ after the abysmal Demi Moore movie of the same name, and as much information on them dug up to bolster the tabloid stories.
Again, despite the reports that these women would be the first Marine Commandos to earn the Green Beret, this was completely untrue. The women were attempting the All Arms Commando Course, a six to eight week evolution aimed at qualifying serving personnel from the other branches of the Armed Forces with the Commando qualification, allowing them to serve in a supporting role with 3 Commando Brigade. The Royal Marines Commando Course is 32 weeks long and a completely different beast.
Most people will remember Capt Pip Tattersall as the woman who passed the Commando Course. Capt Tattersall was the first female to pass the course in 2002 and immediately became a media sensation. Her achievement was congratulated by MPs in an early day motion in the House of Commons, she was mentioned on No. 10 Downing Street’s official website and named Woman of the Year by Good Housekeeping Magazine. Very high profile but as the first female Commando, probably to be expected.
Unsurprisingly, there was a corresponding backlash from several corners regarding this. Some found it suspicious that someone who could never cross the first main obstacle of the Assault Course, the 6-foot wall, miraculously achieved it on her final attempt when onlookers were dispersed to avoid placing undue pressure upon her. Others looked upon it as the opening of the floodgates where the standards for passing the Tests would be lowered, similar to the Army Fitness Tests where women have different criteria to the men for the same tests.
Personally, I don’t know. I wasn’t there and didn’t witness Capt Tattersall’s attempts. Among myself and my peers when we heard that women were starting to attempt the All Arms’ Course, we weren’t particularly interested either way. Our prevailing opinion being that if they passed it under their own merit then it was a job well done. I don’t care who you are, the Commando Tests are tough, unchanged from the days when they were evolved to prepare soldiers to deploy on specialist warfare missions during the war. Anyone who passes them gets my respect.
And that is the key point for me and most of my contemporaries. That the standards remain unchanged. Undiluted. Valid. I remember talking to a Warrant Officer at the time who informed me that there were some very high-level discussions taking place regarding identifying alternative standards to facilitate females viewing the course as achievable. The Royal Marines of course defended the standards as a hallowed benchmark, never to be tinkered with in the pursuit of a well-intentioned social experiment.
The Royal Marines could never hope to win such an argument at MoD level. Reforms and alterations that improve and promote inclusion and equality take precedence over almost anything a Royal Marines’ General may go in to bat with.
But here’s the interesting thing; Regardless of the conflicting opinions on a woman passing the All Arms’ course, something fundamentally important came out of the situation. After Capt Tattersall, the Royal Marines would never have to adjust the Commando Tests to encourage women to attempt them. Because a woman passed the Tests under the same criteria as the men, proving that the Tests can be passed by either sex without the need for alteration. So, whether by accident or design, the Royal Marines have ensured that they will retain the one standard for some time to come.
And despite the fact most of us remember Pip Tattersall as the woman who passed the Commando Course, there has been another, although with much less fanfare. Surgeon Lt Lara Herbert RN passed the course carrying exactly the same weight and within the same timings as the men, first time around proving again, that women can pass the Tests as they currently stand.
Women in front-line combat roles is an altogether different subject and probably more hotly debated. Those for the initiative point to 21st century values and equality legislation. Those against highlight the risk to unit cohesion, additional logistical requirements and distraction through romantic trysts and liaisons. In 2016, the UK Prime Minister David Cameron lifted the ban on women serving in these units.
The Israeli Defence Force is usually held up as the example where females are integrated into combat roles and have been for some time. Again however, there are limits here. For example there are ongoing trials evaluating mixed-sex tank crews but the line has been drawn at females serving in Special Forces units. Other considerations were also recently brought to bear when a deployment of female soldiers manning checkpoints in a kinetic area attracted the wrath of Islamists who viewed the women’s presence as a direct provocation, inciting a higher level of violence and attacks. Some elements of the IDF remain unconvinced that total inclusion into ground combat roles can ever be achieved, pointing to an earlier trial where medical and psychological experts questioned the wisdom in exposing a large amount of women soldiers to excess physical and mental pain and exhaustion just to find one or two candidates who could successfully complete the training.
Another consideration that raises its head when the discussion of having women integrated into ground combat units is that of their treatment at the hands of the enemy. An example I heard at a recent discussion panel was that of the fate of the Royal Irish Regiment soldiers who were taken hostage by the West Side Boys in Sierra Leone back in August 2000. While, by and large, these soldiers endured their period of captivity and survived to be rescued in the SAS Operation Barras, the point was made that had there been female soldiers present, their treatment would undoubtedly have been vastly different to that of the men. The West Side Boys were a collection of vicious, well-armed thugs constantly out of their heads on either cocaine or marijuana and regularly used rape as an integral weapon in their campaign of terror. The point being made at this discussion was that in all likelihood, female soldiers in the same situation would be forced to endure far worse treatment and trauma than the men as a result of their gender.
The problem seems to lie with how to integrate women into ground combat units while maintaining the physical standards that ensure all soldiers deploy to conflict zones confident in the abilities of the soldier next to them. I personally witnessed a situation some years ago when I was assisting on a pre-deployment course for soldiers deploying abroad to be integrated into a front-line unit. As part of the preparatory training package there were standard criteria that the soldiers had to meet in order to be signed off as ready to deploy. These involved a balance of skill-based tests and physical tests such as medical training, weapons training and shooting and casualty evacuation procedures. It was this last subject that proved problematic for the female soldier on the course. Her shooting was okay, she was good at med, and had no problems with the variety of weapons that she had been instructed in. One of the casualty evacuation procedures used was that of the casualty drag; hauling a dead weight to simulate getting a wounded soldier out of the line of fire and into cover. We used a heavy dummy, weighted to represent that of a soldier and his body armour, rifle and equipment to test the soldiers in this. It wasn’t easy but it was an accurate representation of what it felt like to drag a wounded oppo out of a firefight and into safety. And it was, as one would expect, a criteria test; pass or fail.
The female soldier struggled badly. She never managed to haul the dummy much past the half-way mark and even at that she would collapse exhausted and unable to go any further. She was given several opportunities over a two day period to attempt the test again in the hope that she might find the strength from somewhere to pass it. But to no avail. The result was passed to the unit’s headquarters who immediately sent a Major to the training area to investigate the matter. He was apprised of the situation and watched as the female soldier completed her final attempt but again, failed to achieve it. After several calls back to the unit he approached the senior instructor and asked if he would be happy to pass the female as ready to deploy if the unit in country accepted her at risk. The senior instructor stated that if the unit was happy to take her then he would annotate her training record to show that she was being given a limited pass and highlight the reason for this.
Before the Major could call headquarters with the result, the senior instructor pointed out an important fact: While the female soldier could deploy to the unit with a limited pass, all the soldiers that she was deploying with would remember that she couldn’t pass the casualty drag. This would impact on their confidence in her once engaged on operations, where her ability to get an injured colleague out of the line of fire could not be relied upon. He also highlighted the fact that if she was deployed with a limited pass, she would only be allowed to operate within limited parameters once in theatre, not carrying out the complete role that she was being deployed to fulfil.
Long story short, the Major took responsibility for the remainder of the situation and the woman was deployed as intended. I asked the senior instructor if any men had failed the casualty drag during his tenure and he informed me that he had seen 2 individuals fail. They had been members of a support unit being deployed to augment a front-line unit and had struggled with most of the fitness but bombed on the casualty drag. They had been failed, headquarters informed and they were returned to their respective units without further discussion. No Major was sent to the training area to investigate, no request for limited passes forwarded.
I asked my colleague what his thoughts were on the disparity between the treatment of the sexes in this situation. He shrugged, said he thought it unfair but that the Army were massively overcompensating to show that women were not being discriminated against when it came to filling available roles, including serving with front-line units. The problem in his view was that it achieved exactly the opposite; male soldiers would eventually regard all females conducting the pre-deployment training as an attend course, rather than a criteria one, thereby devaluing any progress in equality.
But women have proven beyond doubt that they can not only fight alongside male counterparts in combat operations but also excel at it. Gallantry awards to women fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan are not unusual or the actions they are awarded for different from that of male soldiers. Female medics in particular have shown outstanding bravery on the field of battle with Kylie Watson, Sarah Bushbye and Michelle Norris among a growing group of female soldiers awarded the Military Cross for bravery and valour. Leigh Ann Hester, an American MP serving in Iraq, was awarded the Silver Star for her role in recovering from an ambush and assaulting an enemy position with hand-grenades and small arms.
So there is no argument that women cannot be as brave or as proficient as men on the field of battle. I worked with a female soldier some years ago who pulled off an astonishing recovery from a dire situation, saving her own life and eliminating the immediate threat. Operational sensitivity precludes me from going into detail but suffice to say I don’t know many people, male or female, who could have done what my colleague did and I’m still awed by her actions these many years later.
Is there an answer here? Can we seamlessly integrate women into front-line combat units? Do we want to? Is the problem one of perception rather than practicality? I don’t know. But one thing’s for sure; this is not a subject that is going to go away any time soon. To that end, real answers and solutions are going to be required. Answers and solutions that, while addressing the issue, do so without risking the lives of those men and women who will be going on the front line.
