Last IOC in Marine infantry experiment drops female officers

Sgt Aaron Kennedy, MS — Wed, 08 Apr 2015 14:34:13 -0400

http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/story/military/2015/04/07/last-ioc-in-marine-experiment-drops-two-officers/25418867/

For your consumption.

Of note is reference to Ground Intelligence Officers (0203) remaining open. Our (3/1) Assistant S2 (Aka Scout Sniper Platoon Commander) was a Ground Intel Officer.

The two-and-a-half year period in which the Marines' infantry officers course became gender-integrated for research will end without graduating a

Response by CSM Charles Hayden made Apr 8 at 2015 2:36 PM

CSM Charles Hayden — Wed, 08 Apr 2015 14:36:48 -0400

Sgt Aaron Kennedy, Told you so!

Response by LTC Stephen C. made Apr 8 at 2015 2:41 PM

LTC Stephen C. — Wed, 08 Apr 2015 14:41:41 -0400

Sgt Aaron Kennedy, MS, it will be interesting to read the final report.

Response by CPT Zachary Brooks made Apr 8 at 2015 2:53 PM

CPT Zachary Brooks — Wed, 08 Apr 2015 14:53:11 -0400

Love seeing actual results coming out with information to back it. Hopefully this can get some of the aggressive supporters (that want a "first this" and a "first that" as well as "Men and Women can do all the same things") to wake up a bit. Evidence and hard data are important to have.

Response by SSG John Erny made Apr 8 at 2015 3:31 PM

SSG John Erny — Wed, 08 Apr 2015 15:31:31 -0400

We can not change the cards that mother nature has dealt us Humans. Males have testosterone and therefore can grow much larger muscles than females. Males also have a greater lung capacity than females that better supply oxygen to the blood. So mother nature is not fair, well it is what it is and we can not change that. Unless you want to start messing with human genetics? I elude to the the Halo Game Series.

So, do we lower the standard for females, or for everyone? I do not think that is a viable solution, it will simply get people killed in the heat of combat. There is a reason that the standards are set high, because what we do is not easy, and some of them harder, much harder that others. Clearly women are smart enough to do the job, but it takes more than that. Many of the couch potato males in our society could not do it either.

Are there females that could pass male standards, probably. They would be have to be very athletic and driven. What would be the long term affects on their health running at such a high tempo? Most males end up banged up after a career in high tempo MOS's

Now look at the standards for tier I forces like Delta and Seal team 6, most healthy physically fit males can not meet their physical standards, not even close. Do we play the politically correct card and make exceptions? I do not have the answer for that. Do we create roles for women in certain areas to take advantage of the fact that they are women and could blend in certain combat environments, go unnoticed? Perhaps that is a valuable asset we could use. Other nations have done that, Russia, Israel; but are willing to accept what will happen to them if they are compromised?

So RP and I being chauvinistic or a realist? I am not going to tell a female no you should not do this, if a service opens a field to a female by all means try it if you want, but do not expect lower standards.

P.S.

DARPA is working on an exoskeleton suit to boost the strength of troops. Perhaps one day every soldier will will have the strength of three big men.

Response by CPT Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 9 at 2015 4:02 PM

CPT Private RallyPoint Member — Thu, 09 Apr 2015 16:02:45 -0400

I just read this. I thought this would have happened. It is an extremely difficult course. Now the Army is going to do their part with Ranger School. We will see what really comes of this. Will they alter the standards? I hope not. I am tired of this Israeli Army thing also. They don't fight how we fight. We have a set of expectations that we have put there for the combat effectiveness. If we reduce them we will be reducing our combat effectiveness.

Response by Cpl Jeff N. made Apr 9 at 2015 10:43 PM

Cpl Jeff N. — Thu, 09 Apr 2015 22:43:37 -0400

I will lead with the quote that I think summarizes the reality:

The worst form of inequality is to try to make unequal things equal - Aristotle

So we learned that not nearly as many women as were allowed to try even volunteered to try. Then of the women that did, 0% passed (the IOC).

4 passed the SOI course for enlisted Marines.

Do you think this will silence the women in combat chatter? Probably not. It will not stop until the standards are lowered and some make it and they can claim victory.

Mind you, the women demanding this are not women in the Marines they are feminists that have zero interest in attending. Women Marines are the best trained women in the US Military(IMHO) and they don't appear to even want to volunteer.

Response by GySgt Wayne A. Ekblad made Apr 10 at 2015 7:21 AM

GySgt Wayne A. Ekblad — Fri, 10 Apr 2015 07:21:45 -0400

No surprises here . . .

Response by PO3 Sherry Thornburg made Sep 24 at 2015 10:55 PM

PO3 Sherry Thornburg — Thu, 24 Sep 2015 22:55:56 -0400

I'm not surprised either.

1. Yeah, women have high endurance capacities, but we don't have the strength capacity to deal with these kind of challenges.
2. You notice that the volunteer pool was enlarged, yet they still had very low application numbers. That should tell you something. Women know this is a very demanding course and only a few brave ones were willing to even consider trying. (I wouldn't have considered it at all. Just me.)
3. If a woman or man wants to try for these types of units, then more power to them, but let's be realistic and realize that only a few highly disciplined dedicated women will even try for such accomplishments. Of those only a few will make it through.

I'm pretty happy with the 44% pass rate for enlisted volunteers. That is higher than I expected.

Response by SPC Luis Mendez made Oct 8 at 2015 4:35 PM

SPC Luis Mendez — Thu, 08 Oct 2015 16:35:27 -0400

OMG you freaking mean to say that not even Androgenic looks didn't helped them either?

Response by SPC David S. made Oct 8 at 2015 5:40 PM

SPC David S. — Thu, 08 Oct 2015 17:40:47 -0400

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. None passed because the course was "designed by males" or failure rate is due to a predisposition in "differences in PT standards" or "physiological differences" not being conclusive for the rigors of combat. Seems it could be a PT issue as the enlisted 34% success rate with the Infantry Training Battalion course vs officers. I would like to know all the PT scores of all the volunteers. I would bet the 122 graduates had better scores.

Response by MGySgt James Forward made May 13 at 2016 3:25 PM

MGySgt James Forward — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:25:39 -0400

The real issue I see is that we will never get data until a woman Marine completes the entire course of instruction. I would like to see a small group of woman Marine Officers go thru the course "unofficially" but in the same manner as the Men. We need data...are they failing due to lack of strength? technique? I don't know. In a video clip I saw one woman Marine trying to climb a rope and not even using her legs, that tells me that fatigue and technique may be part of the problem.