Posted on Sep 11, 2015
Mixed-gender teams come up short in Marines' infantry experiment. What do you think?
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All-male ground combat teams outperformed their mixed-gender counterparts in nearly every capacity during a recent infantry integration test, Marine Corps officials revealed Thursday.
Data collected during a monthslong experiment showed Marine teams with female members performed at lower overall levels, completed tasks more slowly and fired weapons with less accuracy than their all-male counterparts. In addition, female Marines sustained significantly higher injury rates and demonstrated lower levels of physical performance capacity overall, officials said.
The troubling findings come as Commandant of the Marine Corps Gen. Joseph Dunford prepares to make a crucial decision regarding the integration of female troops into closed combat roles. Faced with a Defense Department-wide mandate that will open all jobs to women by Jan. 1, he must decide whether to ask for specific exceptions to the mandate in order to preserve combat readiness. Officials said Dunford had met with Navy Secretary Ray Mabus about the decision but had yet to issue his recommendations.
http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/story/military/2015/09/10/mixed-gender-teams-come-up-short-marines-infantry-experiment/71979146/
Long story but an interesting read. My take is two-fold. One, women simply don't have the experience that men do. That will (most likely) improve over time as women gain experience.
Two, women for the most part simply do not have the muscular strength and endurance that men do. That's basic physiology.
Data collected during a monthslong experiment showed Marine teams with female members performed at lower overall levels, completed tasks more slowly and fired weapons with less accuracy than their all-male counterparts. In addition, female Marines sustained significantly higher injury rates and demonstrated lower levels of physical performance capacity overall, officials said.
The troubling findings come as Commandant of the Marine Corps Gen. Joseph Dunford prepares to make a crucial decision regarding the integration of female troops into closed combat roles. Faced with a Defense Department-wide mandate that will open all jobs to women by Jan. 1, he must decide whether to ask for specific exceptions to the mandate in order to preserve combat readiness. Officials said Dunford had met with Navy Secretary Ray Mabus about the decision but had yet to issue his recommendations.
http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/story/military/2015/09/10/mixed-gender-teams-come-up-short-marines-infantry-experiment/71979146/
Long story but an interesting read. My take is two-fold. One, women simply don't have the experience that men do. That will (most likely) improve over time as women gain experience.
Two, women for the most part simply do not have the muscular strength and endurance that men do. That's basic physiology.
Women in the Military
Marine Corps
Infantry
Posted >1 y ago
Responses: 78
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As a leader I think we went about this in the wrong way. The first test should have been to do away with the female standards. Train them on the male standard to build their strength and their confidence to start with. They have been told you cant do it for so long that its become the truth for them. You have to crawl before you can walk in life. It is no different in the military. If you change a standard do you not train your personnel to the new standard ?
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PO1 John Miller
SSgt (Join to see)
Pretty well stated SSgt! As a leader of Marines yourself, if you haven't already, are you training your own female Marines (if you have any) to male PT standards?
Pretty well stated SSgt! As a leader of Marines yourself, if you haven't already, are you training your own female Marines (if you have any) to male PT standards?
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SSgt (Join to see)
PO1 John Miller when I had females I did. my shop currently doesn't have females.
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With all the tough talk going towards the Ruskies, it would probably do best to go with what works -- all men.
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when minutes count, between life and death, your only as strong as the weakest link
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Believe it or not, this argument has been going back since the early 80's. While I was attending NCO school, we had a debate about women in infantry units. I took the hard stance that they had no business in an infantry unit. A female Marine heartily disagreed with me stating that she could do anything a man could do specifically because "She carried a tuba around a marching field all day long." The argument got so heated, our instructor had to shut us up. A couple days later it was my turn to run the school. I purposely made it a tough run, a quick pace and up some hills. The only ones to fall out were the women...all of them including our tuba player. I proved my point. Now given, there are probably some very physical women that can perform the job of a grunt. But those numbers, I would suggest are very low. Don't get me wrong, I love women, and I respect the job they do for our country! But an infantry unit is not the place for them. Even in non combat training, how many complaints would we get from men just talking like men? Would there then be rules put in place to stop men even talking about what young men talk about? There are other things to think about besides the physicality of a woman filling a grunts role. One more point to make before I end this chapter. Have you all seen any of the real "COPS" shows where the woman was not able to perform her duty as an officer? I have, and after seeing it I wonder if I'm the only one noticing that the women underperformed the men. JMO
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IF THE PC CROWD HAS ITS WAY WOMAN WILL BE INTERGRATED INTO MALE COMBAT UNITS DECREASING THE UNITS. STRENGH AND CAPABILITY AND SURLY LIFES WILL BE LOST BUT THE PC CROWD DONT GIVE A RATS ASS ABOUT THAT
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Make them all female units with female officers let them be stand alone units to avoid fraternization and then we'll see what happens
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As I see the entire testing process is Flawed. If you want a true testing results it needs to be equal across the board. The change and Testing needs to happen at the Boot Camp level or even recruitment's minimum physical requirements. Men and Women need to have the exact same training and Physical Fitness standards beginning from their indoctrination. That way you will have a Better testing pool because there is no difference in Training and Conditioning. I do believe Then and only then you will be comparing Apples to Apples. I think if that happens, we will find that woman can "Pull Their Weight" and preform and or exceed expectations.
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LCpl Steve Smith
SPC Luis Mendez No, there are some different standards for men and woman but those are minor. I was suggestion that whatever those differences in training be taken away and the women fallow the men's requirements ( it would not be a big change in training that I know of, but I was not a Drill Instructor so I do not know all the training requirements for women). Remember that a Marine is a Rifleman 1st and everything else second. Now that the decision has been made to have woman in front line combat units the woman will need to go through the exact same training the men do, no more or no less, they will need to meet the same requirement men do to become a Grunt. Female Grunts is a new thing but to get a true evaluation to see if women can become grunts . I believe you need to start the study at the induction process or in Boot and go from there. right now they are having WM's that have been in for a bit so they are having to be reconditioned to becoming a grunt so they have not had the chance to go from boot into S.O.I. right away. a Fresh group of subjects no ones that have been in for a bit.
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SSgt (Join to see)
LCpl Steve Smith -
The difference is not minor or you wouldn't bring it up to begin with. Just remember you compete with these female marines for promotion. They should have to train to the same standard as male marines for every thing.
The difference is not minor or you wouldn't bring it up to begin with. Just remember you compete with these female marines for promotion. They should have to train to the same standard as male marines for every thing.
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LCpl Steve Smith
I re-read my comment and see I was vague on who's training standards would have to change, I thought that you all would know I was meaning the Woman's Physical training would have to the same as the Male standards are not the other way around. sorry for thinking that was a given lol.
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Mabus is a social engineer.. until he gets the results he wants we'll keep wasting money and time. Nice of him to denigrate the females who took part in the exercise as well as those who volunteered. Bottom line is that standards will have to be lowered to accommodate the pencil pushing, slogan writing, fair is fair crowd.
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Cpl Brad MarkW
Sooooo, mixed-gender teams came up short in Marines' infantry experiment. That's what.
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