Women in Combat Hampered by Band-of-Brother Myth, Author Says. Do you think this is true?

SGT Private RallyPoint Member — Tue, 08 Sep 2015 22:47:43 -0400

Stars and Stripes | Sep 06, 2015 | by Wyatt Olson

U.S. military branches have four months to meet the Pentagon’s deadline for opening all front-line combat positions to women, unless a service seeks exception to the policy before Oct. 1. Much of the debate swirling around the coming change has focused on the physical standards women will be held to in those positions.

After two female soldiers made history by earning their Ranger Tabs recently, a top Ranger School official took to Facebook to dispel rumors that standards had been lowered for the women.

Arguments over physical standards distract from a more fundamental issue about women in combat, says author Megan MacKenzie in “Beyond the Band of Brothers: The U.S. Military and the Myth that Women Can’t Fight,” published this month.
“I think the debates around physical standards can stop us from having a discussion about military culture,” said MacKenzie, a senior lecturer at the University of Sydney’s Department of Government and International Relations.

MacKenzie, who spent five years researching women in the military in the U.S., Canada, New Zealand and Australia, interviewing male and female soldiers and key policymakers, is slated as a keynote speaker in October at the Association of the United States Army’s annual national meeting in Washington, D.C.

“I think women are showing they can do the job. Physical capability is not the issue; it’s men’s acceptance of women that’s the issue,”she said. “That’s a cultural problem, not a physical problem at all, and that’s going to be the last hang-up in terms of integration.”
At the heart of that cultural attitude, she argues, is the band-of-brothers “myth” — a phrase made famous by Shakespeare’s Henry V, who rallied his outnumbered troops on the eve of battle with a speech that included the line, “We few, we happy few, we band of brothers.”

The term reached its modern zenith with the historian Stephen Ambrose’s 1992 book “Band of Brothers,” recounting Airborne soldiers’ experiences during World War II in Europe, which later became an HBO miniseries.

The band-of-brothers myth, MacKenzie contends, is not that a group of male warfighters can develop a close bond, but that the nation’s security rests upon such exclusive masculine camaraderie. This all-male bonding is often cast as “mysterious” and “indescribable,” and thus all-male units “are seen as elite as a result of their social bonds and physical superiority,” MacKenzie says in the book.
The band-of-brothers myth “shapes our understanding of what men and women can, and should do, in war,” she wrote.

The formal exclusion of American women from combat has always been about men, not women, with an evolving set of rules, guidelines, and ideas primarily used to validate the all-male combat unit as “elite, essential, and exceptional,” she wrote.
Women are often seen as “potential spoilers” of the band-of-brothers military culture, she wrote.

It was during the post-Vietnam War years that the military and popular culture embraced in tandem the band-of-brothers narrative as military thinkers — and moviemakers — began assessing U.S. shortcomings in that conflict, she said.

“Military morale was at a low point,” MacKenzie said. “You started to hear that part of the failure in Vietnam was a result of cohesion, that we needed stronger cohesion.”
Troop cohesion, “largely defined as men’s ability to trust each other and form social bonds,” became synonymous with combat effectiveness after Vietnam, “which by definition excluded women from cohesion,” she wrote.

MacKenzie’s book is in part a response to a body of writings by former military officers who have argued that placing women in combat roles would be detrimental to the military and national security.

In “Co-Ed Combat: The New Evidence That Women Shouldn’t Fight the Nation’s Wars,” long-time critic of integration Kingsley Browne wrote that “for very fundamental reasons women do not evoke in men the same feelings of comradeship and ‘followership’ that men do.”

Robert L. Maginnis, author of “Deadly Consequences: How Cowards are Pushing Women into Combat,” told Stars and Stripes that MacKenzie’s argument “attempts to wrap feminist theories and ideologies around military realities that she knows little about.”
“She does not appear to understand cohesion,” he said. “Survival and mission accomplishment for ground combatants, based on significant combat evidence, depends on physical strength, and male advantages in physiology are an important aspect here,” he said.

Cohesion, Maginnis said, does not depend on the “exclusion” of women. “That’s a boilerplate feminist theory, which is an anti-male philosophy believing that men are hopeless misogynists and there are no differences between men and women that matter,” he said.

MacKenzie acknowledges differences between the sexes but objects to them being cited as evidence of women’s inferiority for combat positions.
“It’s starting to get old,” she said. “We keep going back to women and men are different but ignoring that warfare is also different and physical standards also potentially need to be adapted. Most militaries around the world are adapting the physical standards because war has changed so much. Just basing standards around measuring the fitness of an average 23-year-old male doesn’t tell us much about whether someone can be a combat soldier.”

Debate over physical standards also ignores that in recent years many women have been in de facto combat positions, particularly those who were in cultural support teams attached to Special Forces and Ranger teams in Afghanistan, she said. Many received combat-action badges. Some were wounded. Two died during direct-action raids.
The continuing focus on physical standards “tends to reinforce this idea that women can get into combat roles as long as they don’t change the military at all,” MacKenzie said.
“I think that’s interesting in the sense that where there’s a potential for women to enhance these roles, we kind of assume that women, if they do change anything in the military, it’s always for the worse,” she said.

With the military in the throes of a sexual assault epidemic, full combat integration for women could change the culture for the better, she said.
“We can still honor the military culture, but to try to say that there’s no room for change and women can’t make any change to the military, I think, is unfortunate,” she said.

Response by SCPO Private RallyPoint Member made Sep 8 at 2015 10:49 PM

SCPO Private RallyPoint Member — Tue, 08 Sep 2015 22:49:25 -0400

They are hampered in combat by their physical and emotional capabilities, IN GENERAL.

Response by SGT Jonathon Caldwell made Sep 8 at 2015 11:23 PM

SGT Jonathon Caldwell — Tue, 08 Sep 2015 23:23:30 -0400

They think the sexual assault epidemic is bad now, think about putting a few women on a remote COP with 90 other guys during a deployment. Tell me the numbers wont go up. You would be crazy to think that they wouldnt. I have 3 daughters and no matter what, for that reason alone I would never let them in combat arms even if it was open to them.

Response by SGT Eric Kesseler made Sep 8 at 2015 11:37 PM

SGT Eric Kesseler — Tue, 08 Sep 2015 23:37:39 -0400

Here is my two cents: With the graduation of 2 women from Ranger School, which is long considered to be the closest to combat a soldier can get. In terms of physical exertion, exhaustion, a lot less calories taking in than would be optimal. The ability to carry out a mission, maintain security, and combat effectiveness on very small amounts of restorative sleep. Having been cadre at 5th RTB I trust the officers and RI's that have already spoken out saying standards were not lowered one bit. Having served with outstanding leaders in RTB I would say the question of whether or not they can handle greater combat roles is answered with a firm: YES. Yes men and women are physically and often emotionally very different. We have had many female soldiers in OIF and OEF with the Combat Action Badge, Purple Heart, and one even earned the Silver Star Medal. I served 3 tours, earned the Combat Infantry Badge, nothing higher than an ARCOM and no Purple Heart. Just like there are men that can't pass Ranger School, there are women that can, as recently proven. We can look to other Armies around the world that have women combat soldiers. Their situations are quite different. Most are 1 or 2 year mandatory service requirements. Israel has suffered constant threats of attack since 1948. They are literally surrounded by their enemies and are a very small country with not enough males to fill all the billets. So can women serve in the Infantry, SF, Rangers, Delta, etc? I also would like to point out something, just because someone CAN do something does not necessarily mean they SHOULD do that thing. The main thing that I think prevents women from serving alongside our hardened combat soldiers is the very essence of what it means to be in combat arms. It is very macho, chauvinistic, and full of all kinds of behavior that one would not want their wives or daughters around! As a father of a beautiful 16 year old young lady I can tell you I want her nowhere near an Infantry platoon down range! Evolution has made it so men are naturally more aggressive, protective of females, and physically stronger on average. That's the reason my wife asks me to open the jars! :D Women, as the bearers of our children, are made to be more empathetic, nurturing, and not possessing the upper body strength that men typically possess. So I said all that to say this, Just because women are fully capable to fill greater roles in the military, doesn't mean it is a good idea. The camaraderie, esprit des corps, and unit cohesion WILL suffer! And for that reason alone, I say it will ultimately cost lives on the battlefield. I am no stud or hero to be sure. I am certain Rhonda Rousey could whoop my butt in seconds flat. How many women did you meet in the military were at her level of fitness and ability. I would venture to say none. What gets me about this equal rights for women idea is it seems like they want to do everything a man can do. We are simply different. Are very roles in society are shaped by thousands of years of evolution. Why should we mess with that if we don't have to? Israel and North Korea likely don't have a choice. Until our numbers dwindle, we don't need to put them in those roles. Just my thoughts.

Response by Cpl James Waycasie made Sep 9 at 2015 2:07 AM

Cpl James Waycasie — Wed, 09 Sep 2015 02:07:29 -0400

So change it to band of Co-ed myth. If a woman can hack it, and I know a few women that are tougher than a lot of men I know, let them go for it. I wouldn't want somebody telling me I couldn't be something because it was a field that traditionally only women dominated.

Response by SGT Private RallyPoint Member made Sep 9 at 2015 7:52 AM

SGT Private RallyPoint Member — Wed, 09 Sep 2015 07:52:29 -0400

I think that it comes down to discipline - if it's not yours, don't touch it. If you're in combat, your mind shouldn't be on sex with other service members. I've often been the only female on a COP or on a mission and we worked out just fine.

Response by SGT David T. made Sep 9 at 2015 11:02 AM

SGT David T. — Wed, 09 Sep 2015 11:02:09 -0400

I have served in both types of units. I found that women were no better or worse than males at performing their roles to include basic soldier skills. Here is food for thought: other nations use women as Infantry with no issues so why would our army be any different?

Response by SSG Private RallyPoint Member made Sep 9 at 2015 1:27 PM

SSG Private RallyPoint Member — Wed, 09 Sep 2015 13:27:57 -0400

I would say to some extent yes! Anyone with an iota of common sense cannot rightfully expect brothers with a bond and hardened by combat to welcome with open arms someone who would have not been welcomed previously. I am sure my brothers will be fine with the transition, but give them a little more time!

Response by SSG Warren Swan made Sep 9 at 2015 1:46 PM

SSG Warren Swan — Wed, 09 Sep 2015 13:46:08 -0400

I'm going to wait with a Cheshire cat smile....when a DS at Benning who wears the cord and disks shows up and is a female (now about those POG jokes again lol). Women are very capable leaders and Soldiers. Ranger school did nothing to prove that. Women have proven that longer than there's been an actual service branch of any military. It's high time we treated them as such. I have only one issue with women in combat and it's not a capability issue, but a personal training one. In the foxhole, if I had to save my buddy who's a man or the other who's a female, I'd want to save both, but I'm gonna bust balls to save that female. It's how I was taught growing up by my parents. I'm not alone in my thought process and that would have to be disinstilled into every man entering service that a woman is just another Soldier and in the heat of battle gets no preferential treatment. That would be a hard pill to swallow, and even tougher to implement.

Response by MAJ Private RallyPoint Member made Sep 9 at 2015 2:44 PM

MAJ Private RallyPoint Member — Wed, 09 Sep 2015 14:44:43 -0400

Ranger School ≠ Service in a combat MOS

There are so many other issues, all discussed ad nauseum. The only criteria should be whether or not including women in certain positions makes the organization better. Not whether it is in their personal interest.

Response by MCPO Roger Collins made Sep 10 at 2015 10:42 AM

MCPO Roger Collins — Thu, 10 Sep 2015 10:42:54 -0400

Lots of favorable comments regarding what is normally a controversial issue. I don't know how many of these are from those that have actually served in a true mano a mano combat situation, but those are the ones I would listen to the most. Sorry, IMO, I believe it will cost lives due to our natural instinct to protect the female of the species. Yes, there are some that could run circles around some males, but they are the few that are extraordinary. However, this is all academic now, for the most part it is fete accompli.

Response by SGT Private RallyPoint Member made Sep 10 at 2015 1:46 PM

SGT Private RallyPoint Member — Thu, 10 Sep 2015 13:46:26 -0400

No as Lon as they don't take every comment as SHARP

Response by SGT Michael Glenn made Sep 10 at 2015 3:03 PM

SGT Michael Glenn — Thu, 10 Sep 2015 15:03:37 -0400

I agree with this Author about males not being able to handle females in these roles....

Response by LCDR Private RallyPoint Member made Sep 10 at 2015 9:58 PM

LCDR Private RallyPoint Member — Thu, 10 Sep 2015 21:58:19 -0400

Not even a little. The Marines just completed a long study that shows pretty clearly that women on the whole do not belong in the infantry.

Response by SSG Delanda Hunt made Sep 15 at 2015 3:24 PM

SSG Delanda Hunt — Tue, 15 Sep 2015 15:24:17 -0400

Sergeants your job will be a lot harder when the girls arrive, especially if they are good looking. There would be instant competition for them, someone will get lucky and start dating them, jealousy will divide the platoon, she then breaks up with one
soldier and start dating a sergeant in the same platoon. Discipline will start to break down and the next thing will be a claim of sexual harassment and the whole company will be involved, morale will be in the gutter and everyone who can will want to transfer out of the platoon and company. This is just one of a thousand reasons why this is such a bad idea. Nobody will want to be in the Infantry and slots will not be filled. I can see bad things coming from this and not one good thing that I could think of. The Draft might be necessary if you can't fill Infantry slots.

Response by CW3 Jim Norris made Dec 8 at 2015 10:54 AM

CW3 Jim Norris — Tue, 08 Dec 2015 10:54:48 -0500

It is both insulting and inappropriate to insult the bond that I and many, many other combat infantrymen feel toward those we fought, bled and sometimes held our brothers as they died. How dare you refer to that experience as a 'myth'. You want to cast aside a tradition that has existed since the formation of the Army, have at it. But, I'll be damned if you will diminish here, or anywhere else within my hearing the Band of Brothers of my 1st Infantry Division wihtout comment.

Response by MAJ Ken Landgren made Dec 8 at 2015 6:02 PM

MAJ Ken Landgren — Tue, 08 Dec 2015 18:02:21 -0500

What is at stake for combat arms is accomplishing missions, killing the enemy, protecting your buddies, and evacuating them if necessary. In combat arms units it I commiserate to have intense feelings as its existence evolves around life and death. If I expect the main gun of an M1 to be loaded in 5 seconds, I refuse a loader who takes 10 seconds. I am sure thousands of combat arms soldiers are thinking down these lines.

Response by 1LT Aaron Barr made Feb 26 at 2016 9:45 AM

1LT Aaron Barr — Fri, 26 Feb 2016 09:45:28 -0500

McKenzie seems to take a lot for granted. It's quite something to me that he can talk about a 'myth' of male bonding while ignoring that the most notable roles women have played in combat were in actual myths. Further, I find it amusing that men would create a myth that has, for pretty much all of human existence, has led to us being killed, wounded, traumatized and broken in our millions while women were largely safe.

No, this isn't about men, it's about basic biology. Our species, as such, is no different from any other animal from a biological perspective; our purpose is to perpetuate ourselves via reproduction. Our societies, which, to paraphrase Socrates, our individuals writ large against the sky, are the same. All of civilization is built around creating a stable environment conducive to bringing about children and raising them into productive, contributing adults. Our biological differences informed things like combat which is why the idea of combat being a male profession is virtually universal across time, geography and culture.

Broadly speaking, men are taller, heavier and a higher proportion of their body mass is muscle which leads men, in general, to be stronger than women, even when a man and woman of the same weight are compared. As such, women are less physically capable of performing the tasks of combat. For example, I was branch detailed through Field Artillery and I question the ability of women to physically be able to load a 155mm howitzer, especially over time as in a FPF situation. Even better, would anybody here, man or woman, that was under attack and had to call in an FPF get a warm & fuzzy if you knew that the entire gun crew of the battery assigned to you were women?

More importantly, from a group survival perspective, men are FAR, FAR more expendable than women in general and young men especially when compared to young women be that group a family, town, clan/tribe, nation or our entire species. Again, biology is behind this; under 'ideal' conditions, a man could easily father more children in a month than a woman could bear in her entire life. As a group, our survival is more impaired by the loss of 1 woman than 100 men, at least in terms of continuing our group's existence into the future by having children.

Whether its instinctual or realized, even at the subconscious level, men know this. During WWII, the Soviets used co-ed units and these suffered appalling casualties. Some of this was from the women not being up to the task but a lot more of it derived from the men taking too many risks to try and protect the women. So much so was this the case that Stalin discontinued the practice citing unacceptable casualty rates. I'm going to repeat that as it bears repeating; women in combat roles led to such high casualties that they were unacceptable to Josef Stalin.

Nor do I believe that the 'if you can do the job you should be allowed regardless of gender' argument will stand up for very long. I give it less than a year before the social engineers are concluding that there's just not enough women in combat roles to suit them. Then you'll see the standards watered down, either directly via gender-specific requirements or just lowered across the board. This cannot help but decrease combat effectiveness, increase casualties and hurt us badly in the long run.

I don't think that it takes a very high level of intelligence or investment in time and thought to see what I've discussed above. Sadly, we live in a culture that conflates equality of rights and before the law to mean equality of outcome and sameness of circumstance peddled by most of the influential in the media, politics and academia. This is simply not true and it will result in a lot of wasted money at best, a lot of flag-draped caskets of KIAs that need not have been at worst. We're going to be spilling a lot of blood on the altar of political correctness, diversity uber alles and stupidity before this is through and it's pathetic.

Response by LTC Paul Labrador made Feb 26 at 2016 5:57 PM

LTC Paul Labrador — Fri, 26 Feb 2016 17:57:58 -0500

I think it is lazy analysis to discount the affect of the nation's culture on how small unit bonding occurs and how the genders interact. If you want a recent example of how females affect males in combat, one only needs to look to Israel. Israel used to have co-ed combat units because they HAD to. However, what they found was that female casualties hit morale harder than male casualties. Also, males went out of their way to protect the females, putting males in undue danger. I don't remember if this was from Yom Kuppor or the 6 Day War, but afterwards, Israel made combat units male only. This is not saying females weren't capable of fighting. This is saying that cultural impact cannot be blithely dismissed as a non-factor.

Response by SGT Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 27 at 2016 1:21 PM

SGT Private RallyPoint Member — Sat, 27 Feb 2016 13:21:29 -0500

I have remembered some things since I posted this blog. When I worked at a chemical plant, every year we had shutdowns, or turnarounds, as we called them, and we had 175 to 220 foot towers we had to climb up and go into. After the man hole covers were removed and the tower cleared of chemicals, women technicians along with men, climbed inside of those towers and used wrenches and other tools to remove the trays in the tower. We started at the top and worked our way down to the bottom manhole. The women worked hard, if not harder than some of the men. It reminded me of a military team, working together to accomplish the same goal. We depended on each to watch each other's backs, while in the towers. When we got tired, we took small breaks, in the tower. The woman I worked with was as feminine as a woman can be, but on the job, she worked as hard as any man, and got sweaty and dirty, and never complained. These were 12 hour shifts. The only time we got out of the towers were to eat and use the restroom. The oncoming shift made shift relief inside the towers.
We had ERRT (Emergency Rescue Response Teams), and they're men and women, who go inside towers, buildings, etc., when someone has gotten hurt. We trained in spaces where you couldn't see anything, and were only two person compatible. We had helmet headlights, and first responder gear, I.E., 1/2" ropes, stainless quick connects, flat board, stainless carribeaners, web harness gear, and hand tools in case some of the equipment had to be removed. Usually, the women, being smaller, went into the small space, secured the injured with a neck brace and put the injured on the flat board, tied them down with harness webbing, and all by herself, pushed the injured out of the hole far enough for someone to help get them out the rest of the way. We practiced stopping bleeding, wrapping them with gauze and tape, and tying them securely on a flat board, ALONE.
We also had to practice chemical fire fighting techniques, in which we would climb a 50' tower or cooling tower with two, 1" fire hoses, which weighed well over 50 lbs. We went to Texas A&M fire fighting school every summer for fire fighting and rescue practice. We went to Chorpus Christy for a week and practiced in the bottom of the Air Craft carrier, USS Lexington. It didn't matter if it was 100 or 30 degrees. We all practiced.

My thoughts about this, demonstrates how a female can adapt, and be on her own to accomplish saving a life, or/and adapt from a rescue to a body recovery. They can do the job. When these females were hired, being in the ERRT was voluntary, and everyone of them would volunteer. If they decided it wasn't for them, they could get off the ERRT. None of them ever got off the team. They were good technicians and ERRT members. They can do any job given to them, if the desire, to be the best, is there, just like a man.

Response by PFC Tuan Trang made Feb 27 at 2016 4:40 PM

PFC Tuan Trang — Sat, 27 Feb 2016 16:40:02 -0500

I'm fine with all combat field open to women, but lower the standard is something that i woudn't agree with.