Another civil rights victory

[tvashtarkatena]

Seems like a chick that can do 50 pushups can fuck up a machine gun nest pretty good, no? Or fly a fighter, or....

[billcoe]

Equal rights? How about this, treat them equal! Let them have the same physical fitness standards as us, after that I will look at them like they are equals on the battlefield. Why should we treat them as equals when we have to do 77 push-ups to get a 100 on the APFT and they only have to do 50? Why are their standards so much lower than ours? Now you want to put them in a job where they will have to carry the weight of a man but their physical standards are so much lower? This isn't a desk job, this is a job where if you can't pull your weight people die. If they make female PT scores the same as males, I am all for this! Let them get out there and spread some hate to the bad guys. After 14 years of service in Combat Arms units, Sof units, and co-ed support units, I have met 1 female that could mentally and physically do the job. She was a fucking stud and people gave her the respect she earned and deserved. 1, out of a few hundred. Just sayin.

 

Don't disagree but isn't it job specific? Isn't that more of a reflection of military training being outdated? The training is appropriate for some (infantry), but how about Pershing Missile Crewman? Seriously, aren't many combat MOS's (aka jobs-careers) going high tech? Women have both the spatial control (think working a controler with yer thumbs) and maturity needed for a lot (didn't say all) of the burden many of the combat mos brings.

[tvashtarkatena]

Nothing impresses the Taliban more than hitting the deck and snapping out a round of pushups.

 

Or maybe its your 50 cal. Hell, I don't know.

[yellowlab03]

Listen, the APFT is a joke... It is. But, it is a base line, it is a standard. The base line, should be the same across the board male and female. I know a female who is a super troop, she scores well above any other females and a lot of males. She is also 4'11" and 98lbs. She can not physically do the job. You can not put body armor on her, an 85lb ruck and a 240 and tell her to keep up with a patrol. Fly helo's? Sure. Run the gun in a truck? Sure, no problem, but you dismount her and now you have to have two or more people split her gear up and carry it. Hell, it sucks doing it and I am 5'11" and weigh 201lbs.

 

And no, there is no job specific PT test.

[prole]

Yeah, let's not pretend the US military is really all that. Maybe allowing fit women will make up for the loss in male fatties.

 

Too Fat to Serve: US Army Gives Tons of Overweight Soldiers the Boot

 

Fifteen times more troops were discharged from the US Army this year due to obesity than five years prior. With scores of recruits unfit to serve due to the extra pounds, the country’s top brass have deemed it a national security concern.

 

­The American Army is discharging servicemen in an attempt to cut its budget, and the first to be given their walking papers are those who have failed fitness tests because of obesity. During the last 10 months alone, 1,625 troops were dismissed from the US army due to being overweight, the Washington Post reported.

 

Over the last 15 years, the figures of obese people actively serving more than tripled. Armed Forces Health reported that in 2010, 86,186 servicemen (5.3 per cent of the military) had at least one obesity-related diagnosis.

 

In 2010, the highest percentage of overweight troops were women older than 40 serving in the Air Force. Marines and troops in other branches under 20 were deemed the most fit.

 

The alarming trend caused the top brass to review the soldiers’ training programs, prompting them to push commanders to discharge all those unfit to serve.

 

“A healthy and fit force is essential to national security. Our service members must be physically prepared to deploy on a moment’s notice anywhere on the globe to extremely austere and demanding conditions,” Commander Leslie Hull-Ryde, a Pentagon spokeswoman, told the daily.

 

Soldiers themselves have in fact argued that the fitness test they have to undergo is too strenuous, with strong, fit servicemen being unfairly excluded.

 

Although younger generations are said to live more sedentary lives while enjoying larger mealtime portions, some servicemen have taken to the Internet to counter that they became overweight due to injuries, not sloth.

 

Blogs and forums are filling up with soldiers and their relatives who have criticized the new policy, claiming the troops are being treated as expendable items.

 

“My son fought for this country and has a wife and 3 young children, the youngest a month old and they are now homeless,” wrote one soldier’s mother, whose son got a knee injury while serving in Iraq and was later kicked out of the military.

 

Another user says that his wife was hurt, gained weight because of a lack of exercise and time to visit the gym, and was eventually dismissed from the forces. "It truly is a sad state, when there are people begging to get out of the Army, and they want to throw out someone who truly wants to serve," he pointed out.

 

Obesity has also become the main cause of ineligibility for recruitment in the US, leading the Pentagon to worry about the impact the trend will have on its fighting forces.

 

Retired Lieutenant General Mark Hertling said in a 2009 speech that 75 percent of civilians who wanted to join the force were ineligible due to being overweight.

 

"Of the 25 percent that could join, what we found was 65 percent could not pass the [physical training] test on the first day. Young people joining our service could not run, jump, tumble or roll – the kind of things you would expect soldiers to do if you’re in combat,” he pointed out.

 

It comes two years after former General David Petraeus lifted the ban on fast food restaurants, such as Taco Bell, Burger King, and Pizza Hut, on military bases in Afghanistan, saying that the eateries “enforce military readiness.” In February 2010, his predecessor General Stanley McChrystal banned 57 fast-food restaurants located on Afghan military bases.

 

During the peak of US military involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan this past decade, the Army allowed recruits to sign up who in previous times would have been considered ineligible, including obese people or those with criminal records. Following a recent order to reduce the active-duty force from 570,000 to 490,000 by 2017, Army commanders have now been tasked with weeding out substandard troops.

[yellowlab03]

Dude don't even get me started on fat people in the Army right now. There are more fat people (male and female) testing the tensile strength of their uniforms than there should be.

 

[prole]

And the gangbangers...geez Louise!

[tvashtarkatena]

Listen, the APFT is a joke... It is. But, it is a base line, it is a standard. The base line, should be the same across the board male and female. I know a female who is a super troop, she scores well above any other females and a lot of males. She is also 4'11" and 98lbs. She can not physically do the job. You can not put body armor on her, an 85lb ruck and a 240 and tell her to keep up with a patrol. Fly helo's? Sure. Run the gun in a truck? Sure, no problem, but you dismount her and now you have to have two or more people split her gear up and carry it. Hell, it sucks doing it and I am 5'11" and weigh 201lbs.

 

And no, there is no job specific PT test.

 

Sounds like a fixable problem to me. Tailor the reqs for the job.

 

I was 36th out of 1200 in the USNA fitness test. Way above hundreds of talented college level athletes (I was on the sailing team cuz I love to party). Yeah, I was in OK shape but it didn't reflect even a remote reality when it came to measuring true athletic excellence, which I clearly did not possess in any discipline.

 

I also scored the highest in my class as a pistol shot. Beginners luck + a good instructor. Now THAT is a fucking LOL.

Edited January 24, 2013 by tvashtarkatena

[KaskadskyjKozak]

Dude don't even get me started on fat people in the Army right now. There are more fat people (male and female) testing the tensile strength of their uniforms than there should be.

 

The military is just a reflection of our society, no?

[yellowlab03]

We have tried numerous times to get a job specific PT standard. It will never pass, mostly because of the females. It isn't even the majority of females, the majority don't want to be in combat arms, it is our civilian leadership trying to politic this shit.

 

Honestly, make one standard for males AND females and I would gladly accept them and most everyone else would too.

[tvashtarkatena]

Roughly speaking, that's true. There is some skewing toward rural areas and geography - the South being one area. The enlisted ranks include more high school graduates but fewer college than average. Household income - its centered on the middle class - not skewed towards the low income end, as is often assumed.

[tvashtarkatena]

We have tried numerous times to get a job specific PT standard. It will never pass, mostly because of the females. It isn't even the majority of females, the majority don't want to be in combat arms, it is our civilian leadership trying to politic this shit.

 

Honestly, make one standard for males AND females and I would gladly accept them and most everyone else would too.

 

Lifting the ban might accelerate the drafting of such a standard.

 

Politicians don't make those standards, anyway, no? I think the military itself handles those details.

[yellowlab03]

There should have never been a double standard from the begining. And if you were an officer in the Navy, you should know how much politicing there is in the service by both civilians and those serving.

[tvashtarkatena]

Oh yes. I know.

 

Practically speaking, however, you have to lighten up on the women for things like pullups in one size fits all requirements in order to siphon off the talented snipers, pilots, and other specialties that a non-pullup doing individual may excel at. The physiological difference are what they are. Which matters most to combat effectiveness in the end? This is not to say your 98 lb PT star should need help performing basic duties - that ain't right.

 

The Navy is different than infantry, of course. Coffee sipping, button pushing, and the willingness to jump a long way into the water when it all goes wrong are more valued skills than carrying heavy loads (although the boiler techs assigned to dump WP over the side in 55 gallon drums at a full run may take exception to this characterization), but the complaints about the double standard were the same then as now. At USNA, Brasso and shirt tucking were particularly valued skills which I unfortunately never really mastered. I was great at getting off base undetected, however, using a wonderful labyrinth of utility tunnels that connected with several manhole covers downtown. We eventually figured out which one had the least car traffic through trail and error. Like any prison, concealment, of weed, booze, and yourself, served as a conduit to softening what could otherwise be an austere existence.

 

In any case, those non pullup doing women went on to be talented pilots and sailors, every bit as valuable and effective as their male counterparts.

 

Lifting the ban will likely produce what change often does - reform in the areas that have needed it for a long time. The military will do what it always does: take way to long too make that happen. This is the same army that witnessed the destruction of every single one of its tanks within 30 minutes of their first encounter with the Germans in North Africa. The army eventually figured enough out to beat back that psychopathy. Figuring stuff out is what an army does.

 

In the end, though, women like Maj. Hegar will finally be recognized and compensated for what they've been doing for years now. That doesn't necessarily require watering down military effectiveness, but it will change the nature of the bond between combat soldiers, as did racial integration.

Edited January 24, 2013 by tvashtarkatena

[tvashtarkatena]

I'd like to present one more idea - the basic role of the military in society.

 

It's not just for defense (or offense). It plays many other roles. It's a jobs program. It can, and often does, expand civil rights. It socializes disparate people around a common purpose.

 

These roles are no less valuable than defense. After all, if we don't put our money where our constitutional mouth is, what are we protecting? Our way of life is more than a 2 ounces of pot in every chicken or someone else's nativity scene on your lawn. It's about the ability to make the most out of one's time here on earth. Historically, most barriers to that have been largely artificial - someone outsider's narrow, assumed, and uninformed view of what you are capable of. There are millions of folks here looking for reasons why other folks they'll never meet can't do things. The road to true greatness is to remove those barriers to see what's possible.

[rob]

Roza Shanina

 

Roza Georgiyevna Shanina (3 April 1924 – 28 January 1945) was a Soviet sniper during World War II, credited with 54 confirmed targets hit, including 12 snipers during the Battle of Vilnius. Praised for her shooting accuracy, Shanina was capable of taking precise bolt action shots on moving enemy targets. She fired in quick succession, effectively eliminating two enemies by double shots. Shanina volunteered to serve as a marksman on the front line.

The Allied newspapers described Shanina as "the unseen terror of East Prussia". She became the first Soviet female sniper to be awarded the Order of Glory and the first servicewoman of the 3rd Belorussian Front to receive it. Shanina died during the East Prussian Offensive while shielding the heavily wounded commander of an artillery unit.

 

[tvashtarkatena]

Could marksmanship be genetic?

 

If so, I see Nastia shooting a ladder of holds from the base for us in our future.

 

In the civil rights business, there are those who focus on what can or has gone wrong as a justification for continued discrimination, and others who are inspired by the exceptional.

 

It's a choice driven by one's attitude. You tend to find what you look for.

Edited January 24, 2013 by tvashtarkatena

[rob]

Another badass woman

 

Amage was a Sarmatian queen who, as Polyaenus reports, ruled as regent for her incapacitated husband in the 4th century BC. She was very warlike, and once sent a letter to a Scythian prince warning him to stop his incursions on her protectorates in the Crimea. When he ignored this warning, Amage rode with 120 men to Scythia and attacked him, killing his guards, killing his friends and family, and personally killing the prince herself "in a sword duel". She allowed his son to live and rule his people on the condition that he obey her edicts.

 

[ivan]

i'm guessing chicks in infantry units gonna be a whole lot harder to rape than chicks fixing humvees....

 

my grandma was in ww2 and is buried in arlington today and i'm quite sure she'd be stoked on this news too.

[tvashtarkatena]

Sniping SS officers.

 

How fun is that?

 

I killed a tadpole once and felt bad about it but holy shit, I'd make an acception for those guys.

Edited January 25, 2013 by tvashtarkatena

[rob]

Imagine Firing quickly enough to hit two moving targets with a bolt-action rifle. Respect.

[yellowlab03]

Until she is stuck in an underground hide site for 6 days with 3 other dudes and has to have her buddy hold a bag to shit in. Been there, done that, fuck that noise.

[tvashtarkatena]

Meh. No worse than Big Wall climbing.

[ivan]

Meh. No worse than Big Wall climbing.

speaking of excellent locations to snipe from - dolt tower woudl allow for much fun w/ el cap meadow

[tvashtarkatena]

popping a couple of shitzus as they bound out of their van-full-of-asians might bump the campsite availability up a bit.

Edited January 25, 2013 by tvashtarkatena