Female Grunt Officers......Yea or Nay....
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  1. #1

    Female Grunt Officers......Yea or Nay....


    Nearly 300 female Marines have moved into combat-arms jobs that were, up until less than five years ago, previously open only to men. But only one female officer has led a Marine infantry platoon so far.
    Now, the Marine Corps is calling on female lieutenants and captains to consider making a lateral move into the infantry officer military occupational specialty. The decision would require women to attempt the arduous Infantry Officer Course, which prepares Marines to lead grunts in combat.
    Two female Marines have passed the course so far. Women have been allowed to attempt it since 2012.
    The Marine Corps put out a service-wide message this week soliciting female company-grade officers to volunteer to go infantry. The Infantry Officer Course is typically open to second lieutenants just out of The Basic School.
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    The push aligns with a priority Commandant Gen. David Berger set in February to get more women leading grunt units. Berger told Military.com earlier this year that he's not only open to extending the opportunity to first lieutenants and captains, but also women who left active duty before the restrictions blocking them from serving in combat jobs were lifted.
    "If the door wasn't open before, why don't we say, 'OK, you're a captain -- if you want to, we'll give you a shot,'" Berger said earlier this year. "... Or if they left the military or went into the Reserve because it wasn't an option for them, why don't we make it an option?"
    Marine officials did not immediately respond to questions about whether there's a certain number of women they're hoping to see take up the call to attempt IOC. The message says qualified women interested in attempting the course must submit a lateral move package by Sept. 30.
    The possible career switch is open only to those on active duty who haven't yet been considered for promotion to major. They must have completed The Basic School prior to January 2016, when combat jobs across the military opened to women. They must also be in top shape physically with a first-class physical fitness test score, and have current marksmanship and swim qualifications.
    Naval aviators and unmanned aircraft system officers aren't eligible to apply.
    The Marine Corps has struggled to find female officers willing to attempt the grueling 84-day Infantry Officer Course. As of February, fewer than 10 women had attempted it since infantry jobs opened to women in 2016, and two had graduated.
    The Army, which is about two-and-a-half times the size of the Marine Corps, has 489 women serving in the infantry, as of July. That’s still less than 1% of the Army’s infantry branch, which includes more than 61,000 soldiers.
    To date, 52 women have also graduated from Army Ranger School. That famously challenging course is open to both officers and enlisted soldiers. Four women who have earned Ranger tabs have gone on to serve in that regiment.
    Former Capt. Marina Hierl was the first woman to graduate from the Marine Corps' Infantry Officer Course in September 2017. She went on to lead a platoon of grunts with 2nd Battalion, 4th Marines, during a rotation to Australia, and later served as another unit's assistant operations officer before leaving the service at the beginning of this year.
    The second woman to graduate from the Infantry Officer Course went on to become an intelligence officer. That Marine, whose identity has not been revealed, is a first lieutenant serving as 7th Marine Regiment's assistant intelligence officer, said 1st Lt. Cameron Edinburgh, a spokesman for 1st Marine Division.
    On the enlisted side, at least 219 female Marines have moved into combat jobs previously closed to women, according to data obtained by Military.com. The combat engineer MOS has seen the most women joining the field, with 58 as of February. Forty-two have become infantry riflemen, 28 are assault amphibious vehicle Marines, and 25 are Marine Corps cannoneers.
    More than 50 enlisted women have joined grunt units, but Hierl remains the only female officer to command an infantry platoon. Of the more than five dozen female officers who've served in previously closed roles, all but nine have served in just two jobs: field artillery officer and combat engineer officer.
    The Marine Corps has had a pair of female tank officers, three AAV officers and two low-altitude air defense officers.
    Berger in March acknowledged that cultural barriers still exist when it comes to women serving in the infantry. He stressed that a leader's capabilities should be based on performance -- not gender.
    "Male or female, it doesn't matter," the commandant said. "[We infantry Marines] have served alongside males that couldn't hack it in the infantry. Gender doesn't matter. Can you carry the load? Can you do the job? If you can, all the rest works itself out."
    Whether a Marine passes IOC or washes out, everyone should get the same opportunity to try it, Berger said.

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  2. #2
    Super Moderator Platinum Member USMC 2571's Avatar
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    No problem---IF they can hack it. And through no fault of their own, if it is too physically strenuous, for example, then of course, the answer would be no, just like it would be for a male who could not conform to the physical demands. But if no other factors, sure.


  3. #3
    the current commandant seems to be extremely sensitive to "political correctness" issues, and I fear he will arrange for the standards to be lowered to accomplish this "integration" of females into all levels of the Corps.... looks like our "mission" to fight and win wars' has not only been compromised, it has been replaced with a goal to achieve a "politically correct image", regardless of the cost to the Corps' ability to field an effective combat unit.. JMHO

    Si vis pacem, para bellum

  4. #4
    Quote Originally Posted by oldtop View Post
    the current commandant seems to be extremely sensitive to "political correctness" issues, and I fear he will arrange for the standards to be lowered to accomplish this "integration" of females into all levels of the Corps.... looks like our "mission" to fight and win wars' has not only been compromised, it has been replaced with a goal to achieve a "politically correct image", regardless of the cost to the Corps' ability to field an effective combat unit.. JMHO
    I agree top, just like a few years ago,(well back in the 80's) when they first started letting women maintain Choppers, and the women couldn't change out the batteries, when required, out in the field because of the weight, they had to have a man come and do it...
    PC will be the downfall, this CG has already started screwing the Corp over with his downsizing of our Corps...


  5. #5
    As a past 0311, all I can say is there is no way a woman could have stood up to the grueling experience those of us in the Nam line companies (squads) endured. The heat, the weight, the nastiness and filth of simple everyday life sometimes pressed even the best of us at times. Continuously starving, eating the same little bit of shivt day after day. In a grunt squad there are no secrets, what you are made of shows as plain as day. Not a place for modesty or whining. Exhausted, you learn to just get back up on your feet and go forward again, no time or thought for *****ing.

    I haven't even mentioned the simple acts of becoming transformed into a serious born again hard core killer as the endless days, weeks and months go on and on. And the hate you begin to feel that you never knew you had inside. These phycological changes that occur by default, and the numbing that occurs as you hold your best buds as they die in your arms, over and over. All of us knowing, deep inside, that only a very few lucky ones would ever come out of this never-world. Of course, these transformations are what make the Marine Corps Infantry so elite, even within the Marine Corps itself.

    When I joined the MC I had visions of traveling the world and/or wearing a pair of sharp dress blues. Instead all I got to wear were sweat encrusted ragged, rotten and torn jungle utes with the color changed because of that red dust that even stained deep into our skin.

    Once again, I do not believe that MC Infantry is a place for woman. It's one thing to be in a stateside training company, it's quite another to find yourself over your head in the deep shivt of continuous combat.

    Looking back, even with all the hardships, I am extremely proud to have been a Marine Corps Infantry Marine. It's one of those things; I would never do it again, but I would never take anything for my experience. In the Nam, at Hue City and the Arizona, is where I became a REAL Marine. No woman could have ever endure that, besides, instead of being alert on those ambushes all I'd be doing is screwing one of those Bams. Just saying.


  6. #6
    Very well said advanced...


  7. #7
    My Brother Russ says.....a Woman's place is in bed, with him.....Russ was a Marine Gigolo on the side....very famous on the streets of Da Nang....


  8. #8
    Billy, I wasn't that famous, but my squad did call me #1. Just saying.


  9. #9
    about the only "caveat" to this action MIGHT BE if these female grunt officer wannabes have a little of what the VC women I came across in Nam had... the ones that would castrate you and put your head on a pole were some MEAN boitches, make no mistake, and they WERE able to keep up with the men... of course, their way and OUR way were extremely different.. both were hard, but in different ways.. women that were quite capable in a guerrilla role might well fall flat on their face in a line company... only time will tell, but I do think that this action is a mistake, the commandant may have been watching too many episodes of "Strike Back"...

    Si vis pacem, para bellum

  10. #10
    The commandant should be less concerned about being PC, and more concerned about what will best serve the Marines who are on the front lines trying to accomplish the mission. I personally don't think that women should be in the grunt units, but if they are, they damn sure had better be able to meet the same exact requirements that the men have had to meet.


  11. #11
    Quote Originally Posted by Cpl Keller View Post
    The commandant should be less concerned about being PC, and more concerned about what will best serve the Marines who are on the front lines trying to accomplish the mission. I personally don't think that women should be in the grunt units, but if they are, they damn sure had better be able to meet the same exact requirements that the men have had to meet.
    THAT says it ALL, unfortunately we all fear that when "PC" creeps in, those standards will go down just so some wannabe politician or some feminist that will NEVER serve or be required to endure hardships can say "lookie what I did"....

    Si vis pacem, para bellum

  12. #12
    I will always say "NO", and as stated earlier, a Grunt is not for Women, because of the physical nature of the job...

    Nuff said...



  13. #13
    As a former grunt, women are not up to the physical demands. There might be one or two out there, but as a whole, no.


  14. #14
    Marine Free Member FistFu68's Avatar
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    HELL NO


  15. #15
    I was a Grunt and I conclude, that after being in the bush for 2 months, starving for real food, being so dirty, nasty, and filthy that flies constantly fly around you looking for a place to produce maggots. Trying to get your daily 2 hours of sleep in mud holes during the torrential rain storms, scraping fungus off your feet and crotch area, being eaten alive by crazed insects, knowing your Sweetheart is being screwed by your hometown Homies and never knowing if it's safe to fart because of your ever occurring diarrhea, wondering if this is the last day you will breath air .......I am convinced that having a Female Grunt as your wake-up partner in your Listening Post tenure, smiling at you with that mud coated mosquito bite infected face as she exposes her malnutrition ravished breasts for you, all while she is giving you a well deserved hand job, under the pretense of exercising her trigger finger ......would be well worth putting up with her PMS and lack of physical durability......just saying....


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