Commander: 'Cowards' pushing women into combat

Earlier this year, then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey announced they were lifting the ban on women serving in ground combat operations, a move one Army expert and author says is the result of an aggressive feminist agenda and military brass unwilling to stand up to politicians and champion military readiness over political correctness.

"If you look at the chiefs of the services, none of them have direct ground combat, so they really don't know what we're talking about here. There's a radical feminist agenda here, and they never would have been selected by the Obama administration ... unless they agreed that they would move forward on these particular agendas," retired U.S. Army Lt. Col. Bob Maginnis, author of "Deadly Consequences: How Cowards Are Pushing Women Into Combat," told WND.

"They know what the facts are, but they're cowering with a silence, much like the people on the Hill are cowering because they have a constitutional obligation to stop this, but they're going ahead with it," said Maginnis, who quickly points out that bowing to politically correct forces was commonplace in the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations and is not unique to the Obama presidency.

The most common argument for allowing women to serve in ground combat is one of equality, that women should have the opportunity to serve anywhere men can serve. Maginnis said that may sound like a nice argument, but the facts tell a very different story.

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"The overwhelming evidence out there on physical, psychological, historical and medical reasons, say no. When we're talking about direct ground combat, I'm talking about smashing heads, shooting at short range, wrestling people in a death struggle to the ground," Maginnis said. "The question that ought to be asked is whether we want to be that kind of society that really puts women into ground combat. Are we that society, and what are the consequences for men, women and children?"

He also said this decision will ultimately lead to American women being drafted for military service on the front lines.

"When, not if but when, because of all the economic and world turbulence issues, we return to a draft and a conscription military, women will be drafted for the infantry and every other position that must be filled," Maginnis said. "We used to call them cannon fodder. Well, your daughters of America will be cannon fodder just like your sons because of spineless people today making decisions that are not in the best interests of our families, much less our country."

Ultimately, Maginnis believes the obvious differences between men and women will hurt readiness if these policies proceed.

"Most people need to understand what every mom and dad in America understands and that is, by and large, women are not little men. They are, according to the Army, about five inches shorter on average, 32 pounds lighter, 37 pounds less muscle mass. They have about half the upper body strength of the average man and three-quarters of his cardiovascular fitness," said Maginnis, who believes the military's solution to those discrepancies is very troubling.

"Standards are being jeopardized, and we see that even today with the experiments that the Army and Marine Corps are conducting where you see in the media that women are going through the infantry officer course down at Quantico. Of course, none have graduated yet because it's so tough and rightly should be," Maginnis said. "You had a couple that graduated from the enlisted infantry course recently. What you don't hear is that they had to abide by two different tests that had gender norm standards. In other words, the standards are different."

While the push for gender equality is behind many of these policy changes, why are feminist organizations so eager to place women in the most dangerous positions possible?

"They want women to be forced into all positions, whether it be direct ground combat, special forces or infantry. They say there should be no prohibition, even if it means it's detrimental to readiness," Maginnis said. "The radical feminists believe in an androgynous world."

With military leaders saluting and accepting these cultural changes in the Armed Forces, members of Congress hardly making any protest and three-quarter of the American public on board with women in combat, reversing this policy seems very remote. Maginnis said only one factor can make the government change course.

"Only if our American people recognize the insan[ity] of a decision that will push their own daughters into direct ground combat against their own wills. Once you've opened Pandora's box, and that's what we've done with this decision, we've gone against history and against psychology and all the physical differences. We're pushing in a direction that will jeopardize the very safety of our nation," said Maginnis, who used a football illustration to explain the deliberate disadvantage the U.S. would be facing on the battlefield.

"If we go down to the University of Arkansas and tell them, 'You have a winning schedule, but this coming game you're going to have to put three women on the front line,' if they put three women on the front line on every play, guess what's going to happen. They're going to lose, and they're going to be the laughing stock of the NCAA," Maginnis said.

"That's what we're being told here. For political reasons, we're being told we have to have a certain percentage of women in direct ground combat and the consequences they could care less," he said. "Unfortunately, you don't have the experience on the Hill, and the generals are too cowardly to say what is obvious. The American people may end up paying a very high price when we do go to war, and we will go to war in a serious way in our not-so-distant future."

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