AF Will Team Men, Women on Missile Duty

The Air Force is striking down the last restriction on the assignment of women officers to nuclear missile crews and authorizing mixed teams for duty in underground launch-control centers.

The new policy, effective Jan. 1, will end the current requirement that women must be teamed with other women on the two-person crews that serve at the controls of long-range Minuteman and MX nuclear missiles.

The teams draw 24-hour duty assignments in the small underground bunkers, and the idea of using mixed crews has been opposed in the past by officers’ wives.

Col. Larry Greer of the Strategic Air Command said Tuesday that the change was approved recently in response to complaints. He said men on the crews had complained that women were not carrying an equal share of the alert duty because of the rule that they must be assigned with other women.

The current policy has created scheduling problems, he said. Because a female officer who becomes sick or takes leave cannot be replaced with a man, male officers must serve more frequent alerts.

Under the new policy, a man or woman assigned to a mixed crew will be allowed to refuse if it would make him or her uncomfortable.