Can Women Cut It in Combat?

Re “In Defense of Women in Combat,” Commentary, July 3: Rosa Brooks apparently sees combat assignments for women as their best chance of success, both in the military and in the wider civilian world.

At bottom, her argument in favor of this policy change seems to be that because women will inevitably be killed in today’s frontless combat, they may as well get full credit for participation. Her attempts to debunk opposing arguments might be more compelling if they were not entirely undercut by biology.

First, she needs to understand that there are no male Marine Corps recruits who are 4-foot-10 and 96 pounds. Any male under 5-foot-6 needs a waiver and to prove his physical fitness. Strength and fitness are required more today than ever, when any street can be a combat zone and a convoy is always a target. A tiny minority of truly fit women might be of comparable strength with their male counterparts, but years of weightlifting will not give a woman greater upper-body strength than a man.

The second biological fact is that women can get pregnant. Until birth control becomes 100% effective and is required of women going into a combat theater, each pregnancy represents a degradation of a unit’s manpower, as well as a logistical problem

Although “studies” may show that men in the military support women in combat, if Brooks were to spend time with those men, she would find that the level of this support is far higher when the questions are asked by senior officers and Congress members.

Combat duty is not a fairness issue, not a right of women in the service; it is a way to win wars, and nothing that obstructs this objective should be suffered in the name of political correctness.

Lisalee Anne Wells

U.S. Naval Reserve

(Ret.)

Long Beach

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Brooks wants women in combat.

My mother, Louise Randall Pierson, a spirited feminist, told us kids, “Women should not be allowed as combat troops because they wouldn’t know when to stop killing.”

What do you think, Rosa?

Frank Pierson

Pacific Palisades

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Louise Pierson was a screenwriter whose autobiography, “Roughly Speaking,” celebrated a woman’s role in surviving and prevailing in the grim years of the Depression. Frank Pierson is a screenwriter and president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.