Mixing Military and Politics

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth issued a new directive that is raising liberal eyebrows.

A two-time combat zone veteran, Hegseth ended his military career when his tattoo was deemed politically scary and extremist. It was the image of a Jerusalem Cross, but hey, in woke world anything and everything can be scary. Hegseth had volunteered for support of the Capital in DC when in the wake of Joe Biden’ election. He was denied the opportunity to serve because of his tattoo.

Make that make sense…..oh that’s right, you can’t!

Jaded by the political wokisms he personally endured Hegseth immediately set about revising standards, and returning the Department of Defense to an era of personal and corporate discipline.

Most recently he issued a directive liberals aren’t going to like. The combat arms branches of the military will now have one fitness standard for both men and women. Soldiers, sailors and airmen will meet that standard or they will not be a frontline warfighter in such branches as Army Infantry, Special Forces, Navy Seals, or Air Force Pararescue.

One standard. An equal standard. Not an equivalent standard.

Women serve our nation with every bit of selflessness, sacrifice and love of country as anyone else. But there will be times when men and women should be separate and distinct.

The same woke policymakers and pundits who swear that a woman can actually change into a man now claim it is unfair for a woman to be required to meet the same standards as a man. Woke politicos always demand equality- until they can’t reach equality - then they settle for equivalent.

Not anymore.

The physical training standards for men and women have always been different. Men were required to do more pushups; women did more sit-ups. It’s a question of anatomy, bone structure, muscle base. It’s just science. Two soldiers, not equal, just equivalent. Why is this important?

Because it highlights the impact of politics affecting military readiness.

The laws that prevent discrimination in virtually any workplace have an exception known as the “Bona Fide Occupational Qualification” (BFOQ). For instance, not hiring someone because they are wheelchair bound is generally prohibited. But you can’t be a fireman whose job requires climbing a ladder. Therefore, courts have allowed BFOQ’s to be established when needed. Hegseth just set a legal BFOQ for the combat arms by mandating a single standard.

A little over a decade ago I was at Fort Benning for the Battalion Commanders Course. We were told then to expect women in Ranger School but assured with a wink and a nod that the standards would not be lowered. There is plenty of evidence to the contrary.

Desperate to portray women as equal to men in every respect, politicians needed Ranger qualified women. In truth, the women who subsequently passed the course were indeed studs who could outpace most men in the world. But were they equal, or just equivalent?

The forced integration of women into combat arms roles was politically driven. With civilian oversight of the military there will always be some measure of politics. Where it goes over the line is when national defense is degraded to make a political point.

I’ve seen it firsthand. In Afghanistan, as a part of the special operations community my team inserted early. My six-man team was collocated with Twelve Special Forces, two Psyops soldiers, and One Air Force Combat Controller. We wore civilian clothes, drove civilian vehicles, grew beards, and sometimes rode horses. We also lived in close quarters, with a bunch of dudes sharing the same outhouse, and rarely bathing. It got a bit ripe at times.

We lived among the Afghan people and adapted our mission posture to fit within their cultural norms as a part of our operational mandate. It was an old-world environment. Despite the Taliban being out of power women still wore Burqa’s in public. Western norms were not their norms whether we approved or not. We dealt with village elders, government officials, warlords and bandits, all of whom were men. It was very clear that thousands of years of cultural taboos were not going to unravel overnight. So, when I was asked about who should replace my team, I specifically made note that in my area they would do well to send an all-male team. It was an operational decision.

But the political powers that be sent out a team with two females. It caused problems. Lots of problems. Especially when one of the females insulted a village elder. Nothing like sacrificing mission security and effectiveness to make sure that we had diversity in the field. Politicians issued a decree, the DoD capitulated, and special operations troops operating in austere conditions got an order that was purely political and affected their mission.

Too often liberal politicians see the military as nothing but a Petrie dish in which to grow liberal experiments. Too often the far-left side of the political spectrum is able to use the military to assist them in feeling better about their progressive policies by means of experimentation, with purely political objectives.

The military exists for the sole purpose of defending our nations interests by winning wars, deterring enemies, securing American interests.

Mixing politics with the military solely for the purpose of political gains do nothing but degrade who we are as a nation, and gets people killed.

Women will continue to serve in our military with honor and distinction but there needs to be a dose of reality mixed with that service. There will be times when the needs of national security transcend whether or not some politician desperately needs to virtue signal about gender equity.

Going forward, we will still have women in the combat arms, attending Ranger School, and serving in frontline deployments, but only if they can meet an equal standard required for all.

Equal, not equivalent.