James Mattis For Secretary Of Defense
BY Herschel Smith
8 years ago
Mattis, now a distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution in California, has questioned whether women are suited for what he called the “intimate killing” of close combat, and whether male commanders would balk at sending women into such situations.
Mattis also said he was concerned about “Eros” in the trenches when young men and women live in close quarters in the “atavistic” atmosphere of combat. “I don’t care if you go anywhere in history where you would find that this has worked,” he said of putting “healthy young men and women together and we expect them to act like little saints.”
In periodic speeches to the Marines’ Memorial Club in San Francisco, Mattis said that the U.S. military is a “national treasure,” and it is inevitable that women would want to serve in every MOS.
“The problem is that in the atavistic primate world” of close-quarters combat, “the idea of putting women in there is not setting them up for success,” Mattis said. He stressed that he was not talking about whether women could perform the required amounts of pushups, pullups and other physical requirements — “that’s not the point.”
Commanders must consider “what makes us most combat effective when you jump into that room and you’re doing what we call intimate killing,” he said. “It would only be someone who never crossed the line of departure into close encounters fighting that would ever even promote such an idea” as putting women into close combat.
If nominated, Mattis would almost certainly be challenged on women in combat in confirmation hearings before the Senate Armed Services Committee, which has six women on the panel.
One of them is Sen. Joni Ernst, an Iowa Republican who retired as a lieutenant colonel after 23 years in the Army Reserves and Iowa National Guard. Ernst, who served a deployment in Operation Iraqi Freedom and is the first female veteran in the Senate, has applauded the opportunity for women who meet the standards to serve in the combat arms.
Joni Ernst isn’t qualified to shine shoes for Mattis. And Ernst never engaged in combat, so I don’t give a shit what she has to say about anything on this issue.
But there are progressives in the GOP just like the Democratic party. Women, if I have any reading this column – and I hope I do have female readers for all of my columns – always remember this. Never forget. Progressives want to see women perish in combat and have a deleterious effect on combat effectiveness of the unit because of physical differences between men and women. They want to see you die, and they want more men to die because of you.
Progressives don’t care about the military, and they don’t care about women either. But everyone already knows that.
On December 2, 2016 at 7:34 am, Josh said:
Can we recognize for a moment that we don’t nearly deserve such a man as Mattis as SecDef? I don’t think I’ve ever seen a man so perfectly qualified for a position, ever, and our country isn’t deserving of his service past or future.
Perhaps that will one day change. Perhaps he will help that change along.
On December 2, 2016 at 8:54 am, Frank Clarke said:
Having never been in combat (4F — physically, mentally, or morally unfit for service — they never said which, although the doctor did suggest that my 20/800;20/600 vision might have played a part) I can’t speak with the authority of one who’s been there but… “deadlier than the male” had to arise from SOMEBODY’s experience.
My household includes a wife, three daughters, a cat, and a dog, I shoot better than the cat or the dog. The daughter (five-foot-two, eyes of blue, 125 pounds soaking wet) who instructs the Florida Highway Patrol how to shoot has promised to help me move up in that ranking, but at 73 I’m not sure she has enough time left.
Having witnessed more than a few estrogen-fired differences of opinion, I’m unimpressed by unsupported assertions that women can’t kick ass when they decide the time is right. Yeah, 5’2″ 125 isn’t going to be much use against 6’3″ 260, but he had better not be near the dangerous end of her .357.
On December 2, 2016 at 10:08 am, Inventive said:
My wife can out shoot me with a handgun, all day everyday, so I do understand where you’re coming from. But we’re not talking about theoretical encounters or one off situations. We’re talking about the rigor of continuous combat…
From a physical, emotional and indeed spiritual standpoint, men are consistently better suited for killing people.
On December 2, 2016 at 10:57 am, Blake said:
The only unsupported assertion is the one you make regarding women kicking a** when the time is right.
There are plenty of studies out there that show that women do not hold up under the rigors of boot camp, let alone combat. It is also well-documented that training standards had to be normalized in order to graduate women from boot camp.
I honestly cannot believe you’re that uninformed about what combat stress does to the female physique.
On December 3, 2016 at 7:49 am, Frank Clarke said:
Well, I did say I’ve never been there, and at 73, with arthritis, gout, heart disease, and other typically-age-related frailties, I’m not likely to ever.
I do see your point, though.
On December 4, 2016 at 7:20 am, DAN III said:
Mr. Clarke,
I am not a fan of females in the military except perhaps in the medical field.
My experience with female Army trainees is they experience a multitude of injuries after only several weeks at basic combat training. Moreso than their male counterparts. The bulk of their injuries are stress fractures in the hips and lower extremities.
For those of you who are so supportive of the female gender, I have proposed an idea. That a provisional infantry battalion consisting of nothing but female “infantry” be created. All support personnel female only. Move them into the hills of Afghanistan for a 60 day Search & Destroy mission to hunt Hajii in our never ending war. My expected result would be utter failure. For simply three reasons:
1. Women are not men. Physically, mentally or morally.
2. The women-in-combat argument is predicated on women working INTEGRATED with men. Men picking up female slack. No men. No mission success.
3. Social justice does not win battles.
This soetoro-obama military wants women as combat arms troops integrated into combat MOSs as equal partners. Males will be there to support their fellow female infantry/artillery/tanker “person”. I.e., men will be there to balance the combat scales. To pick up the slack of the 5’1″, 114 pound female who can’t carry her 70 pound ruck and her assigned SAW at 10,000 feet in Paktia province.
Should Mr. Trump’s nominated SECDEF Mattis not terminate the female-in-combat social justice policy of soetoro-obama, I fear that many good men will suffer and die at the hands of social justice….and their assigned, female squad members.
Put women back in the kitchen where they belong. Not in an infantry squad, a tank crew or on a cannon crew. It is time to return to fighting battles to win wars. Not to progress “social justice”.
Bring back the Spirit of the Bayonet.
On December 4, 2016 at 8:15 am, Billy Mullins said:
Women “belong” in any job for which they are qualified, sir. In a society at a different technological level women might better be suited to the role of homemaker but at our current level they are suited to perform pretty much any task for which they possess the necessary physical, intellectual or psychological qualifications.
As for your proposed test, all it would prove is that some (most?) women should not be grunts. There is a light years-wide gap between indiscriminately integrating women into EVERY combat MOS and saying that all women belong in the kitchen.
Oh, and the very last thing anyone who knows me would ever label me as is a liberal/progressive/SJW type. I just prefer to judge people upon their individual merits as opposed to their skin tone or plumbing.
On December 4, 2016 at 3:02 pm, DAN III said:
Mr. Mullins,
You’re welcome to your opinion. May I ask what your opinion is based on ? Would it be Army or USMC combat arms experience ? Or is your opinion based on a feel-good social justice argument ?
Of course you did have to go down that “racist” road. Doesn’t surprise me. But, regarding the “plumbing” of a woman. Yes. They belong in the kitchen and not combat arms or the military in general.
Close combat is brutal, in your face conflict. But, in your social justice world of fairness and equality, women can do anything. But, in my world, they are not the equal of men. Yes. I am a sexist. When I walk with a lady I do so on the street side. I still hold doors open for a woman, even though half of them can’t say “thank you”. And I still address them as Ma’am. And my example is a perfect example of females NOT being in combat arms let alone the military.
Time to win battles. But, we won’t Susie as a Grunt, Tanker or Cannon-cocker.
I’ll be interested in reading your reply to my above questions.
On December 5, 2016 at 8:11 am, Billy Mullins said:
If you knew anything at all you would know I am the last person (aside from your august self, of course) anyone would label SJW.
While I did my time in the USAF, I did serve and my son (who got the cluster on his PH in Desert Storm) has filled me in on just what a lovely experience it was. He was in Kuwait City mere hours after the Iraqis left. While I have never “seen the elephant” I have at least some appreciation of what combat does to a person.
But neither you nor I have any input vis a vis women in combat MOS. All talk her is just so much intellectual masturbation. It may feel good but ultimately it accomplishes nothing.
On December 2, 2016 at 10:15 am, Col. Douglas Mortimer said:
Isn’t Joni Ernst the one who claimed she was going to Congress to drain the swamp and change the DC culture and promptly became part of the Rino establishment? I bet when she got there, she was told to sit down and shut up as a freshman Congresscritter.
On December 2, 2016 at 10:41 am, Fred said:
The brainwashing has got to stop. Women are better shooters than men for preciously the reason that they are not qualified to fight. Women calmly squeeze the trigger, an act that has zero to do with the way God designed men and women. I don’t want to get into a dual, in the open, at 15 yrds with an experienced women but I promise you, none of those women want to follow me up into the back hills of Tennessee to see which one comes back down. The very notion of this, to a woman, is ridiculous because our design differences go well beyond the physical.
God made men to work, protect, hunt, build, and make hard decisions to ensure the survival of the tribe. God made women to help men, to nurture, gather, encourage and yes, even to inspire. These traits of women are not belittling to mention. This notion is absurd and frankly, brainwashing. Women are necessary to the proper raising of children, and maintaining a family and CRITICAL to nurturing that familial relationship without which all of society falls apart. But these qualities are not for and do not translate into killing, they are the very converse. These wonderful attributes of women are OF GOD, ON PURPOSE, BY DESIGN. To attempt to redesign this in a fashion that fits a notion of a godless world is an affront to the Natural Law and a rebuke of the LORD himself by the unholy and misguided followers of evil.
I might add that when this beautiful nurturing and loving desire that God has placed in the hearts of women is tried on a societal scale it is ruinous to that society. A society run by women is one that will not fight, will not risk. Men were designed by God to lead because some people must be ‘hurt’ in order for the whole of mankind to advance. We are not all equal. A nation can not be nurtured into success, it must be lead. A society nurtured by a women run governmental structure is destructive to that society. Call me the sexist, racist, misogynist Fred. I guess I’ll report to the reeducation camp first thing Monday.
On December 5, 2016 at 3:07 pm, Jack Crabb said:
Hear, hear! Very well done, Fred. I would have gone straight to profanity.
Also, it seems Billy Mullins is only addressing one half of the Mattis argument – the “intimate killing” part, while completely ignoring the “Eros” portion.
We can only hope Mad Dog can put some sanity back into the military and in doing so, restore some of the honor that these latest turds have removed.
On December 2, 2016 at 12:17 pm, Ned Weatherby said:
YES!
On December 2, 2016 at 3:35 pm, Phil Ossiferz Stone said:
Hopefully he can weed out the queers from combat arms as well, and get the trannies out entirely.
On December 3, 2016 at 5:49 pm, Mack said:
See this:
* http://freebeacon.com/national-security/gillibrand-vows-oppose-mattis-secdef/
On December 4, 2016 at 8:04 am, Billy Mullins said:
How about we continue to allow women in the combat arms but keep them out of MOS for which they are not physically qualified. It seems to me the qualities Fred mentioned would make women eminently qualified as scout-snipers. Not having ever been in a modern tank, MICV or AFV, I cannot say for sure but I would suspect women could function in some positions in the crew of such a vehicle. My understanding is that certain aspects of women’s physiology would potentially make women excellent candidates for both attack and transport pilots. Why would they not be able to perform as combat medics? Or security Police at forward air bases. Seems that, other than as grunts, there are a lot of MOS/AFS/Rates where women could serve – in combat – without actually being grunts. And why couldn’t a woman BE a grunt if she possesses the required minimum level of physical ability.
Note: I am not in any wise suggesting we forcibly integrate women into every specialty. And we should NEVER compromise or “normalize” in physical fitness requirements or training. What I AM suggesting is not to preclude anyone from serving in the armed forces in any capacity for which they might otherwise be qualified solely because of the phenotype or genotype that they were born with.
On December 4, 2016 at 3:17 pm, DAN III said:
Mr. Mullins,
“….I would suspect women could function in some positions in the crew of such a vehicle (a tracked vehicle, correct ?).
No, no, no Mr. Mullins….your social justice argument of a women functioning “in some positions of the crew” is a No-Go. No men allowed in the tank crew. Only women crew members.
The entire tank crew breaks track. All four of them. Guess you never broke track of an MBT in the mud of Hohenfels or Grafenwohr, have you ? Or you most certainly never had to load up your track with the basic load of main gun rounds, have you ?
You just don’t have a clue. But, you’ll continue to justify your arguments with an “understanding” or a “I suspect”.
On December 5, 2016 at 8:30 am, Billy Mullins said:
“No, no, no Mr. Mullins….your social justice argument of a women functioning “in some positions of the crew” is a No-Go. No men allowed in the tank crew. Only women crew members.”
“Guess you never broke track of an MBT in the mud of Hohenfels or Grafenwohr, have you ? Or you most certainly never had to load up your track with the basic load of main gun rounds, have you ?”
You are pretty good at knocking down straw men, aren’t you, Danny Boy. While not every woman would be able to handle the physical part of serving in the crew of a tracked fighting vehicle, I would not want to bet my home that are none. Would you? I wrote in an answer to one of your earlier screeds that I had never served in any sort of tracked vehicle. I spent my 10+ years in the USAF making sure Pilots could communicate with control towers (among other assigned tasks) so of course I could not have been part of such a crew. Seems I knew (“knew” because he died in a collision some years back) an NG Captain who was a tanker. We once talked about women in combat and he was the one who opined about women serving in the crews of Tanks, AFVs and APCs. He seemed to think some women would fit in nicely.
You appear to have a problem with reading comprehension. Unlike a true SJW (the scrofulous, base canard with you I defame me), I do not advocate willy nilly pushing women into COMBAT MOS. I, unlike your august self, simply believe that each INDIVIDUAL be considered for placement wherever they desire to serve IF they meet minimum standards. But, as I wrote earlier, neither you nor I have any input vis a vis women in combat MOS. All talk here is just so much intellectual masturbation. It may feel good but ultimately it accomplishes nothing.
On April 21, 2018 at 9:55 pm, Georgiaboy61 said:
Re: “But there are progressives in the GOP just like the Democratic party. Women, if I have any reading this column – and I hope I do have female readers for all of my columns – always remember this. Never forget. Progressives want to see women perish in combat and have a deleterious effect on combat effectiveness of the unit because of physical differences between men and women. They want to see you die, and they want more men to die because of you.”
“Progressives don’t care about the military, and they don’t care about women either. But everyone already knows that.”
Women are unsuited to military service in the combat arms branches (and many other areas of the military besides) not only on the basis of physical differences between men and women, but because of the effect women have upon men by their very presence. Specifically, female personnel – even highly-qualified female personnel – are enormously destructive of unit cohesion, espirit de corps, and combat readiness in heretofore all-male units.
Rather than recapitulate the mountain of data that supports the thesis above, I would simply refer interested readers to the following books, all of which are well-done and exhaustively-documented.
“Women in the Military” – Brian Mitchell
“The Kinder, Gentler Military” – Stephanie Guttman
“Coed Combat” – Kingsley Browne
Mitchell is ex-military (U.S. Army); Guttman is a reporter with many years of experience covering the U.S. military; Browne is a lawyer and also a Ph.D.-level scientist.
No modern nation has successfully-used women in combat on a long-term basis. A number of nations in Europe have experimented with allowing women into the combat arms, including the Scandinavian nations, Holland and some others – but none of these nations or their militaries are on war footing or are engaged in a war at the present time, as the U.S. is.
During the Second World War, the USSR fielded large numbers of women in the Red Army out of sheer necessity, thanks to extraordinarily high losses suffered against the invading Germans. Some of these women fought in the combat arms, including women who were fighter pilots and who were snipers. A number of these individuals – for example, Lyudmila Pavlichenko, who scored an impressive 309 credited kills as a sniper – distinguished themselves in action. However, that did not change Red Army policy, which was to purge women from the ranks as soon as possible after the war ended and the crisis had passed. Despite the contributions of women in specialist roles, their overall presence in the ranks was found not to be worth the costs imposed.
During the early days of Israel, when the new nation was fighting for survival against Arab enemies on all sides, women were tried for a period of time in the ground combat arms. Women were fighters in the paramilitary Haganah for a time in the late 1940s and 1950s, before Israel put an end to using women in combat. It was found that Arab forces, upon learning that they were fighting women, tended to resist even more-fanatically – and when female members of Haganah were captured, they were routinely raped, and often tortured to death afterwards. Today, Israel routinely uses women as trainers in the combat arms, i.e., tank school, etc. – but does not send women into combat proper. They, too, found that the cost-benefit ratio simply wasn’t favorable – and wisely ended the practice.
The U.S. military claims to have successfully integrated women into all areas of the armed forces, combat and non-combat functions alike. This is the feel-good story which is trumpeted in the press and the electronic media. This version of events, however, is less than the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth – because for years the U.S. military has systematically lied about the “success” of women in uniform, in particular by exaggerating their successes and minimizing – or hiding entirely – their failures and shortcomings.
In short, the armed forces – under sustained assault from the cultural Marxists of the left – have learned to lie not only to the American people but also to themselves and their comrades.
A prime example lies in how male and female recruits and officer trainees are recruited, trained, graded, selected for assignment and promoted.
Back in the 1980s when women first started entering the U.S. military in large numbers outside of their traditional roles of healthcare and rear-area support functions, it quickly became apparent that female recruits were not keeping pace with male recruits in measures of physical fitness and other areas of training.
When confronted with ironclad evidence that women couldn’t run as far as fast as men, or do as many pushups or pull-ups, the honest thing to do would have been to report these findings to Congress and modify service-wide policy on that basis. However, the U.S. Army high command and other services weren’t interested in doing the honest, hard thing – they were interested in doing the politically-expedient thing, the politically-correct thing – military readiness be damned.
The U.S. Army came up with something they term “Gender Norming.” Big Green will try to tell you that this system treats male and female members of the Army alike, but that is a blatant falsehood. Gender norming is nothing more than a handicapping system, not unlike that found in golf to level the playing field between expert and novice players.
The critical takeaway here is that the army has vastly different physical fitness standards to which it holds recruits and serving members. This is easily proven. Examine the current PFT standards for a 25-year old female soldier and then compare them to those for a 50-year old soldier.
According to the 2018 standards, in order to “max out” the pushup portion of the test, a fifty year-old male soldier needs to do 59 push-ups. Conversely, a twenty-five year old female soldier needs to do only 46 pushups to max out her score. A twenty-five year old male soldier, however, needs to do 75 pushups to max out his score. A fifty year-old female soldier maxes out her push-up score with a paltry 31 reps.
Obviously, the standards expected of men and women are very different – and nowhere near equivalent, as the army brass try to claim. Women, taken en mass, dilute physical readiness of the army, force-wide, by as much as 30-40% on the basis of these data.
Nor does the game-playing stop there. Back in the 1980s, the brass began receiving reports of female recruits have trouble with specific tasks expected of typical male recruits – such as the grenade throw. Large numbers of female recruits were unable to throw a typical M67 fragmentation grenade (or its practice analog, the M69) far-enough to escape the blast cone.
Rather than admit the politically-incorrect and inconvenient truth, the army simply changed the test – watered it down to make it easier for women to pass. This was done by having the grenade toss be underhanded for a few feet over a concrete barrier – a test easy for most anyone to pass.
Certain parts of training which gave female recruits trouble, such as land navigation – were de-emphasized or omitted all-together. These tests, termed “gender biased,” were replaced by cooperative tests women could pass by working together. instead of having to carry a wounded comrade to safety alone or with one other female soldier, females in teams of four were allowed to do a litter carry. Male soldiers still had to do the test the older and harder way.
Even in those rare cases when atypical female recruits and trainees are able to pass selection into combat arms units, their presence in and of itself is disruptive and enormously destructive of unit cohesion, espirit de corps and the male bonding and trust which are so critical to effectiveness in combat.
Being the unapologetic traditionalist he is, his writer is utterly opposed to women anywhere in the military save in the roles for which they are best-suited, i.e., rear-area support and healthcare, but if it is decided that women “must” be allowed into all other areas of the military – including combat arms (whether air, land or sea) – then they ought to be segregated into all-female units – just as the Soviet military did with their women in the Second World War. Doing this would at least minimize the destructive effects female personnel have upon heretofore all-male formations.
In closing, it ought to be remembered that military service is not a right, as the cultural Marxists so often try to claim. Rather, it is both a duty and privilege. Historically, the Supreme Court has always held that the armed forces, because of the unique nature of their respective missions, must have the final and absolute right to accept or reject personnel as they see fit, according to selection criteria they have established and believed to be correct.
Forcing Cultural Marxist social experimentation onto the armed forces by judicial/legislative fiat, as has been done since the 1980s by the left and its political allies, is nothing less than criminal negligence and irresponsibility – negligence and irresponsibility which will eventually be paid for in blood and lost battles and wars.