RAW360: One Former Soldier's Perspective

One Former Soldier's Perspective

R. Alex Whitlock

Serenity over at Serenity's Journal has an informative post about her experience in the armed services as a woman and relates it to recent proposals and fears over a draft:

One of my drill sergeants...although for a different platoon, was a female soldier and we in 2nd platoon in basic absolutely HATED her. She was such a bitch to us at every opportunity. When we gradutated, she handed us an envelope and we never saw her again. Inside that envelope was a letter she had hand written to all of us females. She explained why she had been a raging hag to us for 18 weeks. She explained what we should expect, how we would be viewed, how we can overcome this. She explained that there was no place for whining and complaining and acting like a priss in "this man's army." And she was right. The biggest reason that a female soldier needed to prove herself was because the male soldiers needed to know they could trust her to fight right alongside them when necessary. They didn't need some little girl out there who was going to cry if she broke a nail or got dirty or was tired.

So while I was working my ass off to prove myself, every action I did, every word I said was very closely scrutinized, looking for an excuse not to trust me. It was difficult to prove myself during "down time" but when we went out to the field, I got just as dirty, carried just as much as the guys, marched just as far, dug just as many foxholes, apprehended and successfully searched just as many "EPW"s, (I was an MP), and bitched no more than the guys. I did not care what my hair looked like. I did not care if my nails broke. I did not care if I was filthy. This was not the time nor the place to give a damn about my physical appearance. This was the time to protect my fellow soldiers.

We were out in the field one day and all those who were higher ranking than me were "killed" and I found myself in charge of an entire platoon for the very first time in my life. Even during a field operation, that is an enormous amount of responsibility to place on someone not even out of their teens. I will never forget that after it was realized I was next in line, all heads swiveled to me, all eyes were on me, all were waiting for me to make the next decision. I made it, and all my fellow soldiers trusted my decision. No one questioned me, no one went behind my back and did it their way, no one tried to overstep my new found authority. The trust was so instilled in all of us that they had complete faith that I was doing the right thing.

The proposals for a draft are most notably coming from opponents of Person Gulf II, Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY) and Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE). I think that's telling as the fear and paranoia is the desired effect to bring down support for the war and draw more parallels between PG2 and Viet Nam. It's patently dishonest and I've lost a lot of respect for Hagel in the process (Rangel never had much to begin with).

Posted to Wars and Rumors of War

Observations

Adrianne Truett wrote:

I think there's good arguments for something like the draft. Not a real draft, but what Germany (and, AFAIK, some other European countries) has. A year of service. Either you join the military for a year (or somewhat less) or you work somewhat longer than a year doing community service. Not sex-specific (the main problem I have with the current SS registration), and without the problems caused by mandatory military service across the board (some of which are the reasons for the sex-specific SS registration). Rather than having draftees opposed to the country, to the military, etc., who will work against their own fellow soldiers (what we'd probably end up with in a draft today), or uninterested and inept people who -- even if they're well-intentioned -- are more trouble than benefit (what I hear we had in Vietnam), you get everybody involved in something worthwhile.

Now, I'm not arguing for this, but I do think it's better than an Israeli-style across-the-board mandatory year of military service, given the people it would be applied to.

4/24/2004

R. Alex wrote:

There've been arguments brandied about for a national service requirement. Most prominantly by John McCain, though others have hopped on that bandwagon. I believe that John Kerry is actually supporting a voluntary system where people who give a year of their life "in service of the community" will get some of their college paid for.

In any case, even if Kerry's model were the same as McCain's (which I don't believe it is, though I could be wrong), that's a far cry from what Hagel and Rangel are doing, which is primarily meant to scare the bajeezus out of the middle class, draw more parallels to Vietnam, and hinder support for the war.

It's also worth noting that the objective of this tactic is not even Kerry's policy of getting the U.N. in there, but rather an abject retreat. That's the main reason I'm so furious with Hagel at the moment.

4/25/2004

Add an Observation

Comment spam is an ongoing problems that we're trying to address. Previously we required people to create accounts and log in. I am thankful to say that is no longer the case. We're giving Captcha another try and are playing around with a text-based Q&A variant of Captcha. So bear with us as we try to figure out how to best get a handle ont he problem. Please note that any comment on a post more than 30 days old will go into the moderation queue, where I will get to it when I can which could be once a week.

Observations

Add an Observation

SEARCH

LOGIN

powered by