Survey says few Army women want combat jobs
FORT EUSTIS, Va. — Only a small fraction of Army women say they’d like to move into one of the newly opening combat jobs, but those few who do say they want a job that takes them right into the heart of battle, say preliminary results from a survey of the service’s nearly 170,000 women.
That survey and others across the Army, publicly disclosed for the first time, also revealed that soldiers of both genders are nervous about women entering combat jobs, but say they are determined to do it fairly. Men are worried about losing their jobs to women; women are worried that they’ll be seen as getting jobs because of gender, not qualifications. Both are emphatic that the Army must not lower standards to accommodate women.
Less than 8 percent of Army women who responded to the survey said they wanted a combat job. Of those, an overwhelming number said they’d like to be a Night Stalker — a member of the elite special operations helicopter crews who perhaps are best known for flying the Navy SEALS into Osama bin Laden’s compound in 2011.
Last year, top Pentagon officials signed an order saying women must have the same opportunities as men in combat jobs, and the services have been devising updated physical standards, training, education and other programs for thousands of jobs they must open by Jan. 1, 2016. The services must open as many jobs to women as possible; if they decide to keep some closed, they must explain why.
The Army says about 200,000 of its 1.1 million jobs are either direct combat or related jobs, such as field artillery or combat engineers. That’s roughly 20 percent of the force, though the direct-combat front-line fighters make up roughly half of that, or about 9 percent.
Throughout last year, the Army emailed questionnaires to active-duty personnel, reserves and Army National Guard members to gauge soldiers’ views on the move to bring women into combat jobs. The results from the survey sent to women showed that just 2,238 — or 7.5 percent of the 30,000 who responded — said they would want one of the infantry, armor, artillery and combat engineer jobs.
Army officials also polled men and women on their concerns about integration. They asked senior female leaders to say whether they would have chosen combat jobs if they’d been given a chance 10 or 20 years ago. All agreed that physical standards for jobs should remain the same.
“The men don’t want to lower the standards because they see that as a perceived risk to their team,” David Brinkley, deputy chief of staff for operations at the Army’s Training and Doctrine Command, said. “The women don’t want to lower the standards because they want the men to know they’re just as able as they are to do the same task.”
Mr. Brinkley’s office at Fort Eustis is filled with charts, graphs and data the Army is using to methodically bring women into jobs previously open only to men. The surveys are helping to shape the education and preparation that women, men and top leaders need to put in place to insure the integration goes smoothly.
The questionnaires, and focus groups that followed them, showed younger men and those who have served with women in the last two years more open to the integration, while midlevel soldiers — especially those in units such as infantry and armor that have not yet included women — were more hesitant.
And there were nagging stereotypes. Male soldiers fretted that their unit’s readiness will be degraded because of what they term “women issues,” such as pregnancy and menstrual cycles. Or they worried that women incapable of the physical demands would be brought in anyway.
Officers were concerned about sexual harassment and improper relationships. The idea of integrated units bothered both military wives and husbands.
Plagued by an increase in reported sexual assaults, the military is putting a much greater emphasis on training, reporting and treatment. But that increased focus, Mr. Brinkley said, has prompted some troops to say they are worried to be in the same room together. The men, he said, worry that anything they say could ruin their careers.
Women across the Army have been getting pregnant for years, and those units have dealt with it. While inappropriate relationships do happen, they are a violation of regulations. So it is up to unit leaders to enforce the Uniform Code of Military Justice in the combat arms units, just as they do in others.
Army leaders were unsurprised by the small number of women interested in combat jobs. “The issue is going to be the propensity of women who want to do some of these things,” said Gen. Ray Odierno, the Army chief of staff. “I don’t think it’s going to be as great as people think.”
According to the survey, the vast majority of the women who expressed interest in combat jobs were in lower ranks, age 27 or younger. Some more experienced soldiers said that if they had it to do over again, they might choose one of the combat arms jobs.
What surprised even Mr. Brinkely was what women named as their preferred combat career. More than 30 percent of respondents cited the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment.