Neil gorsuch will be sworn in today. Watch the ceremony administered by Justice Anthony kennedy live at 11 00 a. M. Eastern on cspan. After that, democratic senator, chris murphy, talks about u. S. Foreign policy. We have it live at 12 30 eastern also on cspan. Now, a discussion on women in con bat. Speakers discuss the challenges and how allowing women in combat has changed the military from the institute of World Politics, this is just over an hour. Welcome to everybody. My name is mac owens. I am here at the institute of politics. We are an independent graduate school of National Security affairs. We offer three masters degrees, an executive and a professional masters as well. In addition, we have 18 certificates. We are very happy to cosponsor this event with mark moyier, whom i will introduce in just a second. Very important topic. Weve got a great speaker, who who has done a great deal of work in this area. It is a topical topic in the redundancy department. As i say, we are cosponsoring this with the senator for military and diplomatic history. Will you say a couple of words and i will introduce our moderator. I am dr. Mark moyer. I wanted to thank John Winkowski and katy bridges and thanks to lindsey mark kell and daniel varo, Foreign Policy initiative. We do events on history that have relevance to todays issues. I have been hosting an average of one event per week since we reformed nine months ago. We particularly like to bring in people who havent necessarily been heard inside the beltway. There is a tendency, as im sure a lot of you know, to recycle the same speakers. We were able to bring in our speaker from california, and although she is wellknown, hasnt spoken publicly in d. C. Before. This is the first event we have done on this subject. Certainly one that is very relevant to military affairs, because it is not just a cultural issue but one of military capabilities and readiness and people on both sides of the debate contend that their policy is better in terms of maximizing u. S. Military capabilities. We do see a lot of history involved in this discussion. Comparisons with things like bringing africanamericans into the military or women in other parts of the military or changing the policy on gay and lesbian service or the history of women in actual wars. We very much look forward to a discussion of what we have learned and what we should learn from the past and what lessons of the past are not the ones to follow. So, thank you. Thank you for having us. The introductions continue. I would like to introduce elaine donnelly, the moderator today. Elaine and i go back a ways working on this topic in tandem, not always together but for the most part, we have been taking this issue very seriously for a very long time. Elap elaine is the founder and president for the center for military readiness, an independent, nonpartisan, public Party Organization that focuses on military readiness and social issues within the military. She has served on the Defense Advisory Committee on women in the services and more importantly the president ial commission on the assignment of women in the armed forces. She has provided testimony to congress, published articles on military personnel issues and a variety of publications. I think the most important one she did was the one she did for the law review, which laid out many of the legal issues. It was a response to an article by plamadeline morris. So she went to Schoolcraft College and university of detroit. She lives in livonia, michigan. So elaine will now introduce our speaker. Mack owens and i do go way back. The last time i saw you was at the Naval War College when you were a professor there. I was there for a seminar. It was a real thrill to meet you. I have always admired your articles about the issues of women in the military. I want to thank dr. Mark moyer for sponsoring this program and certainly the institute for World Politics for hosting us here today. I have also been a longtime admirer of dr. Anna simons on issues involving women in the military. She has been chronicling the sweep of history right from the start. I have a note from her from 1997. Which were corresponding that far back because of a book that she had wrote. This may be the first meeting of its kind at a crucial time of change in the arld armed forces. This is perhaps the first opportunity which will have to take stock and figure out where are we going with this . Is this a good idea for women or is it not . In 1992, professor anna simons earned her ph. D. In social anthropology at harvard. It is an honor to introduce her. Since then, she has been in the field of academia and teaching many students common sense as well as everything she knows in the field of anthropology. She has been teaching in the Naval Post Graduate School in monterey, california. Prior to that, she was an associate professor of anthropology at ucla. And an visiting instructor in anthropology at duke university. In 2011, she cowrote the sovereignty sluice, a common sense approach to global security. She has conducted Field Research in somalia and ft. Bragg and wrote a book called networks of dissolution dissolution somalia undone. Her list of scholarly articles is six pages long. She has been in a varite of publications. Before she entered into academia, she was involved in politics, an assist staent to the governor of arizona, Bruce Babbitt and an assistant speech writer for president jimmy carter. I first became aware of her when she wrote her book, the company they keep, life inside the u. S. Army special forces. Her husband is a retired special forces officer. That wasnt the only reason she wrote about this. She applied bwhat she knew abou anthropology to analyze that special culture of special operations. We have something in common. Im a civilian but i have such enormous respect for the culture of people who serve the rough men who defend our country. I think their interests, everything they believe, needs to be given more study and more awareness. Dr. Simon has brought insight into the community of warriors. The funny thing is, they comment on social justice warriors. They dont know anything about what real warriors do. Dr. Simon does. I think the reality of civilian control of the military puts on all of us, civilian or former military, we all have a responsibility to watch what happens to the military. They are there to defend us. We need to be there for them, to defend them. With great pleasure, here is professor simons. I should just go back to california now, so as not to disappoint anyone after that introduction. I want to thank iwp and fwi for hosting and i also want to thank mark for having invited me. I think i want to thank mark. I say i think because while ive written on this topic off and on for the past 20 years, publicly speaking out is always fraught. I would say if anyone in the room knows of anyone who is a young aspiring graduate student in psychology, there is probably no better topic to focus on than why people respond so emotionally to the issue of women in combat units. Im going to try to stay dispassionate and to be provocative, because i think thats my pet gonlg cal duty as i view whats been missing from the women in combat debate. I have to do the necessary disclaimer. I am not speak on behave of the Naval Post Graduate School where i teach or any other entity in d. O. D. If only my views were d. O. D. s views, there would be no debate but, of course meanwhile, others in the room like elaine and other invite es have knowledge about this issue. I know others have inside knowledge of the physiological realities of trying to meet certain physical standards. I am going to defer to them during question and answer, during the questions and answers or the discussion about as for the questions i want to raise, they havent gone unasked so much as theyve remained unanswered over the past 20 years. Proponents of those in combat units, those who successfully lobby for lifting the combat exclusion ban have done a masterful job of putting opponents on the defensive. Just the fact that i can use these two words, opponents and proponents signifies who has had the political upper hand. Indeed defense secretary leon panetta was brilliant when he declared that all Ground Combat units would be open to women in january 2016 unless the Service Chiefs could justify which specific units should remain closed. By putting the onus on the Service Chiefs and the civilian secretaries to have to try to defend the status quo, he essentially sandbagged any male in uniform who could only then sound like a chauvinist. Or a dinosaur, if he argued for Ground Combat units staying all male. Those who favored injecting women into Ground Combat units have also long engaged in clever sleight of hand by equating women serving in combat with women serving in combat units. At this point only misogynists doubt womens ability to serve under fire. Combat is not an issue. Combat units are. I dont know who is more anxious on behalf of qualified women to be able to work with them on certain kinds of missions than special operators who some might say comprise the ultimate boys club. From operators perspective, women are already a critical asset for intelligence work, reconnaissance, and certain other sensitive missions. Operators concern, which should be our concern, is how would womens presence help them close with and destroy the enemy more effectively. It cant and wont, unless you believe as some proponents do, that women think sufficiently differently from men. And that without them, combat units are missing womens unique approach. Ill come back to this momentarily. First lets review why we have combat units in the first place and why we should want them to be as single mindedly lethal and focused as possible. Unlike other military units that are responsible for handling logistics, communications, intelligence, and other functions, Ground Combat units exist to take the fight to the enemy and to kill or destroy more of them than they can kill of us, no matter how long it takes, no matter how little support they receive, and no matter how many casualties they suffer. Casualties. Thats what the enemy speaks to inflict. Casualties or attrition is why combat units have to be predicated on interchangeability. When someone is wounded or killed, someone else needs to be sent to take his place. Interchangeability, meanwhile, brings me back to the idea that because women dont think like men, they add value. But if thats the case then women and men arent easily interchangeable, are they . A female casualty could only be replaced by another female, which presents major logistical and other challenges. So which is it . Either men and women do think alike and are eminently interchangable, so as long as they meet the same physical standards, in which case why add women. Or if men and women dont respond to situations similarly and dont think alike, and are eminently whoops, excuse me. Dont think alike, well, then, what does injecting females into small 10 to 12 man groups do to cohesion . Cohesion, thats a term ive come to despair of, thanks to what academics have done to it. Forget about what you think cohesion might mean. As in shared attitudes and affinities. Academics have split it into, theres social cohesion, which is how much people like each other, and then theres task cohesion, which refers to soldiers ability to do a job regardless of their interpersonal differences and dislikes. Increasingly, academics have argued that the only kind of cohesion military units need is task cohesion. To remain effective over the long haul no longer requires that individuals have anything more than the mission in common. Yet has anyone asked those in Ground Combat units or the sergeants major who oversee them how they define cohesion . Or whether academics might have gotten this wrong . Although even more significantly, and what academics dont tackle at all is, what wrecks cohesion . Curiously, the studies so common in the services, special operation command, on gender integration, didnt delve into this. Maybe thats because all sentient adults know what can wreck cohesion. But if you dont seek it, you dont have to find it. Many and women have been each others most consistent distraction since the beginning of time. To pretend there wont be problems when young men and women are thrown together for prolonged periods in emotionally intense situations college campuses, anyone . Defies common sense. It also defies biology. There is a darwinist opposition. Truism. Male competition and female choice. Cast back through history or think back through literature. Mens abiding interest in women and womens interest in having men be interested creates limitless potential for rivalry, jealousy, favoritism, suspicion, distrust, and friction. Why would we want to interject any of this into combat units . Proponents, of course, say that in the thick of combat, no one is thinking about sex or gender. Okay, thats true. But this is also a classic red herring argument. The potential for trouble lurks after or before the bullets are flying. Spend time around soldiers, when theyre coming down from adrenaline highs or are depressed, upset, or bored or frustrated. Theyre prone to all sorts of temptations. Red herring argument number two is that men voice the same objections about blacks and gays not so long ago and they got over those objections. Theyll get over the integration of women, too. Except attraction between the sexes are all together different from racism or bigotry, which lie at the opposite end of interest, disinterest spectrum. Red herring argument number three is that numerous of our allies have opened their Ground Combat units to women so we should too. But why, we should ask, have they done so . One aim for progressive european militaries is to model social justice. Theyre quite explicit about this. Which, of course, they can well afford to be. Why . Because who in the end do they know will come to their rescue . I dont mean any disrespect, but few of our allies can get anywhere without our logistical help. Thus leaving our Ground Combat units is the only thin line between us and harm. So how, again, will injecting women into their midst make them more lethal in combat . And why havent proponents been made to answer this . Or maybe advocates here would tell us that our Ground Combat units likewise need to serve purposes other than combat as well. For instance, maybe they need to do something beyond excelling at fighting and need to exemplify social justice or equity. But if equity is what proponents care about, then why dont they lobby for a draft . And universal service . Or for those who invoke patriotism, love of country, and womens desire to defend the United States in the same way men do, why dont they argue for allfemale units . Or for those concerned about career advancement, which does traditionally favor combat officers, why not challenge the Promotion System overall, since anyone, male or female, who is not in a Ground Combat unit, must be similarly disadvantaged . Although here i note more research does need to be done. Are there positions that would or could prepare a woman to be able to eventually compete for a shot at being able to be a wartime combatant commander, without her having had to lead an infantry squad, a platoon, or a special forces team first . Could a woman do other jobs and still be able to viably lead an infantry battalion, a brigade, or division . Which rungs would combat soldiers say they need their commanders to have climbed . Pose these questions to enough men in uniform and it might turn out there is a way or maybe theres several ways to finesse the issue of getting more women into senior military command positions without having to alter the makeup of Ground Combat units. Is it conceivable a woman would have what it takes in mens eyes to lead them effectively without her having been a grunt first . Maybe she doesnt have their speed, their strength, or stamina. But if she proves strategically smarter, why not . If this is one incomplete area of research, a second involves data that already exists. Tens of millions of dollars have been spent on studies. But what about systematically analyzing whats already in the records . For obvious reasons, to do with budgets and political sensitivities, neither the army nor the marine corps will voluntarily air their dirty laundry. But how many hours have been lost to investigations and disciplinary actions relating to fraternization, sexual assaults, and allegations of these and other genderrelated issues when men and women have been colocated . Publicly everyone says glowing things about combat support and female engagement teams. And some officers i know are deeply grateful they were sent american women who could search and interact with afghan women. Their teams experienced no problems with american women who belong to either combat support teams or female engagement teams living on their fire bases. But some teams were torn apart. How many . Where is the data . And why isnt this considered relevant . Of course read the studies, and they acknowledge between the lines that looking too closely in this direction would prove devastating. Why . Because one conclusion reached prior to the lifting of the ban is that men and women should really be trained together. You shouldnt just thrust them together downrange. When they train together, they bond more familially. They become protective of rather than predatory on one another, which is interesting, especially since, once again, the very real prospect of attrition is being ignored. But say one of these units that had bonded thanks to training together takes a gender casualty. Then what . Does the whole unit need to be pulled out so it can be retrained together . In other words, the question is, if training together from the outset is so critical, what does that mean when theres attrition . For anyone not unanimous with them, and as i hope im making clear, combat units have no civilian analog. No other entities are designed to be sent into harms way for such indefinite periods of time in order to inflict harm. Wildfire firefighters might come closest in terms of having to