These articles first appeared in the Oct.-Nov. 1997 issue of CMR Notes, a publication of the Center for Military Readiness

RAND STUDY RELEASED

The latest RAND study, titled "New Opportunities for Women: Effects Upon Readiness, Cohesion and Morale"comes with the usual feminist spin. Thousands of military occupations were opened to women three years ago, but few have been filled with female soldiers.

Never mind that the majority of women might be avoiding unpleasant, previously all-male near-combat jobs, or are simply unqualified for them. According to Army figures, every time a person is mal-assigned to an occupation beyond their physical capabilities, it costs at least $16,000 to transfer them elsewhere. Nevertheless, ideologues suggest that gender quotas should be used to force women where they shouldn't or don't want to go.

Congress has never enacted such a mandate, because of predictable consequences. Physical standards would have to be gender-normed or dropped all together. Legions of sensitivity trainers would have to be trained and deployed, at great expense, to cope with escalating disciplinary problems. Pregnancy and childcare costs would soar, and morale would flag. Potential recruits would shun the volunteer force, and experienced soldiers would continue to resign in great numbers. In an actual war, combat effectiveness would be vitiated, lives needlessly lost, and national security threatened.

All of these problems are evident in the RAND report, but superficial accounts have obscured the disturbing news. For example, in units that are undermanned or heavily populated with women, pregnancy has a negative effect on "availability" for deployment. Some women demand co-ed housing, while others complain of male supervisors with access to their sleeping quarters. Disciplinary rules don't seem to apply to women, and men are terrorized by false accusations of sexual misconduct. Male/female tension is everywhere, but headlines proclaim--disingenuously--that gender is not a factor!

Gullible reporters enthuse about surveys supposedly showing strong support for women in voluntary combat, without recognizing that such an option would be just as unworkable for women as it is for men. Only 10% of female privates and corporals agreed that women should be treated "exactly like men"in the combat arms.

The report's bibliography, which includes books and articles with loaded titles such as "Warrior Dreams: Violence and Manhood," "Sexism and the War System, " and "Woman, Race, and Class " explains why the RAND report reads like a tax-funded feminist polemic. Far-left authors and liberal sociologists, such as Angela Davis, Susan Faludi, Catharine MacKinnon, Madeline Morris, Judith Steim, Mady Segal, and Patricia Schroeder are heavily represented. Authors and experts with differing views or actual military experience are conspicuously scarce.

The chapter on "cohesion" is particularly disappointing, because it declares "success" under a civilianized definition. Expert witnesses have described the importance of building cohesion for reasons of combat effectiveness: "... Unit members [must] become totally dependent on each other for the completion of their mission or survival; and group members must meet all standards of performance and behavior in order not to threaten group survival."(p. C-80, Presidential Commission Report)

RAND researchers redefine cohesion not in terms of combat survival, but in civilian "workplace" terms relating to "social" relationships (getting along) and accomplishment of "tasks" (getting the job done.)

Gender is disavowed as a problem factor, except in certain areas. Men in gender-integrated units tend to be more careful about personal cleanliness when working around women, and are more likely to confide their problems to female colleagues, which decreases their desire to fight or drink excessively. That's about it on the positive side.

On the negative side, researchers confirmed that woman are more prone to injuries; medical lost time (including maternity leave) detracts from unit strength and readiness. Gender-norming reduces female injuries, but heightens resentment of double standards and degrades morale.

RAND recommends tests to qualify individuals for "heavy-labor" jobs, but only if they don't become "barriers" to women's careers. The big "if” signals a replay of efforts in the early 1980s to devise effective tests that would match individuals to strenuous jobs. According to Lt. Col. Harry W. Crumling, USA (Ret.) who participated in the project, diligent work by Army flag officers and exercise specialists to devise such a system was soundly rejected by "the women's lobby within the Pentagon." (Washington Times, Sept. 2, 1997)

This is why the RAND recommendation sounds politically correct, but is really illogical. Feminists keep saying they want equal treatment, but if women don't succeed in equal numbers, they demand specialtreatment. Which proves something we already knew: the Pentagon should not be run by feminists, or men who are intimidated by them.

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REVEALING RAND REPORT REVISIONS

Sensitive Passages Deleted

The Center for Military Readiness has discovered that the draft version of the Defense Department's RAND report, titled "Recent Gender Integration in the Military: Effects Upon Readiness, Cohesion and Morale," was revised and "cleansed" of political incorrectness prior to release of the final report on October 21. Starting with the first part of the title, which was changed to "New Opportunities for Military Women,"unidentified spinmeisters exorcised sensitive passages, and burnished those that sing the praises of gender integration. Truth, it seems, is the first casualty of social engineering.

A comparison of the draft and final versions reveals that a number of candid statements made by interviewees in the field--servicemen and women who trusted that their views would be faithfully reported-were paraphrased, revised, or omitted all together. Quotable "sound bites" were added to skew media perceptions of the report, and to euphemize certain controversial findings regarding pregnancy, interpersonal relationships, mandatory political correctness, and readiness.

Such practices, were telegraphed by Army Assistant Secretary for Manpower and Reserve Affairs, Sara Lister, who told U.S. News and World Report reporter Richard Newmanthat the service is reluctant to publicly discuss strength and pregnancy issues. She explained that when it tried to do so in the past, those subjects quickly became fodder for conservatives seeking to limit women's role in the Army. (p. 52, August 11, 1997)

A similar strategy was announced in an August 7 memo by Louis Finch, Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Readiness, who recently issued a gag order to his staff members, admonishing them not to reveal or comment on negative field trip reports (Navy Times, Aug. 18, 1997) Finch's order, issued after Washington Times reporter Rowan Scarboroughobtained and quoted an internal field report about Air Force maintenance and equipment problems, confirmed what many people suspect. Some Pentagon officials are willing, or are being required, to withhold information on certain controversial issues.

The following are changes noted in the final version of the RAND report, as compared to the draft version.

1) The draft version included a frank discussion of problems caused by heavy concentrations of single, pregnant soldiers in some units:

"Single, pregnant, junior enlisted personnel were considered the most problematic of all pregnancies, for several reasons. First this was perceived as a moral issue, and thus distasteful to those who thought military personnel should adhere to higher moral values. Of more relevance to the readiness of the unit, however, was that pregnant single women were perceived to be a long-term burden. Not only were their activities' potentially restricted during pregnancy, and their absence during their convalescent leave a loss to the unit, but their problems being a single parent were felt to have the most effect upon the unit. ... Many junior enlisted personnel cannot afford to live off base and own a car, so in some places they must take the bus to work and are frequently late." (p. 40, draft)

The revised version, which also appears on page 40, is somewhat shorter and more vague, with references to "moral issue" and "long term burden" excised or paraphrased. The section did admit that such problems "consume the time of supervisory personnel," but few of those problems are "unresolvable."

2) The final RAND report section-headlined "Other Findings Related to Gender" (pp. 94-96) is dramatically different from the draft section titled "The Findings Within a Context' of Transition,"which included the following comments that were cut:

"Pregnancy is an unplanned loss exclusive to women, which unit commanders reported may dramatically increase unplanned losses, which hurt understaffed units the most.... [W]hen women, especially single women, intentionally become pregnant' to escape either unpleasant duties, a certain command, or a deployment, both men and women resent the additional burden they must shoulder as a consequence of their absence." (p. 101, draft)

"...Additionally, men perceive that young women who regret their decision to join the military can use pregnancy as a 'Get out of jail free card ' whereas young men have no such escape clause." (p. 102, draft)

3) Both versions report that only 43 percent of military personnel surveyed agreed with the statement, “I believe that my coworkers and I would respond well to a crisis.” Service, unit, grade, race, and gender were not significant in this item. But the next sentence was eliminated: "That number is unsettling given that the military's job is to be prepared for what is essentially a sustained crisis."(p. 62, draft) The missing sentence was a significant editorial comment by RAND researchers. By contrast, comments that praised gender integration were emphasized in the final version and accompanying news releases.

4) The original section on "Sickness or Injury”does not equivocate on reports that women are sick or injured more often.

"As the Marines told us, 'Women were broke more often,' or experience a disproportionate number of injuries."(p. 41 draft and final)

But the final version added this on p. 40: "There are no automated records of the frequency of and reasons for absence, however, so we could not confirm these reports;" and this on p. 41: "...most units did not report that gender integration has had a significant negative effect upon the number of personnel available to a unit. .. [when] units were fully staffed and the proportion of women was representative.... "

The problem is that many units in the downsized military are indeed under-staffed, and the "availability" problem is aggravated by gender quotas that result in "Amazon units" where women are over-represented. (p. 40 draft only)

5) The following observations were also deleted from the final report:

• "Some unit commanders appear to feel pressured to report success in the training, retaining, and promotion of women. Men who perceive this believe women are given more opportunities than men to work up to the standard." (p. 102, draft)

• "Women agreed that false harassment complaints are a problem, and added that they undermine the ability of women who are truly harassed to have their complaint taken seriously..." (p. 104, draft)

Spinning Works

Dana Priest of the Washington Post was the first to set the "spin" of the RAND report story just prior to its release. Priest focused on the news that 47,544 previously closed billets were recently made available but were filled by only 815 women. She also claimed, incorrectly, that Congress had "ordered" the positions to be opened up, and implied that the "negligible" and "minuscule" results were evidence of gross discrimination against women. Most news reports parroted the Washington Postline.

Congress should investigate Pentagon censorship, and demand absolute candor and truthfulness in all testimony and official reports. Civilian officials have no right to shade or censor the truth in tax-funded reports, in order to advance self-serving objectives or ideological agendas.

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