Diversity Thursday is the reason why I started to routinely follow you over 5 yrs ago. We are taught this BS while the PLAN are taught how to actually fight.
Does any sane person believe that when we execute a "Security Cooperation" engagement with some African Country where 95% of their force is male (plus 3 nurses and 2 cooks helpers), that shifting the gender balance of our trainers to 50% women is going to increase knowledge transfer?
There is so much to be sad about in both of these papers, but one quote stood out for me:
"In addition, does the partner nation have the capacity to absorb an influx of women? Are there barracks? How would uniforms be adjusted to accommodate physical differences between men and women? How robust is the sexual assault prevention program? What type of policies does the partner nation have regarding pregnancy and childbirth? Without serious considerations of these types of issues, any program focused on gender balancing will fail in the long run."
Every bit of this Adds COST and NO VALUE to the military goals of killing people, breaking things, and then keeping everyone secure in place. Only spoiled rich countries with no active (and recognized) threats will entertain wasting money on this crap.
We are no longer a serious nation, and we are likely to be bloodied badly by the army that has crossed our Southern boarder over the past 15 years
"Diversity is our strength" has to die. You can't end discrimination with more discrimination.
This is a great article and much needed. Women (properly defined) CAN do much of what men can do. But why waste them and and their time on things that men can do. Women are too valuable to society to not employ them in the most useful way. I recall one of the Scandinavian countries trying to balance gender roles and they were not able because people wanted to do what they wanted to do. Our Military should not be a socialogical experiment for people who are mentally ill. We need to be able to efficiently break things and kill people. This just another example of the DEI crap that has affected our society.
The Darwinian nature of battle argues against these types of affirmative action quota based systems...when the bullets are flying downrange, they really don't care about your gender or politics, they care how you execute your battle plan (small unit to large) and how well you shoot back. It does matter, however, if you've ignored learning to shoot to take seminars on the correct pronoun or have recruited a bunch of people who aren't ready to run a few hundred yards under fire from cover to cover to bring defilade fire down on a position. Then...then...you get people killed.
Just a moment for Afghanistan. I did not, and do not, feel the same way about it that I did Saigon. We abandoned a lot of things on the Embassy roof in Saigon - and it was done not by us, but a portion of our government, making a waste and mockery of our blood and treasure. I can see how some might feel the same about Afghanistan, BUT they have never and will never have an advanced centralized authority or society - it will always be tribal. We weren't going to change that. To the extent we had done what we could do, hunted who we could hunt - or would hunt, based on limitations in attacking the tribal areas in Pakistan - and achieved whatever objectives we had beyond just endlessly sending raids and patrols into the countryside forever...it was time to come home.
So it was time to leave as there was no purpose without a much larger effort encompassing an entire region - which should have been done long ago, in a short time, at greater cost and energy - but it would have been over. Water under the bridge. But the decision to leave Afghanistan to itself was correct. The shame was in HOW IT WAS DONE, not the decision to leave. I attach THAT shame not to us, our nation, even our politics - but the nincompoops in charge of executing the operation. Anybody with half a brain, and an appreciation for disengaging from the enemy while in contact, knows how to collapse a perimeter to keep that kind of stuff from happening and executing an orderly withdrawal...not even under fire. That they so totally messed it up...didn't even really seem to care....is the shame of it. But it is THEIR shame, not ours.
Perhaps our doctoral level elite should spend a few years in the weeds of the environment they're trying to influence. No one should be working to influence a field that is only a mere set of abstract gender percentages. Ms. Bogacz for example? Pure academic. She needs to be sent to observe a staff that's dealing with a hot shooting environment. Give these people a few weeks in high stress, sleep deprived planning environment where they work the same hours.
It's time to temper abstract feel good policies with real world experience. Perhaps a few weeks on the frontlines of Ukraine.
Read a few pages Sal. Looked at how long the piece is and decided from what you wrote that she is just another Karen who thinks every place with a few more men than women is discriminatory. Guess I missed if she had ever been deployed. Got no time for considering such nonsense. They could have all the military jobs for all I care as long as we stay safe. Go for it. We who’ve been there know the vast majority that do serve get out. Got recruiting?
It's a belief. You can't argue belief. You can't convince a Catholic to become a Buddhist or vice versa. No matter how many Communist regimes have failed and how many dead bodies are left in the wake, people still believe. Supposedly people sent to the Gulags by Comrade Stalin would say "if only Stalin knew..." He did know, he sent them there, they still believed.
People like the above will always put belief over reality. Very rarely do they have epiphanies and it's almost always self generated. The best you can hope for is to give them a nice desk or a corner office and ignore them. Very hard to do in modern times.
"Cassandra Benson teaches economics at the Air Force Academy. During a lecture given in January 2023, the Friday before Martin Luther King Day, she addressed minority cadets by their proper names but declared she would refer to white cadets by a number, since in her opinion, all white people look alike.
...The experience of White Boy #2 is not an isolated event; he has had to bear the brunt of other CRT related character attacks from superior officers. In a leadership class taught by Colonel Melissa Youderian, White Boy #2 was asked to explain his white privilege. In this version of a perp walk, what did the colonel expect him to say about a situation over which he has no control? To the young man’s credit, he explained that he, like all the other cadets in the room, was privileged to attend the Air Force Academy and have the opportunity to serve his country. The colonel remained unresponsive and incredulous but extracted vengeance by awarding his courage and forthrightness with a “C” grade in a class where performance is measured not by test scores but by whim."
Diversity Thursday is the reason why I started to routinely follow you over 5 yrs ago. We are taught this BS while the PLAN are taught how to actually fight.
Virtuoso performance here, Sal.
Does any sane person believe that when we execute a "Security Cooperation" engagement with some African Country where 95% of their force is male (plus 3 nurses and 2 cooks helpers), that shifting the gender balance of our trainers to 50% women is going to increase knowledge transfer?
Equity - six letter English word for "jedem nach seinen Bedürfnissen".
My heading is spinning after reading today's column. America sounds like a nation in freefall.
There is so much to be sad about in both of these papers, but one quote stood out for me:
"In addition, does the partner nation have the capacity to absorb an influx of women? Are there barracks? How would uniforms be adjusted to accommodate physical differences between men and women? How robust is the sexual assault prevention program? What type of policies does the partner nation have regarding pregnancy and childbirth? Without serious considerations of these types of issues, any program focused on gender balancing will fail in the long run."
Every bit of this Adds COST and NO VALUE to the military goals of killing people, breaking things, and then keeping everyone secure in place. Only spoiled rich countries with no active (and recognized) threats will entertain wasting money on this crap.
We are no longer a serious nation, and we are likely to be bloodied badly by the army that has crossed our Southern boarder over the past 15 years
"Diversity is our strength" has to die. You can't end discrimination with more discrimination.
This is a great article and much needed. Women (properly defined) CAN do much of what men can do. But why waste them and and their time on things that men can do. Women are too valuable to society to not employ them in the most useful way. I recall one of the Scandinavian countries trying to balance gender roles and they were not able because people wanted to do what they wanted to do. Our Military should not be a socialogical experiment for people who are mentally ill. We need to be able to efficiently break things and kill people. This just another example of the DEI crap that has affected our society.
The Darwinian nature of battle argues against these types of affirmative action quota based systems...when the bullets are flying downrange, they really don't care about your gender or politics, they care how you execute your battle plan (small unit to large) and how well you shoot back. It does matter, however, if you've ignored learning to shoot to take seminars on the correct pronoun or have recruited a bunch of people who aren't ready to run a few hundred yards under fire from cover to cover to bring defilade fire down on a position. Then...then...you get people killed.
Just a moment for Afghanistan. I did not, and do not, feel the same way about it that I did Saigon. We abandoned a lot of things on the Embassy roof in Saigon - and it was done not by us, but a portion of our government, making a waste and mockery of our blood and treasure. I can see how some might feel the same about Afghanistan, BUT they have never and will never have an advanced centralized authority or society - it will always be tribal. We weren't going to change that. To the extent we had done what we could do, hunted who we could hunt - or would hunt, based on limitations in attacking the tribal areas in Pakistan - and achieved whatever objectives we had beyond just endlessly sending raids and patrols into the countryside forever...it was time to come home.
So it was time to leave as there was no purpose without a much larger effort encompassing an entire region - which should have been done long ago, in a short time, at greater cost and energy - but it would have been over. Water under the bridge. But the decision to leave Afghanistan to itself was correct. The shame was in HOW IT WAS DONE, not the decision to leave. I attach THAT shame not to us, our nation, even our politics - but the nincompoops in charge of executing the operation. Anybody with half a brain, and an appreciation for disengaging from the enemy while in contact, knows how to collapse a perimeter to keep that kind of stuff from happening and executing an orderly withdrawal...not even under fire. That they so totally messed it up...didn't even really seem to care....is the shame of it. But it is THEIR shame, not ours.
Perhaps our doctoral level elite should spend a few years in the weeds of the environment they're trying to influence. No one should be working to influence a field that is only a mere set of abstract gender percentages. Ms. Bogacz for example? Pure academic. She needs to be sent to observe a staff that's dealing with a hot shooting environment. Give these people a few weeks in high stress, sleep deprived planning environment where they work the same hours.
It's time to temper abstract feel good policies with real world experience. Perhaps a few weeks on the frontlines of Ukraine.
Read a few pages Sal. Looked at how long the piece is and decided from what you wrote that she is just another Karen who thinks every place with a few more men than women is discriminatory. Guess I missed if she had ever been deployed. Got no time for considering such nonsense. They could have all the military jobs for all I care as long as we stay safe. Go for it. We who’ve been there know the vast majority that do serve get out. Got recruiting?
An interesting piece.
However, I disagree that a person like that is well-meaning. At no point do these people clearly articulate the benefits of gender parity.
She’s an activist, and should be called out as such.
It's a belief. You can't argue belief. You can't convince a Catholic to become a Buddhist or vice versa. No matter how many Communist regimes have failed and how many dead bodies are left in the wake, people still believe. Supposedly people sent to the Gulags by Comrade Stalin would say "if only Stalin knew..." He did know, he sent them there, they still believed.
People like the above will always put belief over reality. Very rarely do they have epiphanies and it's almost always self generated. The best you can hope for is to give them a nice desk or a corner office and ignore them. Very hard to do in modern times.
We are 2 years and 3 months past the findings of this report. The beat goes on….
https://news.usni.org/2021/07/12/lawmakers-survey-94-of-sailors-say-damaging-operational-failures-related-to-navy-culture-leadership-problems
"Cassandra Benson teaches economics at the Air Force Academy. During a lecture given in January 2023, the Friday before Martin Luther King Day, she addressed minority cadets by their proper names but declared she would refer to white cadets by a number, since in her opinion, all white people look alike.
...The experience of White Boy #2 is not an isolated event; he has had to bear the brunt of other CRT related character attacks from superior officers. In a leadership class taught by Colonel Melissa Youderian, White Boy #2 was asked to explain his white privilege. In this version of a perp walk, what did the colonel expect him to say about a situation over which he has no control? To the young man’s credit, he explained that he, like all the other cadets in the room, was privileged to attend the Air Force Academy and have the opportunity to serve his country. The colonel remained unresponsive and incredulous but extracted vengeance by awarding his courage and forthrightness with a “C” grade in a class where performance is measured not by test scores but by whim."
https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2023/09/25/the_united_states_air_force_academys_white_boy_2_981680.html?mc_cid=31f608e5b8&mc_eid=e51bf416d0&fbclid=IwAR0uo0k1dpfe41aH6worNb-pHdLnqGNfobsomW05ehGvawP49ieHRXWsBKA
And then suddenly, for no reason at all, I realized Boko Harum had a point.
Really, 1 in 4 engineers are women? Where are they hiding out? As an engineer myself, I'd call it about 1 in 20.