When asked by CNN’s John
King if it was a good idea to expand the role of women in combat, Rick
Santorum gave a largely incoherent response that suggested he believed
women in combat introduced an element of “emotion” that would interfere
with fulfillment of the mission. Here is what he said in pertinent part:
“I do have concerns about women in front-line combat. I think that could
be a very compromising situation, where people naturally may do things
that may not be in the best interest of the mission, because of other
types of emotions that are involved.” He either meant that men would
be more emotional if women served alongside of them or that women would
be more emotional than men and would tend to compromise the mission.
The explanation he gave is hard to decipher and sounds sexist and knee-jerk
rather than rational and contemplative.
I happen to agree that women ought not be required to serve in combat,
but for a different reason. If able-bodied women are capable of child
bearing, then if we place them at risk of capture, we could experience
one of the greatest horrors any civilization could be forced to endure.
Yes, men like women could be raped in captivity, but only women can
be impregnated and forced to give birth. If that horror were not gruesome
enough, the children born of female soldiers could be mistreated to
extract strategic information from those soldiers or other Americans
or allies in captivity. The entire nation could be forced to confront
a blackmail scenario where to save the lives of children born in captivity
we would have to accede to demands that reduced our strategic effectiveness.
Moreover, if the duration of a war is as long as the war in Afghanistan
(over 11 years), children born of soldiers held in captivity by the
enemy could be forced into slave labor, could be forced on suicide missions,
could be made to engage in criminal enterprises, or could be murdered
in a public act of terror. There are, thus, many rational and compelling
reasons why women ought not be required to serve in combat.
To be sure, we need the most able people male and female to serve in
the military but to serve the best interests of the United States we
have to be mindful of the unique characteristics of each person if we
are to minimize the risks they and the nation face and maximize effectiveness.
Consequently, we would not require a person with extreme myopia to serve
as a fighter pilot, even if he or she wore corrective lenses, because
the risk exists that the person might lose those lenses and be unable
to fly the plane. We would not require a person who has suffered from
epilepsy, heart arrhythmias, or an occasionally debilitating condition
to serve in combat, even if medication could control those conditions,
because those conditions pose a higher than necessary risk of disability
at a critical moment. Likewise, if women are child bearing, they should
not be required to serve in a capacity that would risk capture because
of the obvious and horrific consequences that could occur to them, rather
than to men, if they were captured by the enemy.
I do not share the view that women are somehow less able to perform
roles in combat than men. Nor do I subscribe to the view that women
are more emotional than men or that men are unable to perform their
duties when women serve alongside them. Those views seem born more of
prejudice than of reliable evidence. Response to a crisis varies person
by person but gender alone does not qualify or disqualify a woman from
serving her country. Consequently, if able bodied American men are in
short supply in some future conflict, I certainly expect that the women
of this country will serve in combat and will serve well if that is
required of them. When the supply of able bodied men for combat is adequate,
however, the military should not require women to serve in any role
that places them at risk of capture, even if women volunteer for those
assignments.
Some have argued that women must be permitted to serve in combat roles
to avoid gender bias, without regard to the risks I present here. They
submit that there is no valid distinguishing principle between men and
women. While I agree with them that all are entitled to equal justice
under law (regardless of gender, race, ethnicity, or creed), we must
frankly recognize that, indeed, there is an undeniable biological difference
that makes it objectionable in the extreme for women to be placed at
risk of capture.
Thus, in this respect women are different and the standard applied to
them must likewise be different than that applied to men. Were men child
bearers and not women, I would argue that women rather than men should
be in front-line combat. The point of distinction is, therefore, not
based on gender but based on the immutable characteristic that women
have and men do not (childbearing capability). The point is simple and
yet profoundly important to appreciate. No civilized nation with a sufficient
quantity of able-bodied men to serve in combat should place women in
that role because, if captured, women can be forced to endure unspeakable
horrors that men haven’t the biological make-up to experience, horrors
that magnify greatly the devastating nature of war not only for the
women captured but for innocents and, indeed, for the entire nation.
2012 Jonathan W. Emord
Jonathan W. Emord is an attorney who practices constitutional and administrative
law before the federal courts and agencies. Congressman Ron Paul calls
Jonathan “a hero of the health freedom revolution” and says “all freedom-loving
Americans are in [his] debt . . . for his courtroom [victories] on behalf
of health freedom.” He has defeated the FDA in federal court a remarkable
eight times, six on First Amendment grounds, and is the author of Amazon
bestsellers
Website: http://www.emord.com
E-Mail: jwemord@gmail.com
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