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From: zubbie@ihlpl.UUCP (Jeanette Zobjeck)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Re: Women in combat
Message-ID: <175@ihlpl.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 24-Jun-85 21:14:38 EDT
Article-I.D.: ihlpl.175
Posted: Mon Jun 24 21:14:38 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 26-Jun-85 06:03:26 EDT
References: <742@oddjob.UUCP> <388@mtxinu.UUCP> <1041@peora.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
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> > > {J. Eric Roskos}
> > 
> > >However, I noted with an extreme degree of irritation how many congressMEN
> > >made the blatantly sexist remark, "obviously no one feels women should have
> > >to go into combat;" and even more, I noted that no women I knew challenged
> > >this statement.  They generally agreed with it.
> 
> OK, I'll challenge it.  I think (subject to requiring a certain level of
> physical strength, as we do with fire fighters) that women should have to
> go into combat if men do.  Of course, I'd just as soon no one had to
> go to war at all, at all.
> -- 
> 		Karen Isaacson

I'll challenge it also.!

In 1968 (late '68) the decision was made to allow the people of S.Viet-Nam
to celebrate their new year (Tet) in a more traditional way then had been
allowed for some time. A cease fire was arranged - history shows that it
was used by the RVN and the Viet-Cong to build up troops and supplies so
that when the offensive began things were even bloodier than before.
The year 1969 saw more bloody and useless killing than any single year
before or after (most of it occuring in the first 6 months of that year).

I was there to see it and I have yet to find a way to justify my contribution
to that effort..... (I hope I never do!)

I saw women in combat Most were Vietnamese. Some carried weapons and some
just fought for survival and subsistance for their families and themselves.
No man put out a greater effort and I saw no women in that country unwilling
to defend what they valued or believed in.

Viet-Nam was an unusual war because of the immediacy (sp) made possible by
technology. It is unfortunate that we still (as a world, as a society as
a race of thinking beings) have not learned our lesson - and probably 
never will.

I would be the last person to advocate war. 
I would almost as definitely be first in line too grab a weapon if
my loved ones were threatened as the people of that country were.
I can't and won't try to reconcile (sp) the vast differences expressed
here. It is only inside myself that I have reached a balance.
Many of my friends have their names inscribed on a wall in our nations
capitol (finally) and but for a lot of luck and the grace of God I 
might have been listed there also. 
I carry my own scars, inside, and my own wounds. 
Perhaps the wish to  "protect" women from war is one of the things 
which has made it such an ongoing item.

Succesful cmbat experience makes good line officers who may eventually
rise to decision making positions in the government not only in this country
but in most others as well. 
Consider, for just a moment, the prospect of world in which major decisions
which affeect the lives of all through military action might be made 
by women.

jeanette l. zobjeck
ihnp4!ihlpl!zubbie

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All opinions above could be mine
All opinions above could be yours

I take them as my own.
Do you dare?
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