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| ISSUE #16 | October 30,1997 |
| ISSUE #16 | October 30,1997 |
Gender in the Military--Again
by Colonel Daniel Smith, USA (Ret.), Associate Director, dsmith@cdi.org
There's an old saying that things happen in threes.
That, in late October 1997, seems to be the case with the very contentious issue of women in the military.
In response to a congressional mandate to study the issue, the Pentagon employed two researchers from RAND Corporation to review progress in gender integration in units and occupational specialties that were first opened to women between 1992 and 1994. The results of the three month study, just released, contained no real surprises.
Through on-site visits, interviews with commanders and other leaders, and focus groups, the researchers found that complaints centered on two issues: fear among men that they could be subject to false accusations of sexual harassment (although how to define or determine what constitutes sexual harassment was unclear), and the perception of double standards in the levels of effort that male superiors demanded of junior enlisted men compared to enlisted women and in physical training requirements.
Perhaps more significant than the prevalence of these two areas in the concerns voiced to the researchers is the fact that those who raised these issues were numerically very much in the minority. Furthermore, the study resoundingly reconfirmed what many inside and outside the uniformed services have long maintained: leadership, training, and checking (a function in part of workload) are the real keys to sustaining unit performance, building cohesion, and maintaining morale.
The second recent event, which obtained much more publicity in the general media than the RAND study, was the Army's announcement that it was toughening the physical training standards for men and women and, in the case of sit-ups, eliminating the "double standard" entirely. Differing physiologies between women and men (women have less upper body strength and smaller hearts than men) mean that differences in the number of push-ups and the time for the two mile run remain, but they will be narrowed.
The third event comes from overseas but is a significant one. This past Monday the British Ministry of Defence announced that it was raising the number of jobs open to women in its 109,000 person army from 47 to 70 percent, a figure that will put them higher than the U.S. Army at 67.2 percent. Although still banned from front line units, among the positions the British Army opened to women are combat engineers and field artillery gunners.
Three years ago in the United States, the Secretary of the Army argued that positions in these units should be open to women on the basis that the units "do not engage in direct combat" (engineers) or "do not collocate under a strict definition" of that term and are not liable to a "high probability of direct physical contact" with personnel of hostile forces (field artillery). However, in the end combat engineer line companies, field artillery battalions, and Multiple Rocket Launcher positions stayed closed to women, along with infantry, armor, and Special Forces battalions, Rangers, ground cavalry squadrons, forward air defense artillery batteries, and ground surveillance radar platoons.
As the RAND study and the adjustment of physical standards show, better information and education can provide a basis for reevaluating old standards and revising outmoded ideas. Panama in 1989, the Gulf War in 1991, and Bosnia in 1997 have shattered any remaining preconception that future wars and operations-other-than-war will have neat front lines that will "protect" women from engaging in "direct" contact and combat with hostile forces. Even the proliferation of remotely controlled weapons and information gathering platforms will not entirely preclude the clash of bodies--women and men--upon battlegrounds of the future.
The question really comes down to when, not if, the current restrictions on military occupational specialties will be lifted. That will depend not so much on factors that have driven past changes, such as demographics, but on our society and how quickly the remaining vestiges of the exclusive military male culture change.
The Reluctant Giant - NATO in Europe
by Tomas Valasek, Research Analyst, tvalasek@cdi.org
The Eastern European revolutions of 1989 had surprisingly little impact on Western European countries. Years after the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact, the West's military alliance--NATO--remains an exclusive club geared toward common defense against an enemy that dropped its weapons nearly a decade ago. U.S. troops in Europe have been reduced but not withdrawn, and Europe shows no less reliance on the U.S. for its security today than it did during the Cold War. Several attempts to create a European defense system have come and gone because of a lack of consensus and U.S. reluctance to bless such endeavors.
NATO's only major change came after opportunistic Balkan leaders unleashed a large-scale ethnic conflict in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina.
The United Nations first attempted to end the violence. In a spectacular failure which should serve as a warning to today's NATO expansion planners, UN security guarantees were not backed up by the political will to enforce the guarantees by expanding the mandate of the military force sent to the Balkans or to increase the size of this force when it proved insufficient.
In this regard, the decision of the U.S. not to contribute troops to the UN force in Bosnia was an important factor in the UN's failure. Local factions were able to exploit to the maximum the gulf between the UN's words and deeds. By the time NATO's potentially overwhelming firepower restored a semblance of order in Bosnia, hundreds of thousands of people had died, the Europeans had lost faith in their ability to guarantee peace in Europe, and the United Nations had suffered enough humiliation to last for decades.
It remains to be seen whether we draw the right conclusions from the events in Bosnia. We now have a better understanding of the type of conflicts likely to befall Europe (and other regions) in the future. Ideally, future tensions will be diffused by preventive diplomacy before actual shots are fired. But clearly, some military might will be needed as a "reserve" to intervene when diplomats initially fail.
NATO can provide the military power but it cannot provide the means to arbitrate disputes that prevention requires. It therefore lacks the legitimacy to intervene to head off or mediate disputes which a more inclusive organization would possess.
It would seem to be in the U.S. interest to nurture the European's confidence in their ability to coordinate their defense and to encourage their attempts to establish a broad and inclusive European security organization. Such an stance by the U.S. towards a real political- military "European pillar" would take pressure off U.S. taxpayers and military forces and enable us to concentrate our resources where they are needed.
To the extent that NATO expansion perpetuates the need for U.S. military involvement in Europe, it goes against our national interest.
GAO: Pentagon's future spending plan "includes substantial financial risk"
by Chris Hellman, Senior Researcher, chellman@cdi.org
Since the 1993 Bottom-Up Review (BUR), the Pentagon has repeatedly stated the need to reduce its infrastructure and operating costs in order to free funds for weapons purchases. Most recently, the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) reaffirmed this position by calling for additional base closures, greater privatization of maintenance work, and less "red tape" to offset the costs of modernization programs.
The BUR noted that approximately 60% of DoD's spending authority (about $160 billion in Fiscal Year 1994) went for infrastructure activities. Yet a report recently released by the General Accounting Office (GAO) found that the Pentagon's funding for infrastructure had not decreased as called for (and projected) in the BUR and subsequent Pentagon statements.
The report also found that, in planning future spending, DoD has made certain questionable assumptions about its ability to successfully control costs. For example, the Pentagon anticipates no real growth in the cost of its healthcare programs even though these costs have grown 73% in the last decade. The Pentagon has also assumed substantial savings from a range of management initiatives as yet undefined.
Given questions about the Pentagon's ability to control costs in other areas of its budget, the services' desires to put additional funding into weapons procurement, and the likelihood that overall military spending will remain at current levels in the near term, finding ways to reduce infrastructure costs becomes more critical. This point has been made repeatedly in the months since the QDR was released (just as it was made repeatedly after the BUR).
For example, earlier this month, speaking before a commission formed by Business Executives for National Security, an organization looking at ways to streamline Pentagon business practices, Defense Secretary Cohen forcefully restated the need to close additional military bases. His plea was echoed by former Defense Secretaries William Perry and Frank Carlucci who were also at the meeting.
Similarly, Philip Odeen, who chairs the National Defense Panel of the QDR, told the Association of the United States Army that his panel's upcoming report would emphasize the need for more base closures. Meanwhile, however, Congress's annual Defense Authorization act failed to include language permitting additional base closures at this time.
Unless Congress and the Pentagon can reach agreement on realistic ways to achieve significant cost savings in DoD spending, the military's budget is headed for a "train wreck" with potentially severe consequences. In today's constrained budgetary environment, it is difficult to see how the Pentagon can fulfill its planned weapons purchases while maintaining its current force structure and strategic plan.
For more information, see GAO's report, "Future Years Defense Program: DoD's 1998 Plan Has Substantial Risk in Execution" (NSIAD-98-26).
Early Benefits from the Chemical Weapons Convention
by Andrew Koch, Senior Research Analyst, akoch@cdi.org
The newly adopted Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) is already producing considerable benefits. Not only does the CWC strengthen the norm against possessing or using chemical weapons (CW), it provides adversaries a formalized mechanism to resolve concerns about a foe's CW capabilities. Pakistan's October 28, 1997 ratification of the treaty--to which India has already acceded--is one example. With other arms control talks between New Delhi and Islamabad stalled, adoption of the CWC by both states is a small but important step in relieving tensions in South Asia. The opening of these states' CW programs provides an example of how adversaries can reach strategic agreements with mutually beneficial outcomes.
Contrary to what CWC opponents have charged, the treaty has not encountered significant problems with its verification regime. To date a large number of inspections world- wide have been completed without incident. Pakistan's accession to the CWC, despite concerns that India has not declared its entire CW program, demonstrates Islamabad's confidence in the treaty's verification regime. In fact, Pakistani officials have quietly said one reason Islamabad joined was to have the ability to conduct challenge inspections of India's CW facilities.
To be sure, the CWC still faces some daunting challenges. Russia--which has the world's largest stockpile of chemical weapons--and "rogue" regimes such as Iran, Libya, and North Korea have yet to accede to the treaty. Even so, the early successes of the CWC, despite concerns about its verification regime, should be noted by the U.S. Senate when it finally starts its debate about ratifying the nuclear weapons Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.
On Thursday, November 6, 1997 CDI will release a study on private sector mercenary groups. The monograph, titled "Soldiers of Fortune Ltd.: A Profile of Today's Private Sector Corporate Mercenary Firms" was written by David Isenberg, Senior Research Analyst.
Hard copies of this monograph are available for $10.00 a copy. On November 6 an online version of this monograph will be posted on CDI's web site. Much of the research cited in the endnotes of the monography was found online via searches on the World Wide Web. Many of those articles are stored in CDI's Arms Trade Database. To access them set your browser to http://www.cdi.org/ArmsTradeDatabase/CONTROL/Small_Arms/Mercenaries/
To order send a check payable to the Center for Defense Information. Or, if you wish to order by credit card, Visa or MasterCard, call 1-800-234-3334.
This topic is also the subject of a forthcoming episode of America's Defense Monitor, CDI's television series. Interviewees include Lt. Gen. Ed Soyster (USA-Ret), Vice President, Operations of Military Professionals Resources Inc. The 30- minute episode, "Conflict Inc.: Selling the Arts of War," is available for $25 for a VHS copy.