Women in War
September 17, 2001
Lindsay Becker
Russell
Please add the works cited. Until the sources are cited the essay is incomplete.
As a woman in the United States Army, I live everyday knowing that I am not allowed
to do all the things in the military that men are allowed to do. Because I am a woman, I
am disqualified from fighting in any war as an infantryman, but put in a building or
taking care of the wounded.[clarify the meaning of the last part of this sentence.] I
cannot become a ranger or a fighter pilot. I have always been the type of person that
believes if I am willing to do something that I want [try to say this in another way],
whether it be for personal pleasure, for a good cause or some other reason, then I should
be given try to avoid the slangat least a shot. I believe that if a woman wants to fight in
war, then she should be allowed, but only with the proper training and the right set of
mind. [Why did you qualify this statement? Aren’t proper training and appropriate mindset assumed?]
When I was at Basic Combat Training, avoid the slang a bunch of us females were
having a conversation on the reason one reason? why women are not allowed to fight in
war. He who? said that the reason was because when the enemy happens to see a
wounded female and a wounded man at the same time, there is almost a hundred percent
chance that the enemy is going to attack and kill the woman before the man. Mainly
because they come across as being more vulnerable then men.(fragment) I can see that to
a point, but if I were that were that femal,e I would put up a fight that the male would
never expect out of me and they who? are going to wish they had gone went after the
male.
Ted Sampley, a U.S. Veteran dispatcher? states that women should not be allowed to
fight in war because if they are captured, they could be sexually violated and raped
(Women in War). I guess if women were thinking about getting raped at the time, then
we would all have alarms in our houses or our car, carry mace or a gun, and never go
anywhere alone. I’m not sure what this sentence means. I know that a lot of women do
some of these things, but we cannot not do avoid doing things because we are afraid of
the “what if’s.”. To me, I guess if I would not do anything because I was afraid of what
may happen, my life would be pretty boring. I, along with many other people are not
going to live our lives afraid of things, instead we will do what we need to do to survive
and if that means going to war then we are going to. Try to reword these last two
sentences to make them more direct and stronger.
More than 400,000 women served in the WWII, and women now make up about
eleven percent of the military today. They serve in every capacity except ground combat
(Smith). Well, that is, in most cases. What does this mean?
Women have been known and looked upon as heroes for disguising themselves as
men; many of them didn’t get their identity revealed until they were dying or already
dead. In 1863, a girl known only as Emily (19 years old) ran away from her home to
serve her country. While fighting for Chattanooga her side was pierced by a minie ball,
which in the end was fatal. When someone went to her side, they (singular?) realized she
was a woman and then asked who she was. She refused to disclose her name, afraid of
the consequences. That is until she consented to dictate a telegram to let her father in
Brooklyn know why she ran away and what had happened to her(Wilson).
Ma Ying led an all female palace guard troops in the nineteenth century in Siam,
which known as Thialand today. Her troops were considered the best trained and most
loyal of Kings soldiers and were never defeated in battle (
). A citation is required here.
Tamara of Georgia ruled for twenty-four years. The men she led to battle called her
“King” because she campaigned with them and shared the hardships as a male soldier.
Before her death in 1212, she had managed to conquer parts of Turkey, Persia, and
Armenia that bordered Georgia at that time. Tamara of Georgia ended frequent
invasions, which had decimated her nation prior to her reign (
). A citation is required
here.
The first recorded effort to bar women was a law passed in 590 AD at Synod of Druim
Ceat, which in the end proved to be unenforceable. Women refused to lay down their
arms and comply with it then, why would people think it would be different now when
we have better means of fighting an enemy(
). A citation is required here.
One never knows when a war will come. One never knows who will be sent to
war, it may be the person who means everything to you, or possibly yourself. Avoid
using “you.”I do know that if I am still in the military, I will do all I can to help this
country. If I do get sent, I can guarantee that I will be one of those women who disguise
themselves as a man, and along with me myself I know there will be plenty more that will
do the same. Just like me myself, they know that sometimes you avoid “you.” have to do
what’s right even if it means losing their life in the end.