In war’s wake, no further combat roles seen for women

American military women saw their most extensive combat action ever in a major war in Operation Iraqi Freedom.

But their expanded role has not spurred calls in Congress to open up even more combat roles to women, as happened after Desert Storm 12 years ago. Both the Senate and House armed services committees, which write military laws and policies, passed 2004 defense authorization bills this spring without any amendments debated or passed to expand women’s war missions.

“I think that the stories you’ve seen and what you hear from commanders is that women did their jobs and did them very well, working side by side with men,” said retired Marine Lt. Gen. Carol Mutter, who is chairman of the Pentagon’s Defense Advisory Committee on Women in the Services. “And my answer is, what else would you expect? This is what they were trained to do.”

The Defense Department has yet to collect statistics on pregnancies and injuries in the field to give some indication of whether more women in combat puts stress on unit readiness. Some legislators also want to look at the effects mothers going to war have on children.

“We don’t know for sure what the results were from this mobilization regarding women because nobody has asked questions, much less gotten the answers,” said Elaine Donnelly, who directs the Center for Military Readiness.

Gen. Mutter said her committee plans to look at all issues of overseas deployments, including the impact on families, as the military fights the war on terrorism.

In Operation Iraqi Freedom, women’s missions did not involve ground combat, from which they are banned. But they flew combat jets and helicopters, and operated warships, for the first time in a major air-ground campaign.

The Marine Corps saw the first female Cobra helicopter pilot fly combat missions. They also saw one of their enlisted woman give birth in a war zone aboard a combat ship — an event Pentagon officials said was a first.

Hundreds of Navy women manned warships, including five aircraft carriers. Two female officers commanded warships — one a Tomahawk-firing destroyer and the other an amphibious assault ship carrying Marine Harrier attack jets.

Women also flew the Navy’s two carrier fighters, the F-18 Hornet and F-14 Tomcat.

“It’s gotten to the point where they are a part of everything,” said a senior Navy officer at the Pentagon.

The Air Force had women flying virtually every combat plane in its arsenal, including the B-2 stealth bomber, the B-52, the A-10 low-flying attack jet, and the service’s front-line fighters, the F-15 Eagle and the F-16 Falcon.

Even female aviators on Air Force refueling jets found themselves closer to combat. Air commanders pushed the fleet to get as close to strike fighters as possible to cut down on travel time to and from targets.

Capt. Tricia Paulsen-Howe, a navigator on a KC-135, flew for hours over hostile territory, refueling planes and searching for the two crew members of a downed F-15E north of Baghdad.

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