I say NO. Not on the field or deployed in ANY combat unit.

I ain't gonna rant and rave but being now ex military (navy) and living and working on ships with 200 men to 20-40 women i can safetly say.........men moan more than women seriously lol

If a woman can do a job then let her be if she can do it better then crack on..............The amount of times i have encountered men moaning and bitching that women can't do jack are the ones who tend to be worried a women is gonna show them up!

I know women in the UK can't be a marine or diver or infantry or para........this is not slatting us this has its reasons. Womens bodies are not made for this level of stress and in long run can effect us having babies etc. I don't agree with jobs being held back from women but then when i hear the risks i am happy where i am.

Why can't we be in any combat zone? I liked it..............

Men should not slate women for a job at end of day, we can do a job as good as the next man and some times better

But a man or any 1 that is gonna argue this or slate this fact then need to grow up.

I have for the whole of my naval career with females friends every day took slatings that the military is a mans world...........only possibility I could work out why they would do this is jealousy

actually i recall that the most experience the Israelis had with women in combat roles were during the War of Independence (1948) where everyone was fighting no holds bard against those odds...it was found that many(dare say most) women that were fighting had boyfriends or husbands alongside them, and actually the women were good fighters, it was the men that tried to do crazy bravery stunts to impress them that got killed more often than not.
Women have niches in the military. About what sherman said about israeli female pilots, well i thought there were more but im surprised at those low numbers.
the us has many female pilots, and lets never forget that during WWII many soviet women pilots did great feats of bravery and daring during the war, and many became aces, including several double aces. (however there were also cases of soviet male pilots being their wingmen and being too brave on their account...)
but i think the best solution is that too each his/her own, and if somones qualified for a MOS then let them have it. No slack for females though, they should hack it just like the guys.

All of this talk has reminded me of a buddy of mine. He is a cross country runner and even during practice he won't get beat by any girl on the girls cross country team. I remember a single funny situation, we had this girl that was one of the top female runners in our conference last year and during practice one time she almost caught up to him, so he decided to sprint the last mile of a 6 mile workout just to not be beaten.

The kid almost died
but in his mind his pride survived....

Pretty sad if you ask me, but thats the way he is. Also not going to be too much female competition for him during Basic since he's 11B at Benning.

Sure why not, they are just as good as men, maybe even better in some fields. I've known a lot of very good female leaders. And many are WHOO-AH also.

Yes, why not. To not allow females to serve in combat roles is to ignore 50% of your potential recruiting base.

They can have a lot more to offer than men can also.

Err the reason women are not allowed in direct combat units like infantry isn't some question of their own ability. Actually, its been proven that women psychologicaly can handle the stress of combat a little bit better then men. The reason women aren't allowed, and shouldn't be allowed in forward combat areas is this

Men, not the women, cannot handle it psychologically.

When a man sees his brother go down in combat it sets a certain number of reactions in motion in his mind. When that same man sees a woman go down, the reactions in his brain are totally different. A male is a hell of alot more likely to lose their cool when they see a woman blown open then a man, something in connection to their mind's eye of their mothers or some bull crap. I saw this in a huge report after the Jessica Lynch incident.

Another major issue is that if u torture a captured american woman in front of a captured american man, the man is a hell of alot more likely to crack.

So i reiterate, its not about physical strength because thats what training is for, you are TRAINED to be a soldier woman can be just as good a soldier as the men if not better, its that by serving WITH men they will impede the males' ability to fight, through no fault of her own mind you.

Honestly though..... one of the things I enjoy about the Infantry is not having to watch my mouth a majority of the time.

I don't have to worry about EO complaints because I call somebody a name.

I will go with "Sure why not" as the Russians used women in the frontlines and beyond without any major issues.