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Women warriors play an essential role in military

By Andrea Stone, USA TODAY

By Tony Overman, AP
First Lt. Susan Gordon, performs a preflight check Wednesday.

WASHINGTON — Until a Marine radio operator became the first woman in the U.S. military to die in the war against terrorism, the conflict seemed like a battle waged just by men. Now, besides TV images of bearded Green Berets trekking across mountains and burly Marines hunching in foxholes, there's the photo of Sgt. Jeannette Winters, one of seven servicemembers who died Wednesday when their Marine cargo plane crashed in Pakistan. Winters, 25, was one of an estimated 6,000 women warriors who have quietly helped rout the Taliban who had ruled Afghanistan, and the al-Qaeda terrorist network based there.

None serves in the special operations forces combing caves in search of Osama bin Laden. Nor are they among the infantry troops based in Kandahar and Kabul. Women are not permitted by law to serve in ground combat units.

Number of women who served in previous conflicts
World War I - 33,000
World War II - 400,000
Korean War - 120,000
Vietnam - 7,000
Grenada - 170
Panama - 770
Persian Gulf - 41,000
Somalia - 1,000
Haiti - 1,200
Bosnia - 13,935
Kosovo - 5,660

But they are in nearly every other unit that supports combat troops: intelligence analysts, fuel handlers, bomber and fighter pilots, supply officers, psychological operations soldiers, gunship crewmembers, even members of honor guards for the fallen. Two Navy ships sent to the region have women commanders. Overall, an estimated 10% of the forces involved in the war in Afghanistan are women.

Yet the Pentagon is downplaying their presence. That's a turnabout from the 1991 Gulf War, when women played a major role in a conflict for the first time and attracted a lot of media attention.
 
 

Current Events Test


NAME ______________________________________________________________________
 

What kinds of combat jobs do women do in the Military?

Are women permitted in ground combat units?

Who was the first woman killed in this war and how?

Infantry troops are based where?

Which previous conflicts had the 3 largest amounts of women serve in the military?

Bonus: What percent of the military in the war in Afghanistan is women?