Treblaine said:
RC1138 said:
Yes, women are generally weaker than men, and so too were the guerillas of the Viet-cong generally smaller and weaker than well fed American Marines in the Vietnam war yet they fought a stand up fight and inflicted heavy losses, so many battles were won by the Americans only thanks to the entire military force working in coordination such as artillery and air support. The battle of Khe Sanh was won by brilliant military planning of defences with artillery and carpet bombing with B52 bombers so that Khe Sanh didn't end up like Dien Bien Phu. There is a good case to be made that almost every battle is won by who has the best use of heavy artillery.
It's not about being the strongest.
I recall part of the standing orders for US Marines when they were in Iraq was "do not die". To make it clear that it was part of their mission to absolutely minimise casualties and fatalities in their ongoing battle against the many insurgency factions. Being protective is part of the deal of modern combat where missions are about minimising losses. A common creed is "no man left behind". America's involvement in the Battle of Mogadishu was all about trying to rescue a few pilots who'd crashed in enemy territory, didn't make a difference they were all men and open homosexuals were banned from service.
The thing was, it wasn't an issue for the Viet-cong or the Red army to have mixed gender units, they were highly effective against a much better trained force.
Women in frontline combat may not be realistic, but it is at least practical.
I'll take this one point by point.
Khe San was a frontal assault done by the NVA, that is, the Army of North Vietnam. That was the regular Army, same as the U.S. Army, British Ground Army, German Heer, and the like. No women served in any capacity in the NVA. The VC, Viet Cong, were the insurgent forces of the Vietnamese people, obviously consisting both men and women (as well as children and the elderly). Casualty figures also need to be kept in mind. While it's true that strategically, American forces never really gained ground in the entire war, Tactically, American forces remained almost universally victorious (Even the Tet Offensive would be considered Tactically a Victory) That is all to say, Americans by and large always out gunned and thus, out killed, any aggressor in the entire Vietnam war. That's true now. While yes, Strategically, we are doing little to nothing in the mid-east, tactically we win every single engagement. We always kill more of them then they kill of us.
As such to the grander idea, women, even part of a insurgent unit, would not fit in a modern setting FPS as you would ALWAYS be on the losing side tactically. I can't think of a game where your team receives greater losses then the enemy team and you still "win." If anything the casualty comparison is GROSSLY, sometimes in the 100's to 1 range in favor of the player character's side.
Next, speaking as someone who was in the military, leave no man behind is a core concept, but, as with EVERYTHING in the military, their is a hierarchy of needs and orders. Some things supersede others. The Soldier's Creed, which all U.S. Army personel memorize, goes as this:
I am an American Soldier.
I am a warrior and a member of a team.
I serve the people of the United States, and live the Army Values.
I will always place the mission first.
I will never accept defeat.
I will never quit.
I will never leave a fallen comrade.
I am disciplined, physically and mentally tough, trained and proficient in my warrior tasks and drills.
I always maintain my arms, my equipment and myself.
I am an expert and I am a professional.
I stand ready to deploy, engage, and destroy, the enemies of the United States of America in close combat.
I am a guardian of freedom and the American way of life.
I am an American Soldier.
The order is as important as the words. The mission comes *first.* The only thing that can come between you and the mission is doing your duty to the United States. You *can* and may *have* to leave a fallen comrade should the mission demand it. For example, you're mentioning of the Operation Irene. Assuming you've read/seen more than just Black Hawk Down you may know that in fact, *many* U.S. Soldiers were left behind, at both crash sites and isolated pockets of soldiers. Additionally, securing the crash sites of the first, and then the second, helicopter had nothing to do with removing or recovering bodies. Standing military orders demand that *no* property, especially technology and vehicles, can be left to be looted by the enemy. Helicopters have secure satellite and radio uplinks built into them. That needs to be destroyed above all else as it can hurt OPSEC for soldiers any, and everywhere.
For the record, I went to West Point, military history, hierarchy, and strategy is kind of something I qualify as a true expert on. Women do not, nor will for the foreseeable future, have a place on a battlefield of this reality. It's not even their fault. There is no fault to be had, it's just how the pieces lay on the board. You wouldn't expect a quadriplegic to work in a coal mine, women cannot properly be integrated into an *effective* (key point) fighting unit. Rescuing survivors was a secondary, and in the eyes of the Ground Operations Commander. And that's how it always works. If we have a vehcile rollover (which I have hand many). First mission priority is to call the dozer's and flatbeds to recover the vehicle and get it back to base. We have to, in fact, call that in BEFORE, we can call in a CASEVAC.
How does this relate to the grander idea? Leaving no man behind in fact cause a number of extra casualties that were unneeded. The fact such extra resistance was present at crash sites while casualties were trying to be evacuated resulted in *more* casualties for the Americans then would have been necessary. A pilot captured during a failed attempt to rescue him (which resulted in deaths of his rescuers) ended up being returned to U.S. Custody. And that was just between friends and battle buddies. Imagine if it's a romantic interest. To great of a danger for high ranking members of the chain of command to risk. That is the reason we *still* and *will not* integrate women into combat units.
Also it is not presence of women that made the Red Army an effective fighting force. It was the sheer number and mass of people. In fact most military historians would argue the Red Army was probably the least effective fighting force in history, as combat related causalities it received were greater than those of all the major belligerents combined, some ten million killed/captured/wounded. That's *not* an effective fighting force, nor one I'd want to be part of/related to. The Viet-Cong have a similar situation, usually being massacred in any and all engagements. What made them "effective" was their ability to strike on their terms, when and where, which is a very effective Strategic goal to undermine an enemies fighting spirit, but due to their lack of training and poor equipment, they lost tactically every time.
Neither are indicative of a modern setting FPS, nor the world as we currently know it.