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Dozen female U.S. soldiers have died in Iraq combat
By LISA HOFFMAN
Scripps Howard News Service
April 13, 2004
- "It was loud, there was shouting, my team leader‘s seat was on fire ... Okay, the door. Open the door. Just my luck, a 400-pound door is stuck ... More shouting. Seems so far way, like a voice at the end of a tunnel. Got to get the door open or we‘re going to die."
That is part of the e-mail account that Pfc. Rachel Bosveld, 19, sent to her brother, Craig, of a Sept. 12 ambush that struck her Humvee with a rocket-propelled grenade while she and her unit were on patrol in Baghdad, according to an internal Army news-service article.
Somehow, the Waupun, Wis., high school graduate known for her high spirits and artistic flair managed to escape with a few bruises and a dislocated shoulder from trying to unjam the door.
Forty-four days later, the Army military policewoman‘s luck ran out. Two weeks short of her 20th birthday, Bosveld died in a mortar attack on a Baghdad police station.
Bosveld is one of a dozen female U.S. troops who have died in combat in Iraq - the most who have fallen in action in the 55 years women have been officially part of the full armed forces. In all, women make up between 10,000 and 15,000 of the 130,000 troops now in Iraq, according to experts on women in the military.
While women have served - and died - in virtually every conflict since the inception of the United States, it was not until 1948 that Congress allowed them to be full-fledged members of all the military branches. Before that, they were largely limited to the Army and to auxiliary jobs as nurses or other medical personnel.
During the Korean War, the first conflict to occur after the admittance of women to all the regular ranks, about 14 female soldiers died in plane crashes. Eight women, predominantly nurses, died in the Vietnam War. In the Persian Gulf War, the toll was 15, but only five in action.
In the ongoing Iraq conflict, a total of 18 women, all Army soldiers, have perished so far in the year-old war.
The latest woman to die under fire was another young MP from Wisconsin - Army National Guard Spc. Michelle Witmer, 20, of New Berlin, Wis., killed last Friday (April 9) when her Humvee came under bomb and small-arms attack in a restive section of Baghdad. In what is believed to be a U.S. military first, two of Witmer‘s sisters - including her twin, Charity - are serving in Iraq as well.
Although women remain barred from duty in the front-line infantry, armor, special forces, submarines and other high-risk military specialties, they are serving - and dying - in the thick of hostile fire in Iraq.
That is generally because Operation Iraqi Freedom has become a protracted battle against a guerrilla insurgency, where even those serving in what traditionally would be considered support units can find themselves front-line fighters. In many incidents, female troops have laid down counterfire or otherwise fought back when their units came under attack. Several, including Army Spc. Karen Guckert and Pvt. Teresa Broadwell, have earned medals for valor under fire.
Of those killed in combat in Iraq, according to Army casualty reports, five died in hostile attacks on their convoys and four in helicopters shot down by the enemy. One died when a bomb she was trying to disarm detonated. Bosveld was killed in an enemy mortar attack, and Wittmer died in an attack on her Humvee while she was on patrol.
The average age of the dozen combat victims was 23. Nine were privates or other relatively low-ranking enlisted soldiers, one was a non-commissioned officer and one an officer.
Aside from the 12 battlefield deaths, six female soldiers have died in accidents, from medical causes or from what the Army described as a "non-combat gunshot wound."
By all accounts, the battlefield deaths have triggered little public debate or even notice, within the military or in the public at large. Those who study the issue of women in the military say that times have definitely changed since the 1990-1991 Persian Gulf War when the mere presence of female military truck drivers drew media note.
Since then, women have been welcomed as fighter-jet and attack-helicopter pilots. So prevalent are women in uniform now that the Pentagon says it could not field sufficient forces without them.
"I think the public has accepted that women are part of the military, and that even if they‘re in support roles they are at risk," said Mady Segal, associate director of the Center for Research on Military Organization at the University of Maryland. "The story here is a story of cultural acceptance."
Not everyone agrees. Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness and a longtime opponent of women serving in combat, warns that, due to physical differences, female soldiers "do not have an equal opportunity to survive, or to help fellow soldiers survive, in close combat environments."
Donnelly blames "feminist activists" and "Clinton-era social engineering policies" for allowing women to serve where they are at undue risk of capture and torture and where they lack "the strength to cope with physical burdens" of battle.
She has collected more than 20,000 signatures on a petition calling on President Bush to keep female troops away from "close combat units."
(E-mail Lisa Hoffman at HoffmanL(at)shns.com of visit www.shns.com.)
http://www.knoxstudio.com/shns/story.cfm?pk=IRAQ-WOMEN-04-13-04&cat=II
By LISA HOFFMAN
Scripps Howard News Service
April 13, 2004
- "It was loud, there was shouting, my team leader‘s seat was on fire ... Okay, the door. Open the door. Just my luck, a 400-pound door is stuck ... More shouting. Seems so far way, like a voice at the end of a tunnel. Got to get the door open or we‘re going to die."
That is part of the e-mail account that Pfc. Rachel Bosveld, 19, sent to her brother, Craig, of a Sept. 12 ambush that struck her Humvee with a rocket-propelled grenade while she and her unit were on patrol in Baghdad, according to an internal Army news-service article.
Somehow, the Waupun, Wis., high school graduate known for her high spirits and artistic flair managed to escape with a few bruises and a dislocated shoulder from trying to unjam the door.
Forty-four days later, the Army military policewoman‘s luck ran out. Two weeks short of her 20th birthday, Bosveld died in a mortar attack on a Baghdad police station.
Bosveld is one of a dozen female U.S. troops who have died in combat in Iraq - the most who have fallen in action in the 55 years women have been officially part of the full armed forces. In all, women make up between 10,000 and 15,000 of the 130,000 troops now in Iraq, according to experts on women in the military.
While women have served - and died - in virtually every conflict since the inception of the United States, it was not until 1948 that Congress allowed them to be full-fledged members of all the military branches. Before that, they were largely limited to the Army and to auxiliary jobs as nurses or other medical personnel.
During the Korean War, the first conflict to occur after the admittance of women to all the regular ranks, about 14 female soldiers died in plane crashes. Eight women, predominantly nurses, died in the Vietnam War. In the Persian Gulf War, the toll was 15, but only five in action.
In the ongoing Iraq conflict, a total of 18 women, all Army soldiers, have perished so far in the year-old war.
The latest woman to die under fire was another young MP from Wisconsin - Army National Guard Spc. Michelle Witmer, 20, of New Berlin, Wis., killed last Friday (April 9) when her Humvee came under bomb and small-arms attack in a restive section of Baghdad. In what is believed to be a U.S. military first, two of Witmer‘s sisters - including her twin, Charity - are serving in Iraq as well.
Although women remain barred from duty in the front-line infantry, armor, special forces, submarines and other high-risk military specialties, they are serving - and dying - in the thick of hostile fire in Iraq.
That is generally because Operation Iraqi Freedom has become a protracted battle against a guerrilla insurgency, where even those serving in what traditionally would be considered support units can find themselves front-line fighters. In many incidents, female troops have laid down counterfire or otherwise fought back when their units came under attack. Several, including Army Spc. Karen Guckert and Pvt. Teresa Broadwell, have earned medals for valor under fire.
Of those killed in combat in Iraq, according to Army casualty reports, five died in hostile attacks on their convoys and four in helicopters shot down by the enemy. One died when a bomb she was trying to disarm detonated. Bosveld was killed in an enemy mortar attack, and Wittmer died in an attack on her Humvee while she was on patrol.
The average age of the dozen combat victims was 23. Nine were privates or other relatively low-ranking enlisted soldiers, one was a non-commissioned officer and one an officer.
Aside from the 12 battlefield deaths, six female soldiers have died in accidents, from medical causes or from what the Army described as a "non-combat gunshot wound."
By all accounts, the battlefield deaths have triggered little public debate or even notice, within the military or in the public at large. Those who study the issue of women in the military say that times have definitely changed since the 1990-1991 Persian Gulf War when the mere presence of female military truck drivers drew media note.
Since then, women have been welcomed as fighter-jet and attack-helicopter pilots. So prevalent are women in uniform now that the Pentagon says it could not field sufficient forces without them.
"I think the public has accepted that women are part of the military, and that even if they‘re in support roles they are at risk," said Mady Segal, associate director of the Center for Research on Military Organization at the University of Maryland. "The story here is a story of cultural acceptance."
Not everyone agrees. Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness and a longtime opponent of women serving in combat, warns that, due to physical differences, female soldiers "do not have an equal opportunity to survive, or to help fellow soldiers survive, in close combat environments."
Donnelly blames "feminist activists" and "Clinton-era social engineering policies" for allowing women to serve where they are at undue risk of capture and torture and where they lack "the strength to cope with physical burdens" of battle.
She has collected more than 20,000 signatures on a petition calling on President Bush to keep female troops away from "close combat units."
(E-mail Lisa Hoffman at HoffmanL(at)shns.com of visit www.shns.com.)
http://www.knoxstudio.com/shns/story.cfm?pk=IRAQ-WOMEN-04-13-04&cat=II