Photo Credit: By Rick Kozak — Associated Press
C Company, 1st Battalion, 26th Infantry Regiment soldiers carry injured colleagues to a medical center at the base in eastern Baghdad after an bomb destroyed a Bradley fighting vehicle, killing five U.S. soldiers and an Iraqi interpreter.
Wow, I don’t see a single female face in this group of guys. Here is another example of why women do not belong in a combat situation/scenario. A woman would be required to help carry the bodies of wounded, injured, and killed soldiers; and she doesn’t have the same upper body strength as a man does.
Through email I received even more compelling information regarding this picture and why the collocation rule should stand:
[This picture].. portrays a “luxury” situation. When soldiers are under fire and attacking, as was the case in Fallujah in November 2004, a fallen soldier frequently has to be rescued by another single soldier strong enough to carry him off the battlefield on his back. Other soldiers are busy engaging the enemy and providing cover. This is why the collocation rule is important, and why it should be retained.
I witnessed such a “fireman’s carry” rescue during a live fire exercise at Fort Bragg in 1992. The soldiers were very matter of fact when I asked why they didn’t use stretchers. On ships as well as on land, you cannot count on several people to perform a life-saving rescue.
This is a picture of the ‘fireman’s carry’.
Women are excluded from serving with infantry units (for very good reasons) under the current guidelines.
GAO Report to the Ranking Minority Member Sucommittee on Readiness, Committee on Armed Services, US Senate, entitled “Gender Issues: Information on DoD’s Assignment Policy and Direct Ground Combat Definition”, October, 1998, Chart created from the information available in DoD Exclusions And Number of Restricted and Closed Positions, P. 18
Women have on average about 40-50% the upper body strength of men.
A study that was published in 2000 examined the effects of affirmative action on police hiring. While comparing male and female public safety officers, it was discovered that female officers had 32 percent to 56 percent less upper-body strength and 18 percent to 45 percent less lower-body strength than male officers. (Lott, 2005)
So it would seem that although the numbers seem to be different depending on where you look, the outcome/bottom line/conclusion is the same: women are simply not as strong as men and for that reason they shouldn’t be put in physically demanding all-male positions/jobs that call for typical male strength.
No offense, but this isn’t the best metric. I’ve had five or six pre-teen kids of both genders catch a falling adult as part of a trust-building exercise. While the human body is heavy — I’d be surprised if that injured individual weighed less than 280 lbs with all his gear on — when the weight is evenly distributed across six people it’s not nearly as problematic.
I doubt the average trained woman would be incapable of lifting 48 lbs.
There are very good reasons, cultural, political, and otherwise, to avoid having female troops on the front line, but that picture really isn’t one of them.
Okay, let’s take the argument to the private sector for just a moment.
How many funerals have you attended where the pallbearers were women?
Carrying a body, whether dead or injured, requires physical strength; which women do not have a great amount of in comparison to men. It couldn’t be any simpler.
A study found that “[m]ore than half US soldiers have been medically evacuated from Iraq and treated at two of the military’s large pain treatment centers suffer not from battle wounds but from bad backs”. “Inherent in being a soldier is carrying large weights. Historically, the ideal ‘carry weight’ is a third of your body weight,” said Lt. Col. (Dr.) Frank Christopher, chief of deployment health at Fort Bragg, North Caolina. (Weise, 2005)
Many troops in the field carry much more than that – up to 180 pounds in some cases. (Weise, 2005) How do you suppose a woman would do carrying that kind of weight when a lot of women struggle to carry groceries?
Side plates in the new body armor system have nearly doubled the weight of protective vests from sixteen to thiry-one pounds since March of 2003. (Cox & Maze, 2006)
Both Army and Marine officials have warned members of Congress that “Every pound of protective gear hinders combat troops’ ability to hop over walls, search house after house, and when necessary, dive for cover.”
Battle gear is undergoing testing at Fort Lewis, Washington. It is likely that soldiers will someday carry:
a voice/data radio system for communictions from platoon level up to HQ- a micro-computer processor to manage information flow. (Cox, 2006) also, (Donnelly, 2007)
All of this equipment is estimated to weigh seventeen pounds and will replace items currently in use, which weigh about 18 pounds. Body armor weighs about 31 pounds. In addition, soldiers should carry weapons like an M16 (8 pounds) ammunition another 8 pounds, M14 weighs at 10 pounds, empty. Then there’s the weight of food and water–and should they get into a battle situation, they might need to carry dead or wounded soldiers and their gear. (Cox, 2006)
During one training cycle, some of the women participated in an urban warfare course. One of them promptly broke her leg doing a spider drop out a window. Her smaller frame could not take the shock of landing after dropping approximately 6 feet while weighted down with all the equipment a Marine is expected to wear in battle. (Neumayr, 2005)
Not Equipped for the Rigors of war, Kansas City Star, July 16, 2005.
Soldiers in Iraq Carry Extra Load: Back Pain USA Today, Nov. 21, 2005.
Troops Get Extra Armor, Army Times, Jan 23, 2006.
Fielding the Future NOW, from GPS to Helmet-Mounted Displays, Land Warriors Brings Cyberspace to Soldiers, ARMY TIMES, Sept. 11, 2006.
Constructing the Co-Ed Military, Duke Journal of Gender Law & Policy, Volume 14:815, 6/18/2007, pdf
Hi is this picture a Female/Male “Fireman´s carry” buddy?? or a Male/Male? i already did the zoom and looks like really a female wow incredible lift a bigger heavier man over her slim shoulder more pics of pretty girls doing this feat please:)
Hi Tomslick where did u find the “fireman´s carry” photo not the first one the stretcher..i mean the second looks like a female lifting and carrying the guy over the shoulder..no offense pal:=) Tell me the link where is this photo please
Thanks I love lift and carry female/male specially ots (over the shoulder) and fireman´s style hmmm
Dear Afonso. Those are guys. Get a grip.