The Pentagon’s “Bad-Faith, BS” Review of Women in Combat Roles
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Politics
/ February 2, 2026
The Pentagon’s “Bad-Faith, BS” Review of Women in Combat Roles
Pete Hegseth came to office with benighted views of women in combat. Within a year, he ordered a study on whether having women in combat roles has led to compromised standards.
Joan Walsh
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Former Marine captain Maura Sullivan served as senior adviser to the secretary of the Navy in 2015 and 2016 and worked on implementing the policy of opening combat roles to women. Here she is in Fallujah, Iraq, in 2005.(Courtesy of Maura Sullivan)
They are remembered as “the lionesses.”
In June 2005, three female Marines died in combat in Fallujah, Iraq, even though women couldn’t yet serve in combat roles. So did three men in their convoy, when a grisly suicide bombing by Iraqi militants sent 13 other Marines, 11 of them women, to hospitals and left some with lifelong injuries. The tragedy underscored a poorly hidden truth: Women were already serving on the dangerous front lines of US wars, and the military’s policy of segregating them from men, and denying them weapons and sometimes equal armor, put men and women alike at risk.
Eight years after that tragedy, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta ordered that combat jobs be open to women, but it would take two more years for Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine leaders to review the policy and develop training and evaluation protocols to integrate their combat ranks. In 2015, Defense Secretary Ash Carter announced that all combat jobs would be open to women, “as long as they qualify and meet the standards.” Carter acknowledged that the Marine Corps continued to ask to bar women from certain military roles, including infantry, but refused to grant an exception. “We are a joint force, and I’ve decided to make a decision that applies to the entire force,” Carter said.
Less than a decade later, a defense secretary who may be less qualified than many women in combat would begin to try to dismantle that policy. Pete Hegseth came to office with benighted views of women in combat. “I’m straight up just saying we should not have women in combat roles,” he said on a manosphere podcast in November 2024. “It hasn’t made us more effective. Hasn’t made us more lethal. Has made fighting more complicated.” In his book The War on Warriors: Behind the Betrayal of the Men Who Keep Us Free, he said women performed some military roles admirably, but insisted that “women in the infantry—women in combat on purpose—is another story,” adding that “women cannot physically meet the same standards as men.” (Even though it is Defense Department policy that they have to, in order to qualify …
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The Pentagon’s “Bad-Faith, BS” Review of Women in Combat Roles
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Current Issue
Politics
/ February 2, 2026
The Pentagon’s “Bad-Faith, BS” Review of Women in Combat Roles
Pete Hegseth came to office with benighted views of women in combat. Within a year, he ordered a study on whether having women in combat roles has led to compromised standards.
Joan Walsh
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Former Marine captain Maura Sullivan served as senior adviser to the secretary of the Navy in 2015 and 2016 and worked on implementing the policy of opening combat roles to women. Here she is in Fallujah, Iraq, in 2005.(Courtesy of Maura Sullivan)
They are remembered as “the lionesses.”
In June 2005, three female Marines died in combat in Fallujah, Iraq, even though women couldn’t yet serve in combat roles. So did three men in their convoy, when a grisly suicide bombing by Iraqi militants sent 13 other Marines, 11 of them women, to hospitals and left some with lifelong injuries. The tragedy underscored a poorly hidden truth: Women were already serving on the dangerous front lines of US wars, and the military’s policy of segregating them from men, and denying them weapons and sometimes equal armor, put men and women alike at risk.
Eight years after that tragedy, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta ordered that combat jobs be open to women, but it would take two more years for Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine leaders to review the policy and develop training and evaluation protocols to integrate their combat ranks. In 2015, Defense Secretary Ash Carter announced that all combat jobs would be open to women, “as long as they qualify and meet the standards.” Carter acknowledged that the Marine Corps continued to ask to bar women from certain military roles, including infantry, but refused to grant an exception. “We are a joint force, and I’ve decided to make a decision that applies to the entire force,” Carter said.
Less than a decade later, a defense secretary who may be less qualified than many women in combat would begin to try to dismantle that policy. Pete Hegseth came to office with benighted views of women in combat. “I’m straight up just saying we should not have women in combat roles,” he said on a manosphere podcast in November 2024. “It hasn’t made us more effective. Hasn’t made us more lethal. Has made fighting more complicated.” In his book The War on Warriors: Behind the Betrayal of the Men Who Keep Us Free, he said women performed some military roles admirably, but insisted that “women in the infantry—women in combat on purpose—is another story,” adding that “women cannot physically meet the same standards as men.” (Even though it is Defense Department policy that they have to, in order to qualify …
The Pentagon’s “Bad-Faith, BS” Review of Women in Combat Roles
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Current Issue
Politics
/ February 2, 2026
The Pentagon’s “Bad-Faith, BS” Review of Women in Combat Roles
Pete Hegseth came to office with benighted views of women in combat. Within a year, he ordered a study on whether having women in combat roles has led to compromised standards.
Joan Walsh
Share
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X (Twitter)
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Former Marine captain Maura Sullivan served as senior adviser to the secretary of the Navy in 2015 and 2016 and worked on implementing the policy of opening combat roles to women. Here she is in Fallujah, Iraq, in 2005.(Courtesy of Maura Sullivan)
They are remembered as “the lionesses.”
In June 2005, three female Marines died in combat in Fallujah, Iraq, even though women couldn’t yet serve in combat roles. So did three men in their convoy, when a grisly suicide bombing by Iraqi militants sent 13 other Marines, 11 of them women, to hospitals and left some with lifelong injuries. The tragedy underscored a poorly hidden truth: Women were already serving on the dangerous front lines of US wars, and the military’s policy of segregating them from men, and denying them weapons and sometimes equal armor, put men and women alike at risk.
Eight years after that tragedy, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta ordered that combat jobs be open to women, but it would take two more years for Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine leaders to review the policy and develop training and evaluation protocols to integrate their combat ranks. In 2015, Defense Secretary Ash Carter announced that all combat jobs would be open to women, “as long as they qualify and meet the standards.” Carter acknowledged that the Marine Corps continued to ask to bar women from certain military roles, including infantry, but refused to grant an exception. “We are a joint force, and I’ve decided to make a decision that applies to the entire force,” Carter said.
Less than a decade later, a defense secretary who may be less qualified than many women in combat would begin to try to dismantle that policy. Pete Hegseth came to office with benighted views of women in combat. “I’m straight up just saying we should not have women in combat roles,” he said on a manosphere podcast in November 2024. “It hasn’t made us more effective. Hasn’t made us more lethal. Has made fighting more complicated.” In his book The War on Warriors: Behind the Betrayal of the Men Who Keep Us Free, he said women performed some military roles admirably, but insisted that “women in the infantry—women in combat on purpose—is another story,” adding that “women cannot physically meet the same standards as men.” (Even though it is Defense Department policy that they have to, in order to qualify …
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