22 October 2007

Women Warriors



During the Trojan War, it is said that the Amazons came to the aid of King Priam in his struggle with the Greeks. They came from their country on the southern coast of the Black Sea, led by Queen Penthesilia. She had a reputation as a formidable warrior. Her Amazons also had great prowess in the art of war, and followed the practice of removing their right breast, so that their ability to hurl the javelin would not be impeded.

In Rosemary Sutcliffe's version of the Iliad story, she describes the feast of celebration in Troy after the arrival of the women warriors this way: “Priam gave Pentelisia a cup of gold.   She held it up for all to see, exclaiming "I swear that tomorrow I will take the life of Prince Achilles!”

It did not work out quite that way, but that is the way of thing. The world is intruding on me this week, and it is time to sit up and take note of some things that are going on. We can't pretend not to notice them, since they are so plain. Some of it seems to be really good news, and some of it is unsettling in the extreme. I do not have quite the right words to do it, but I am going to have to do it anyway. The issues of gender, race and economics are coming together in a peculiar brew, right here on the streets around Big Pink.

It started with the oddly truncated last week. There had been the symposium out in Chantilly, which was put on by an industry association to which I belong. It was topical in more ways than one: the theme was about how to deal with information sharing between the national intelligence community and the local Cops. Each side attempting to understand what the other needed, and all the procedural roadblocks that impede communication.

The most impressive speaker was the Chief of the Metropolitan Police, as it turned out. Kathy Lanier spoke about what her officers needed from the Spooks. The first thing that was required was a common vocabulary. The common term after 9/11 was to lump everyone in the civil side into the rubric of “First Responder,” but that really does not describe the role and mission. Kathy explained that the “domestic warfighters,” is a much more accurate term.

She had been a mystery choice by the boy Mayor in the District, replacing the phlegmatic and likeable Chief Ramsey. Where he had been an archetypical cop, thick necked, Kathy is a pert blonde woman with an engaging way of tossing her hair. She had seemed an unlikely choice for the top job at the time, particularly in a city that is largely African American, but as her resume was read, I realized that she was well qualified, and as she spoke, I saw that she was also tough, smart and decisive.

She wore her Glock semi-automatic pistol with an air of easy confidence, and I pondered the cultural divide that enabled her to carry a gun in the facility, but not a phone.

It was an entertaining hour, and as the Chief swept out, I had a renewed appreciation for how difficult the law enforcement problem is, even if you take the terrorist component out of altogether.

Friday morning I had intended to work, but things did not work out that way. I had a couple boxes of materials that had to be delivered for set-up in the morning program, and so I was there early. There was a panel discussion, moderated by a senior officer, and featuring some of the kids who have recently returned from the wars.

You may have heard that the Army and Marines are overstressed in trying to meet the unending commitment in Iraq, not to mention coping with the increased insurgency in Afghanistan.

The line-up was impressive, since these kids have more time in combat environments in their first five or six years than I did in three decades of service. The difference between what we were asked to do in the Cold War and what is required in the Global War on Terror is stark.

Deployments used to be marked by stress and discomfort on the big-deck ships, tempered by continuous training to be ready to take the fight to the Soviets, or to menace the Iranians and comfort the Saudis.

Now it is something else. The bombs are real, and the Navy folks who have been called to augment special operations folks are on the ground, in-country, often assigned to distant Forward Operating Bases far from help when you need it.

Nothing like this had been seen in my time in uniform, and the only people who had seen as much combat action as the young people sitting in front of us was the World War Two generation, who went overseas “for the duration.”

Based on the way the war is going, they are going to be surpassed in experience soon, if they have not already. Most of the crowd were retirees who have the time to take the morning and hear what the active force is doing. Some of them had been in Vietnam, the other time the Army was overstressed and needed augmentation.

In that conflict, Naval Intelligence Officers were sent out to bases scattered around the Mekong Delta, and several had been killed in action. It is dangerous stuff, being on the ground, and what's more, they had to figure it out on their own, since there was no Navy manual for combating an armed and ferocious insurgency.

The panel of junior officers was impressive, the best part of America. The really interesting part was that two of the five were women, and they were the ones with the most time in combat.

A quiet well-spoken enlisted woman had done thirteen deployments- thirteen- to Afghanistan, in support of special warfare teams. The other woman was a Lieutenant who looked a little like Kathy Lanier. In her three years in Iraq, she had been the only woman in a force of two hundred SEALS.

Her team had killed 38 insurgents in direct action, and she had processed hundreds of captives.

The ribbons we wear are little cloth biographies, if you know how to read them. You can tell the difference between Hot and Cold Warrior at a glance. Looking at the Lieutenant's ribbons, I was only mildly surprised to see that she was wearing three Bronze Stars, with the combat action “V.”

I told you something was going on. These are not Amazons, by the way. They are dedicated citizens and good sailors, and tough as nails when they need to be.

In the story of Troy, on the morning of the appointed combat, Achilles the Greek grabbed the bridle of Queen Penthelisia's horse, slashing its throat, and stabbing down under the helmet, wrecking the fallen Queen's throat. Her helmet fell off, revealing that she was a woman, and beautiful.   

Achilles was stuck with remorse.   He allowed the Trojans to retrieve the Queen's dead body.   That evening, King Priam buried Queen Penthelisia in the barrow of an ancient Trojan king, under the cold earth.

Things have changed. In a world of unmanned reconnaissance drones, and push-button weapons, gender does not have the same limiting factors it once did. But some things have not changed, and that is part of the puzzle of this new world that is growing all around us.

More on that tomorrow.

Copyright 2007 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com

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