The Great Illusion: Women in the Military

In the hands of feminists, the thirty-year long influx of women into the militaries of advanced countries is usually presented as a ‘gain’ or ‘victory’ for the members of the female sex, one part of womankind’s unstoppable march from the dark recesses of subjection to the glories of freedom. In this paper I do not intend to address the question as to whether women’s joining in what Lord Byron called ‘the brain splattering, windpipe-slashing, art’ does in fact constitute ‘progress’, rather, I shall argue that the process is part symptom, part cause, of the decline of the ‘advanced’ military. With this objective in mind, the paper is constructed as follows. Part I demonstrates that the ‘advanced’ militaries are, in fact, in decline and have been so for the last fifty years. Part II shows how, in one country after another since 1970 or so, this decline correlates rather precisely with the influx of women. Part III argues that, whereas the regular armed forces of most developed states are ceasing to be warfighting machines, in those places where there are still wars women take little or no part in the fighting. Finally, Part IV presents my conclusions.