Mullen Praises Trailblazing Military Women
(October 9, 2010) |
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| WASHINGTON, Oct. 6, 2010 – The chairman of the Joint Chiefs
of Staff, flanked by two of the nation's top female military
officers, today recounted the early days of women's
integration into the services and said “we would be nowhere
as a military” without trailblazing women.
“In combat, in every part of who we are as a military right
now, women have been extraordinary,” Navy Adm. Mike Mullen
said at Fortune magazine's Most Powerful Women summit here
today.
Mullen took the stage before an audience of mostly civilian
women leaders alongside Gen. Ann Dunwoody, commander of Army
Materiel Command, and Navy Vice Adm. Ann Rondeau, president
of National Defense University.
At the summit's Leadership Lessons panel moderated by CNN's
Kyra Phillips, the three senior leaders recalled how far the
services have come in integrating women since they entered
the military - Mullen in 1968, and Rondeau and Dunwoody in
1974 and 1975, respectively.
Mullen recalled serving on the Naval Academy's admissions
board in October 1976 when the academy received a telegram
from the White House announcing that women would be
permitted to enter the academy in the next academic year.
Only one woman served on the admissions board, he recalled,
and they would have to move quickly to prepare for the
change. The chairman acknowledged it didn't go smoothly that
first year.
“As I look back, I realize now how little I knew about how
to integrate women,” Mullen said, adding that he learned
from the experience. “Throughout my career, I've tried to
listen to people and view the situation through their eyes.
“For me, it's about how we create opportunities, then sink
or swim,” he continued. “If the talent pool is there, we
need to recognize that and make sure doors stay open.”
Those first female graduates opened doors for others, Mullen
said, noting that the military now stays between 20 and 25
percent female. The Navy continues to undergo significant
integration efforts, the panelists noted, with the first
female submariners chosen last summer, 16 years after women
were permitted to serve on surface ships.
“We would be nowhere as a military if someone not had the
wisdom to send that telegram way back then, and if we had
not had women like this ready to step up when the military
wasn't ready for them and blaze a trail,” Mullen said,
referring to Dunwoody and Rondeau.
The Navy's lack of preparation for integrating women in the
1970s “was pretty profound,” Rondeau said. What that meant
for her, she said, was trying to find a mentor she could
trust to help her grow, determining where she could make a
difference, and knowing which battles to fight.
Asked whether women servicemembers must prove themselves
more than men, Rondeau said, “I'm not sure that it is as
much about who you are, as where you are, and what you bring
to the table. You come with a certain amount of competence
and confidence, then you just lead.”
Dunwoody, the military's first female four-star officer,
joined the Army just after the Women's Army Corps was
disbanded. “Our journey was to forge -– and sometimes force
-– women into the full spectrum of capabilities,” she said.
For Dunwoody, that meant jumping out of airplanes, doing
12-mile rucksack marches, and commanding troops in war
zones, she said. “That's our journey and our legacy,” she
added. “That was the journey we had to build throughout our
careers.”
Phillips asked about the evolving role of women in combat
and whether women might soon serve in Special Forces. While
none of the three would speculate on when law or policy
might change in that regard, all acknowledged that women
already serve in combat and that the nature of warfare has
changed such that the issue will continued to be addressed.
“We are in an asymmetrical environment without front and
rear boundaries,” Dunwoody said of the wars in Iraq and
Afghanistan. “Every soldier is in danger. What's so good
about the military is that we continue review those
[policies]. The doors continue to open, and policies
continue to change to capture the talent of men and women in
uniform. All in battle are making sacrifices, and we can
never forget that.”
Military leaders need to assess what has been learned from
combat in Iraq and Afghanistan regarding women
servicemembers, Mullen said. “It's very important that we
take a look at what we've learned in these wars and look at
whether we should evaluate those policies. Battle is nowhere
and it is everywhere right now; everyone is in a combat
zone. We've got to understand what that means and roll it
into the future.”
Rondeau also said she expects laws and policies to evolve to
open more doors for women. “We're putting women on
submarines, we've had them at sea for a while, and we've had
them in the air a while,” she said. “You can't win the
current fight without women on the field, and that just is a
fact.”
The issue surrounding women in combat roles, Rondeau said,
is about not only capabilities, but also mindset. She
recalled a time when she was commander of Navy accessions
training and a female sailor just out of boot camp went out
of her way to ask the commander a question. “Am I ready to
fight and win?” the young woman asked Rondeau.
“I'd put her in war any day,” the admiral told the audience.
“Being a warfighter is not just about the competence to
fight. It's also about the spirit. A warfighting spirit is
something that comes from the heart.” | |
By Lisa Daniel
American Forces Press Service
Copyright 2010
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