Last week, the Israel Defense Forces announced it will no longer train female soldiers to serve in infantry mobility units due to concerns about their physical preparedness. It is no small announcement that after two years of sustained warfare, the prime example of a modern sex-integrated military decided to backtrack. As Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth noted in a tweet last weekend, this is major news for militaries around the world that are reconsidering the role of women in combat.
Israel’s decision highlights the obvious. Proper physical fitness is imperative for soldiers operating in combat roles—not only so they may achieve their objectives effectively, but also so they do not cause undue danger to themselves or their teammates. Soldiers must be able to trust each other. Real-world experience, from Israel to U.S. Army Special Operations Command, demonstrates that it is entirely reasonable to wonder if such trust can be maintained in co-ed military combat units.
Prior to the current administration, the U.S. military employed different fitness test requirements for men and women. A recent memo from Secretary Hegseth directed the secretaries of the military departments to submit proposals for new fitness tests with sex-neutral requirements for identified combat roles. The memo instructed the branches to submit their proposals within 60 days of its publication on March 3, but the new Army Fitness Test (AFT) is the only proposal to be released thus far.
As significant as the new directive is, a future administration that prioritizes sex-based diversity could reverse Secretary Hegseth’s action with the stroke of an autopen. In the upcoming National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the annual approval of the DoD’s budget and expenditures, Congress should take the opportunity to cement Secretary Hegseth’s changes in legislation.
The forthcoming NDAA should uniformly apply sex-neutral physical fitness standards aligned exclusively with validated operational requirements, direct the secretary of defense to provide annual certification to Congress confirming that these new standards remain intact, and direct the DoD to conduct an extensive assessment of the readiness, cohesion, and cultural impact resulting from integrating women into combat roles, with comprehensive findings submitted to Congress.
Despite what some may claim, the DoD’s new directive is in accordance with the evidence. Data shows that when individuals do not operate to physical standard, lethality and effectiveness are sacrificed to the detriment of our soldiers.
A 2015 study by the Marine Corps found that all-male groups significantly outperform integrated groups in simulated combat. The study divided Marines of various occupations into three groups: one all-male, one with a low density of women (1-2), and one with a high density of women (2-6). Over a year of simulated combat, the all-male group proved to be overwhelmingly faster, more accurate in shooting, less injury prone, and more efficient in evacuating casualties. This data further reinforces the conclusion of the 1992 Presidential Commission on the Assignment of Women, which was included in the summary of the 2015 study:
A military unit at maximum combat effectiveness is a military unit least likely to suffer casualties. Winning in war is often only a matter of inches, and unnecessary distraction or any dilution of the combat effectiveness puts the mission and lives in jeopardy. Risking the lives of a military unit in combat to provide career opportunities or accommodate the personal desires or interests of an individual, or group of individuals, is more than bad military judgment. It is morally wrong.
However, proponents of women in combat decried the study. Due to their lack of combat experience, female participants received three months of training in their new occupation prior to the beginning of the study, but many of the male participants arrived with prior combat training experience. But it should be noted that the all-male Provisional Machine Gunner group and the all-male Provisional Infantry group were pulled from non-combat occupations. They had the same amount of experience as the women—but still significantly outperformed their integrated counterparts in the vast majority of exercises. Now that there are numerous women with combat training in the U.S. military, a final DoD assessment on the impact of integrating women into combat roles must be completed in order to end the debate once and for all.
Nevertheless, the study’s findings led Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Joseph Dunford to recommend that infantry jobs remain closed to women. Despite this, the Obama Administration promptly integrated women into combat positions beginning in 2016.
The introduction of sex-neutral fitness standards goes a long way, but even legislation may not be enough. Ideologues in our government and military have consistently prioritized gender diversity over readiness. The Army Combat Fitness Test (ACFT), the predecessor to the new sex-neutral AFT, was originally designed to be sex-neutral until an Army study found that 84% of female trainees failed in a trial launch. Annual certification to Congress confirming that sex-neutral fitness standards remain intact is the only way to ensure that ideologues do not keep hijacking our military readiness in the name of diversity.
The IDF is currently engaged in war and has rightly changed its training standards accordingly. No nation should ask its wives, mothers, and daughters to fight its wars.