Quote:
Originally Posted by helbent4
The greater inclusion of women into the military and further into front-line combat collided with the influx of a core hardened criminal element that had been accepted into military service for one reason or another.
It is impossible to determine statistics but it's possible that as many as 20-25% or more of inductees in 1997 and after in the US military had some kind of criminal record, up to and including felony convictions such as theft, violent assault, drug charges, even murder and sexual assault. ...
... The relaxation of supervision and eventual breakdown in morale and disciple put the large influx of female conscripts squarely on a collision course with various former and current criminal elements, especially those with a history of violence or sexual assault against women. Interestingly, women serving in combat units through the EFCP experienced lower level of sexual harassment and sexual assault (rape), but few were completely immune.
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Just my opinion, but this last sentence sounds
really optimistic to me, given the previous statements. I can see higher levels of harassment and assault across the board. Further, I can then see a lot of revenge violence by friends/allies/NCOs against the assaulters. If gangs are involved, the potential for a spiral of violence within units seems staggering. Admittedly, it might stabilize by 2000(2013, whatever your timeline) as the offenders are driven out one way or another, but until then, I think you've got the potential to really rip units apart. (I feel so glad I'm not a company or battalion commander in this environment!)
To drag the real world into this, I think in the last 1-2 years, two soldiers and/or Marines have been convicted of murdering fellow (female) soldiers/Marines. Those were at Stateside bases (one was at Lejeune, but the woman was from near here, so it got local news coverage), I can only imagine what it might look like overseas, with everyone armed and twitchy from combat stress.
Sort of returning to the Program, I remember reading something that said that women, when introduced to a previously-all-male environment, tended to keep quiet or act much like the guys. Until the number of women in the group rose above 3. Then, with some sort of "critical mass," they started to assert themselves more, no longer being alone. I should think an important component of this working might be to try to assign women together as much as possible. Safety in numbers, and all that.