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a meeting with Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz on Wednesday
morning, Republican Rep. Heather
Wilson of New Mexico said she will "strongly" oppose
any change or narrowing of the charter of — never mind outright
abolition of — the Defensive Advisory Committee on Women in
the Services.
However, Wilson
— who is the only female veteran in the House of Representatives,
and who once served on the advisory committee — also admits
that she has no idea what DACOWITS's recommendations have been to
the Pentagon on some key national-security issues. That doesn't
really matter, she insists. "I don't agree with its recommendations
all the time," she said in an interview with NRO.
The issues
that, for Rep. Wilson, seem to be secondary to the debate over DACOWITS
include recommendations on women in combat situations — including
submarines, multiple-launch-field artillery, and special-operations-forces
helicopters. DACOWITS wants women in those situations, despite the
opposition of many who should know better: the military officials
in or overseeing those fronts. (To put that in perspective, the
special-ops-pilot position DACOWITS wants women in is held by Michael
Durant in Black Hawk Down.)
Rep. Wilson
was optimistic about the success of her meeting with Wolfowitz.
"I am not sure they are ready to announce their intentions
quite yet. But I sensed from him that he understands the importance
of the role of women in the military. He also understands that you
can never rely on the direct chain of command to find out the things
you need to know about what is happening in the field in time to
do anything about it, for the most part." (Can't rely on the
chain of command! Given we're at war, the Pentagon might want to
address that before they listen to civilian recommendations on any
issue.)
But Rep. Wilson's
mission was to warn Wolfowitz. "He probably is listening to
a lot of different voices, but I told him that if the defense department
proposes to abolish [DACOWITS] or to limit its scope, then I will
oppose it strongly — and I am the only woman in this House
and I have served on that committee; I know its usefulness. It would
not only be wrong for women in the military, it would be wrong for
this administration."
And this is
the power that may keep DACOWITS alive?
It's the threat
of being labeled anti-woman by the feminists waiting to pounce that
might keep the Pentagon from doing what it ought to do: Nix the
committee. Wilson says Wolfowitz understands the value of women
in the military. That does not, however, translate into renewing
the DACOWITS charter. (Unfortunately, Rep. Wilson may have reason
to be optimistic. Though he was unavailable for comment for this
article, Wolfowitz was a speaker at a 50th-anniversary tribute to
DACOWITS last year.)
The DACOWITS
charter expires today, Feb. 28. The commission is currently under
a review ordered by Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld which is expected
to be completed in the coming days. Created in 1951 by George Marshall,
DACOWITS, which typically has 30-33 members, advises the Pentagon
on "women's issues." On Sept. 10, for instance, one of
the issues DACOWITS discussed was breastfeeding in the military.
Other hot topics have included inadequacies in maternity uniform.
The Center
for Military Readiness has been leading a debate to rid the women
of the military — and Americans — of this civilian board.
Far from being something women in the military actually want and
need, the board is an insult. To have a powerful taxpayer-funded
team of civilian women go around checking up on fully integrated
bases — complete with three-star protocol status — is
simply an embarrassing and needless expense. DACOWITS devalues women
whose time has more than come in the military already. For years,
this has been a readiness debate — largely theoretically. Now
it's not.
At the helm
of the Center for the Military Readiness is a woman who also served
on DACOWITS during the first Bush administration. Elaine Donnelly,
the center's president, recently warned at press conference urging
the Pentagon to dump DACOWITS that "DACOWITS constantly promotes
policies that would hurt the war effort by taking political correctness
to extremes." America, she says, "can no longer afford
politically correct policies that drive up costs, complicate missions,
and endanger lives."
One of their
notoriously PC policies was a recommendation to redesign Navy submarines
to accommodate women. Sheila McNeill, a former DACOWITS vice chair
(a position Rep. Wilson has also held), said of the recommendation
that "the issues of privacy, career progression, unit cohesiveness
and, ultimately, cost should have far outweighed the effort toward
gender equality."
And shouldn't
they always?
Rep. Wilson
argues that "The advisory committee provides information to
senior leadership that they would not get through the regular chain
of command." But this isn't the military of her youth; today,
women actually serve in that chain of command. What better acknowledgment
to women who serve than to axe DACOWITS once and for all?
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