DOD launches review of ‘effectiveness’ of women in ground combat roles

The Pentagon has launched a formal review of the “effectiveness” of women in ground-combat positions, nearly a decade after the Department of Defense ended a ban that had excluded them from front-line infantry, armor and artillery units.

The six-month assessment, first reported by NPR on Tuesday, will require Army and Marine Corp leaders to submit data on readiness, training, performance, casualties and command climate of ground combat units and personnel, according to a December memo sent by Undersecretary of Defense for Personnel Anthony Tata. Pentagon officials cast the move as a way to gauge “the operational effectiveness of ground combat” units and examine how women have integrated into combat roles over the last ten years.

“The Institute for Defense Analyses is reviewing the effectiveness of having women in ground combat roles to ensure standards are met and the United States maintains the most lethal military,” Kingsley Wilson, the Pentagon press secretary, said in a statement to Military Times.

The institute is a private, nonprofit organization that is largely financed by the federal government to research and analyze national security issues for the Department of Defense.

“Our standards for combat arms positions will be elite, uniform, and sex neutral because the weight of a rucksack or a human being doesn’t care if you’re a man or a woman,” Wilson added, noting that Defense of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth “will not compromise standards to satisfy quotas or an ideological agenda – this is common sense.”

Hegseth — who previously expressed opposition to women serving in ground combat roles — outlined new physical fitness standards for combat posts during an address to hundreds of military leaders in September. The Pentagon chief said he is requiring every combat position to return to the “highest male standard,” while acknowledging that “if that means no women qualify for some combat jobs, so be it.”

“I don’t want my son serving alongside troops who are out of shape or in [a] combat unit with females who can’t meet the same combat arms physical standards as men,” Hegseth asserted. “Standards must be uniform, gender neutral and high. If not, they’re not standards. They’re just suggestions, suggestions that get our sons and daughters killed.”

Before he was nominated as defense secretary, Hegseth, speaking on Shawn Ryan’s podcast, bluntly said: “I’m straight up just saying we should not have women in combat roles. It hasn’t made us more effective. Hasn’t made us more lethal. Has made fighting more complicated.”

Asked about his views on women in the military during his confirmation hearing, Hegseth responded “women will have access to ground combat roles given the standards remain high, and we will have a review to ensure the standards have not been eroded.”

Data released in 2023 showed that women accounted for 17.7% of active-duty troops in the military.