This diary is to recognize the service of women in the U.S. military. There are too many aspects to show the many places and ways they have served since the Revolutionary War. There are many sites devoted to the service of men…and few for the women.
This is my way of honoring those that serve now, have served, and gave everything because they believed.
Army – because they fight
Putting on camo
U.S. Army – 1st Cavalry Unit
Photo credit: U.S.Army Women’s Museum Foundation
Air Force & Army – because they fly
Aviator – Bosnia/Kosovo
Paratroopers – 1990’s
http://www.awmfdn.org/
Source (2): U.S.Army Women’s Museum Foundation
Marine Women: The Fewer – The Prouder
Marine Woman – 1970’s with M16
Marine Sgt in Iraq
Sources: Webshots Community
For more information on “The Fewer and The Prouder” please check out the website for the Women Marine Association
http://www.womenmarines.org/
Women & Water – Navy and Coast Guard
Woman Navy Diver
http://userpages.aug.com/captbarb/divers.html
Lt. Cmdr M. Webber: Commander of San Diego Surface Fleet
Source: TheLog.com Sailors Magazine
http://www.thelog.com/columnists/columnistsview.asp?c=149954
– – –
In Memory – not to be forgotten
Annie Ruth…The Wall…Mother’s hands
Get a box of kleenex – click on the links below…
– Look at the faces
– Feel the loss
– Feel the anger and outrage
– Get your letters to the Senate, Congress, and editors ready
– Get out your walking shows for the next anti-war protest
Continue ranting and raging against this administration….and all administrations that send anyone to an unjust war…
Iraq and Aghanistan
As of July 21, 2005
http://www.nooniefortin.com/inmemory2.htm
A Place on the Wall and in Our Hearts
American, Australian and New Zealand – Civilian and Military Women – Who Died in the Vietnam War (1959-1975)
http://www.vietnamwomensmemorial.org/pages/index2.html
Vietnam Womens Veterans – Memorial
http://www.terrispencer.com/vwv/inmemory.htm
The most comprehensive list of names I’ve found…<u>just keep scrolling</u>…from the Civil War through Current….during peacetime and at war…
Women that gave all to their country
http://userpages.aug.com/captbarb/lives.html
Sisters of the Heart
I stand beside you, my sisters,
To dance on the rainbows, and sing in the clouds,
To howl at the moon, and laugh at the stars,
And to share the delights of our lives together.I stand beside you, my sisters,
To cry at the heartaches, and revel in the joys,
As well as sharing ideas, new and different.
Together we can reach the full potential of our hearts.I stand beside you, my sisters,
In good times and bad, the happy and the sad,
In order to stretch the limits of who we were,
So that we can blossom to who we really are.I stand beside you, my sisters,
As equals in the eyes of the Universe,
But I also will stand in front of you,
To defend you with all that I have in me.We are the dreamers, sharing the power of real Love
Of this Sisterhood that we can awaken in each other.
We stand beside each other and know this joy:
For we are truly Sisters of the Heart.Kari Schad
Parts of this diary have been cross-posted as comments at Cheers & Jeers on DailyKos this week and at My Left Wing.
· 350,000 women are serving in the U.S. military — almost 15 percent of active duty personnel.
· One in every seven troops in Iraq is a woman.
· 35 women soldiers have died as of March 2005.
· 261 U.S. military women have been wounded in Iraq.
Operation Desert Storm:
· In January 1991, more than 33,000 servicewomen deployed to Southwest Asia during Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm.
· 13 servicewomen were killed and two were held as POWs.
Vietnam:
· 265,000 women served.
· 7,500 women were deployed in theater, including 36 women Marines, 421 women in the Navy and 771 in the Air Force. The remainder served in the Army.
· Navy, Air Force and Army nurses accounted for 80 percent to 90 percent of the total number of women who served in Vietnam.
· Majority of U.S. women serving were in their early 20s. When they returned to the United States, they received the same hostile treatment as did men returning from combat duty.
· 48 percent of women Vietnam veterans are expected to experience post-traumatic stress disorder at some point.
· Many women have also encountered health problems from Agent Orange exposure and experienced suicidal thoughts.
more here at NPR
Excellent diary, amazing women!!! Thank you, SallyCat.
The NPR link is really good…thanks for posting the data. Sometimes it’s hard to decide how much info to put in a diary – too easy to write a book!
The info is great…thank you for sharing it.
I thank you Sally and all the women thank you. You did a fine job.
Thank you Jake – for being a man that understands…there are lots of you out there.
The often overlooked soldiers!
SallyCat: excellent diary. Women are overlooked in the military. Many people for various reasons still feel they have no place there at all. It is sad that these women’s contributions haven’t been given more attention.
Thank you for posting this.
and that’s what keeps us from being alone.
The women sometimes feel as alone in the military as they do when they get out. It makes the sisterhood strong.
The old adage is that soldiers are there for their buddies…it is true – whether male or female.
Another vet: 1974-75, U.S.Army, 92Bravo
If I knew 20 years ago what I know today that is what I would have grown up to be. Those sassy girls have so many guys flocking around them too, in the Army they are like Rock Stars. I’m coming back as a U.S. female aviator and I don’t care what I fly in the sky when the ground looks that FINE! Boy am I an objectifying sexist today!
and compassion – is what makes some so sexy 🙂
When we stand tall and confident in who we are and what we do it shows and shines.
Sexiness – just a visible aspect of a confident woman!
Exactamundo, SallyCat 🙂
Tracy, if I could do it all over again, and be young, I would be a pilot of a blackhawk. I love flying.
Beautiful Diary, SallyCat!!!
Had Peter Gabriel in my head as I read and looked at the photos
There’s nothing to gain when there’s nothing to be lost
There’s nothing to gain if you stay behind and count the cost
Make the decision that you can be who you can be
You can be
Tasting the fruit come to the Liberty Tree
It’s your day – a woman’s day
It’s your day – a woman’s day
Changing your ways, changing those surrounding you
Changing your ways, more than any man can do
Open your heart, show him the anger and pain, so you heal
Maybe he’s looking for his womanly side, let him feel
You had to be so strong
And you do nothing wrong
Nothing wrong at all
We’re gonna to break it down
We have to shake it down
Shake it all around
My wife is one of the strongest women or human beings I know. She stands up for what she believes, she has integrity, honesty, a value system that I can only hope that I live up to, with her and a loving kind giving heart.
Wimps like Santorum and his ilk, can’t stand up to a strong women, they scare them, so they need to make sure they don’t have to face a woman who is stronger than themselves.
I have been honored and feel privileged to be married to my wife, she is a Reike Master healer, a Witch who is of the utmost living being of integrity and truth, who gives me so much more than I can ever give her. Though she did say helping her have our two children is the greatest gift I will ever bestow upon her.
I salute all of you ladies, those that served and those that did not, for you are indeed the very fabric of our society, clearly demonstrated by the failure of the right wing women to work to mitigate the damage done by their overbearing, pompous and imbecilic men.
I will with every fiber of my being and if it takes my last breath, fight to preserve and bring forth the full measures instilling into women’s lives the rights that you are entitled too under our constitution.
Each to their ability…
Thankfully there are others in our lives – families of the heart – male and female that help us be our best.
Like you, my husband fights for equal treatment for women – me, his daughter, and granddaughter. We just want to be humanist – not feminist. To let the men that nurture do that, to let women fly jets, and anything else – to be all that the original promise of this nation puts forth. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness – for all.
Blessed be ghostdancers_way….men like you honor all of us with your support.
Well, Sally, Girl, I suppose you knewo I would comment on this one!!!….:o) Navy 1963-66, USAF 1979-81..Irreg AF for 10 years afterwards.
I want to say that there are 8 women’s names on the Wall. I can look it up from my material, who they all are and who they died and what branch they were in and so forth. (Vietnam)
The Navy nurses on Bataan was hard hit with the march and the Japenese did very bad things to them while in prison camps along with the missionary women.
I guess I am still considered the state of TN cordinator for the Vietnam Women’s Memorial Foundation.
It is one of the statues at the WAll that one has to see if ever there. The day we didacated, was one of the most glorious days I ever saw.
Thank you Sally, I have many women who are veterans and we are never far behind supporting our kind.
P.S.: if I had to do it all over again I would do it again. However, I don’t think I would be so quick to do it with this CiC, tho. Would have to think this one over….;o)
It was bad enough under Nixon – this one would have kept me from enlisting.
I would do it again if it was 1974 all over…and probably stay longer. No regrets on my life as it has played out…but a lot of random what ifs…over late night drinks with other vets.
Some of the best times of my life were during those 2 years – the MP’s gave me a confidence and belief in myself. Some of the hardest as well – learning to be myself.
I hear ya there, Girl! If only we had someone who was sincere and with honor himself, would be different. I entered when Kennedy was CiC. I was simply crushed when he got shot. I was in Hospital Corps School when this occured and we all wept.
I served proudly with all honor, as I know you did too, as all do now. It find it hard to see what these gals are having to put up with in this administration.
I, like you, am proud of my service. HUHS…..
Sally, I have lived with this adrenalin rush for ever so long and still try hard to do it, but now that I turned 60, my dr. and children have told me I have got to slow down. Take time off….take vacations, work less hard…do less call…you name it…but it is an addiction and love of my patients that I can not give up. I simply love working hard and doing good for sick ppl and saving lives and I get a fix from all of this. It is what keeps me going…I do not think they understand how I feel…..The ethics of they old school is something that was ingraved into my heart and soul. If God will give me at least 10 more years to do this thing, I will be eternally grateful…The military taught me organization, endurence, pride, strength, compassion, integerity, respect for others and myself, and most of all how to be productive in a positive way.
http://www.vietnamwomensmemorial.org/pages/index2.html)> go to **
lets se if this comes out
Another vet thanks you. . .USWAC 1963-1966 WSMR 6thArmy
(unlike so many, I was safely behind a desk in the US)
Hugs Shirl….
I can bet with all that I have in my purse right now that this is why this sight is so strong….look at all the female vetrans in here.
What can you say that you brought away with you from the military?
Did you see I finally got brave enough to do a link!!!!! :o)..I worked long and hard on this one..bs
Yep, Strong Women. . .ya gotta love ’em.
What did I take from the military. . .2 winter dress greens, 2 summer dress, 1 set of fatigues, and two pair of black highly polished low heeled shoes, assorted ribbons and awards. . .and I cried at the dress parade they had the day I mustered out. <smiles>
Oh, you meant the more valuable less tangible things. . .
A great sense of pride and respect
A love of the job service members do
And an instinctive reaction to bright flashes of light that brighten up the whole night sky. (A few weeks into being a civilian, driving across the county at night, a meteor flashed by within a few hundred miles of my location. Pulled my car over, got out, ran to the barrow ditch along the side of the road and assumed the flat on the belly with hands clasped behind the neck at the base of the skull position). Yeah, I felt stupid a little later, but the good soldier knew what to do just in case it was the real thing.)
I liked my service time a lot and had serious thoughts of making it a career. . .but the ceaseless witch hunts to ferett out “women of my ilk” made me decide against it. The witch hunts were interesting. . .never were instigated because of someone’s unwanted advances, or misbehavior, or complaints. . .just bored CID guys looking to stir things up. Although I was a non participating gay woman while I was in the service. . .it wouldn’t have mattered to them. Guess I had other things to do in my life and it was time to fall in love. . .you know. . .all that stuff.
Oh Shirl, I do know what you mean “assuming the position”! I was at one of my Aunts house in Little River, Kansas and out of the clear blue came this roar/zoom..and after that another one came. I had to be coaxed from under the table by the family. I was under it quicker than a snap of the finger. I do not know how I did it without knocking others our of their chairs. The look on their faces was priceless once I came to my senses. I suppose it was a drill for the REAL thing, I said to them….then they all laughed. The fighter sq. from the air base in Salina, Kansas was holding drills that w/e, and on one told me about it!!! damn it all to hell…I like to have had a heart attack on that one.
One time coming out of anesthesia, the nurse said I kept saying in coming over and over again…she asked my daughters what I meant by saying that and they couldnt confirm it but when I was fully awake, I suppose I had been in deep thought of days of past….I had to explain and say I am crazy to everyone….:o) (which they already knew)…:o)
I left with only my light blues and shoes and purse, money from all the leave I had accumilated and a big smile on my face. Of course there was more but will not go onto it all..:o)
You see a brilliant flash of light – take immediate action!
By the 1970’s it was hands, arms, and M-16’s UNDER the body! Well we did learn to keep exposed skin away from radiation – but that damn weapon left bruises when you hit the dirt face first!
We were all assumed to be either “of a certain ilk” or “easy”. Lots of rumors about relationships with other women. In the MP’s the guys outnumbered us 20-1 so the women hung out together – sisters. Most of the guys I served with were pretty cool about “no” – maybe because I packed a .45 on duty as did my friends!
Sally, it was not an issue for me at all. As a matter of fact I discribed my incident on another diary about the sexual harressment I had to deal with. I do konw for a fact that there were two how were gay in our barracks tho. It did not matter to me. I had my own things going on and had a lot of things to do like working all the time. When not on duty I did some moonlighting with baby sitting and working at the local hospital. Did some waitressing. Did a lot of range shooting with the marines across the river to where I was stationed. Other than that I went to many partys…I loved to party in DC and went as much as possible.
BTW, I did one night of shore patrol. They came for me out of Quantico, Va. to go to Baltimore to pick up an AWOL wave once…they needed a female standby for this thing and I fell to that lucky duty…:o(
Oh, the war stories. . . .Remember the time when. . .
LOL Funny thing, I was feeling somewhat disheartened this morning after reading MAJeff’s diary and looking once again at the persistence of hatred, wishing to feel again the way I did when I was 23 and in the Army. . .Representing the best country and the best people, very PROUD to be an American. . . so I decided to wear my 23 year old face today, just to keep it going
(and why am I hearing the music from mission impossible. . .”The Secretary disavows any knowledge”. . )
How great that you can do that! Someday I will venture into the picture thing. I am trying hard to learn how to do things here.
Shirl, you are a lovely looking lady.
Oh Brenda, how sweet of you. . .
But you have me rolling on the floor with laughter.
Any resemblance between me at 23 and me at 64 is purely
coincidental. . .really, thanks for the kind words and a very good laugh
I had a great laugh when I took some of my Army pics in to work with me a few months before I retired. . .the unsensored remarks of: “Wow have you changed!” got me histerical with laughter. . .it was worth the laugh
Shirl, you are still a very lovely lady!!! Age becomes you..what do you mean!!:o)
My husband’s neice is an Army doc and so is her husband. They are not deployed at the moment.But it scares me that this woman and her great compassion,could be deployed to clean up the bloody gore that is any war.
She joined the Army for the medical education, not the real thing. Like so many.
What might she think if it was one of her three babies being blown up there?Who could stand that?
shycat, I aplaude them both. They are so needed in the Army. I can bet that they can answer you with heartfelt sincere anxiety with your last statement.
What is so dreadful is that this woman has the biggest heart(and I know this is selfish to say this),but her heart may be broken by this senselessness.
Oh dear, I fear for so many people who get desensitized by war,warriors, and unfeeling assholes.
Hate breeds hate .
Shy, I do hear you. I want to maybe aleviate some of your fears. There comes a point when in the medical profession that the ethics of what the oaths are that we take come first, before any other. I could be wrong here but for the most part, there are a lot of great ppl in the military. I blame more of the leadership than anyone. I really believe that they ahve been waiting int he sidelines for a very long time to do their horrible deeds for the sake of our military.
I do know that the old military is gone. The new military is going in another direction than I think is necessary. I really am worried as to the military leadership of todays branches.
of course there are great people in the military! Look at all of you–look at my hub,who served in Vietnam, I am not worried about people,I am worried about propaganda,and people who get sucked in there, I know hub did,and I can bet plenty of others did too.
When push came to shove those that serve don’t buy the propaganda. They are living day to day with what is happening – stateside or in theatre.
The doctors and nurses, and all that serve, see the reality of what is happening…and survive with each others help. With luck they have strong families – like you and your husband – when they come home.
Most that serve do not become desensitized – just more aware. What I saw on the nightly news in the 1960’s and 1970’s affected me but I enlisted anyway. Enlistment was my way out…education money.
What changed me:
The guys I served with that had served in Vietnam…1 and 2 tours. What they talked about on late night duty changed me. The look on their faces when they changed the subject abruptly about what happened in country. The humanity of these men despite the horrors and lost friends had grown not diminished.
Just be there for your niece and her husband. Love them and listen…and listen to the silence as well. They will be more compassionate – and perhaps become activists like a lot of us here.
Well, I saw that look on all of my brother’s friends–they were haunted by what they had done and it wasn’t their fault.It was awful,really. I had no comfort to give or understanding.
Oh dear,I am so sorry this is happening again.
GODDAMMIT
Yes you have support to give – remind them that the war sucked then and it sucks now. The government fucked up and it was the fucked up administration that’s responsible.
Hug them…love them…remind them to blame the assholes that sent them….
And yes….the profanity is sometimes the level that it takes…yell, swear, talk quietly, and hug them…
Same rules apply now…to any of us close enough to someone coming home…human touch is the greatest medicine of all. Touch them and hug them.
Or just listen- honestly I fear for these innocents- they know they can lean on me cause I have wide shoulders-they have always known that-but what about the rage?
Let them rage…but help them direct it to productive change. Anger and rage are destructive if we keep it inside…from any source. But beneath the rage is the pain of betrayal – because they believed and were lied to by their government.
Help them get politically active – use places like Booman Tribune to show them that they have others that listen.
Let them become activists against the war – show them http://www.optruth.org – other vets making sure the word gets out.
Listen to them rage – it needs to see the light of day.
Listen to them – then help them find their way.
‘the rage of betrayal’ isn’t that the truth– Vietnam vets still ragin at me- very difficult subject
I had no idea how many women were veterans here. I am not. Kudos to all of you,the training sounds kinda like Boy Scout Camp, though.
Let me explain about that.
When I was a kid it was the bestest thing to be a Brownie,and then progress to Girl Scouts. Sorry,but it was all about bullshit and obedience.I quit Brownies after one meeting.I was five.So there you have it,I am not a ‘team player’.
It’s kinda odd to me that the government has to ‘recruit’–if it wasn’t the right way to go then why do you have to try so hard?
Basic training…mine was probably pretty different as it was later – so I’ll give you my perspective.
I was at Ft.Jackson, (Army) So. Carolina 1974. We were part of only the 2nd Battation of women to go through basic training there. Most women went to Ft.McClellan Alabama. At Ft.McClellan they wore skirts for training. At Ft. Jackson we wore army fatiques – an equality step forward.
So – we arrive at pre-dawn and several hundred women are bitching and moaning about the hour. We are met by a bunch of pissy, yelling drill sergeants telling us how sloppy and “pretty” we all are. By the end of the day we had uniforms that itched, boots that hurt our feet, beds that were little more than springs with a mattress, 120 thread count sheets, and itchy wool blankets.
We are assigned to rooms of 10 women per room – 100 women per floor. Visual – PMS’ing with 100 other women! Okay…day 2-4 we are drug out of bed before dawn, dress in clothes that don’t fit right, and get yelled at some more.
By day 5 we are the most supportive, caring sisters the world has ever seen. We cover each others back, listen to crying and whining over men, bitch and moan about the drill sergeants…and help each other get through this self inflicted hell.
By the end of 8 weeks, we learned our jobs, we learned the rules of the Army – just like any other job, and had formed the basis of a military wide sisterhood.
That sisterhood is what you see here…not ‘team player’ for the Army. My team consists of the brothers and sisters that served before me, with me, and now.
Not much different than in 63, Sally. I was Platoon leader so I had to get up a half hour before the rest, dressed and was responsible for getting the rest of them up before we really got yelled at.
Yep, sounds like the Army I was in.
LOL…does the term “ladies” make your skin crawl….
I swear if I heard the term one more time I probably would have screamed…it was easier being sworn at in MP school!
actually “ladies” is not what I remember them calling us….:o)
excellent as hell, the way you have put it.
I went to basic at Bainbridge, Maryland. The first week is just as you have said!!!!! Playing the tune to getting to know you, was just a farce. We were issued winter blues, an dit was July, for Crissake! we had to wear the granny hose, now mind you girdles were still the fashion. and they were cotton and we had to wear this hot shit for weeks on end. Cadencing everywhere we went! singing our tunes to the sort of no man shall asunder! and to boot, I am a short person and they put us short weenies at the back of the platoon, so that meant double timing it!!!!!!
Classrooms hot as hell and the first inspection I was in lasted for an hour. AN HOUR at attention, now hear this!!!!! Some were falling out! fainting that is. Once we got thru the fourth week, we could go to the g-dunk and get food..like chips and ice cream..what ever it was to just pig out on. That w/e we got to call home for the first time. My dad and I cried for an hour…..literally an hour! folks. I just knew I had really screwed up my life by that time. I told my parents that I was out at all godly hours of the morning guarding things like dipsty dumpsters vacant buildings, doing fire watch for them all…..Hell I was just miserable…by the time, it was time for graduating, I was just getting used to this mess of things and off I went to another duty station. Oh how well I know what you mean…We really never got rid of the dark blues…:o)..The barracks were left overs from WW2 and they had cracks in them that you could see the light of day through and it did finally did get cold enough there in Sept. to get a real bad chill from the weather.
That was my boot camp…other things I shant go into for shere shuddering of the thought of…:o)
oh and one more thing…scrubbing wooden floors with a toothbrush..we all lined up and did out thing once a week on that duty!!!!!!!!!!
…andour lockers…well we had to fold everything in thirds. place them in a certain spot of the locker. they measured everything down to the fold too. our racks were like Sally said…and when we made our rack up we had to go underneath them to see that thre was not one little pigtail of a sheet or planket hanging..and taunt enough to bounce a quarter on..really that is what they did. The inspection went just like that too…they measured and gauged everything. I learned from boot camp how to sleep in a bed and turning over without moving covers at all…it is a trick to do and I still do it today. There are some things that just never leave one….:o)
some day when I can I will tell you all about my flight school training and ocs…that in and of itself is another story….
Y’all are so funny- now I could never have done any of that-I would have been the smartass in the brig.
Any soldier will tell you that if you’re a smart ass you will spend half your life doing pushups.
Well not half my life but a lot of MP School.
Short version of “remember when”
These guys with 10-20 years in had seen their share of smart mouths…I was no different. By the way – I had awesome biceps from all those pushups! LOL
Shycat – you’d have done just fine with us. We were city girls, suburban girls, farm girls, and all the rest. Black, brown, white….. Just girls when we went in to boot camp and training schools…young women when we came out.
HAHAHA i was always in better shape than any one i knew– ‘ya want another 50? no prob’ thats how you get out of other duties– call me ‘cool hand rosie’:P
or the damm comedienne- get it all done real fast so you can make jokes–
As hub says– “YA baby’-he loves strong women- bless his heart.
You betcha ladies- stand up, stand strong- you will attract your like. Stands to reason.doesn’t it?
The faces we never see.