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some
wuiiici. mo getting a chance. Recently ^ Canadian government announced tha would permit women pilots to fly *n c0 . bat squadrons. And Denmark recenva| allowed women to volunteer for na combat duty. . eS
Since the early 1970s, the serV’ s have failed to attract sufficient num of able men to enter the all-volun forces. Therefore, all four services beg^ to rely more and more on women,
tering
tSCOfe
flight training. Second, only a vf^on]y can become jet-qualified, since the jet-flying jobs open to them are s training command or utility squa ( Even at Patuxent, women can fly P Ly flights in F-4s and A-4s, and P°*
A-7sand A-6s. ButinF-14sorF/A-
no way. So, since most female P’*1’1 -r.
~ ng JeI
craft off aircraft carriers, many leaVC
the
out
Letting women fly off carriers
Time has come to change the rules regarding women in combat. Naval aviation should lead the way by letting women join carrier-based combat squadrons. Despite the recently announced decision to retire the Coral Sea (CVA-43) earlier than expected, the Navy is experiencing a shortage of pilots. This is bound to get worse because pilot shortages mean quicker turnarounds and more time away from home, which induce more pilots to get out.
Allowing female pilots to fly from carriers in combat units would both help the current carrier pilot shortage and give our women aviators the opportunities so many of them are waiting for. At the beginning they could be restricted primarily to force defensive units such as F-14s and E-2s; but as everyone became accustomed to their ambitions and capabilities, these restrictions could probably be lifted.
To do this, of course, will require changing the present law as well as changing the views of the Navy top brass who currently have a prejudice against women in combat roles.
There’s no reason, however, that I can see against permitting women to fly combat missions from ships at sea. From the early days of aviation women have shown they are good aviators who can fly in combat. Female aviators such as Amelia Earhart, Jacqueline Auriol, Jacqueline Cochran, and Beryl Markham (second person to fly solo nonstop across the Atlantic from east to west), to name a few, would undoubtedly have made fine combat pilots. In World War II, the Soviets had many women aviators flying combat missions. Their top female aces were Olga Yemshokova with 17 enemy planes to her credit, Lily Litvak with 12, and Katya Budanova with 10. Few of our male pilots can claim as many victories.
Americans seem to feel a general overall reluctance to let women perform equally with men; be the arena political, business, or military. Recently the door has opened a bit, albeit slowly and reluctantly. In the early 1970s, for example, the Navy allowed women to become aviators. But the admiral commanding the Advanced Air Training Command at Corpus Christi when the first women finished the course felt so strongly against women being naval aviators that he refused to pin the wings on them. As a result, the Bureau of Personnel rather ashamedly had to send down another admiral to perform the ceremony. In 1975, over the vigorous objections of the Navy brass, Congress voted to change the law to permit women to attend the Naval Academy and the other services’ military academies. This caused a tremendous furor of objections from many graduates, especially the older ones. In 1979 the first Navy woman aviator became carrier qualified; two years later the first Navy woman pilot qualified in a jet aircraft; and in 1982 the first woman was selected for test pilot school at Patuxent River Naval Air Station. Finally, a few years ago an Air Force woman instructor pilot at Nellis was nominated to be a member of the Air Force’s famous Thunderbird stunt team, but was turned down by the top brass “old boys’ club.”
Yet as long ago as 1910-11 Bemette Miller and Matilde Moisant flew in a famous flight exhibition team. Furthermore, Bemette Miller was the first aviator to demonstrate a monoplane to government officials, and Matilde Moisant won the Rodman Wanamaker altitude
trophy in September 1911 by reaching1 astonishing altitude of 1,200 feet.
Outside of the United States women are i now constitute more than 10% armed forces. And these women eni the armed services decisively °ul(0 men on intelligence tests. Needless^ say, with the increasing numbers ot nical jobs in modem warfare, the ser ^ are welcoming the smarter women assigning them to such jobs as comp ^ operators, nuclear weapons contro . craft maintenance, missile launching { teries, and electronic warfare s'te* aVja- women attempting a career in nava tion, where there is a particular sho ^ encounter barriers everywhere they (0 To begin with, few women are orde like male pilots—aspire to
Navy when their mandatory time ran ^ and often end up in the airlines. ” t0 give a break to the women who w' fly jets off a carrier rather than tranSP trol helicopters, training aircraft, or P^ aS planes? I am sure they would be good as the macho male top-gun
in ca***6*
Captain Lacouture spent his naval career j 0f aviation, including several tours in comm finer squadrons, air wings, and two carrierf0r ^ tirement he has worked in foreign saes
84
Proceedings
/ juiy1