This is an archive of the former website of the Maoist Internationalist Movement, which was run by the now defunct Maoist Internationalist Party - Amerika. The MIM now consists of many independent cells, many of which have their own indendendent organs both online and off. MIM(Prisons) serves these documents as a service to and reference for the anti-imperialist movement worldwide.
This is an archive of the former website of the Maoist Internationalist Movement, which was run by the now defunct Maoist Internationalist Party - Amerika. The MIM now consists of many independent cells, many of which have their own indendendent organs both online and off. MIM(Prisons) serves these documents as a service to and reference for the anti-imperialist movement worldwide.
Maoist Internationalist Movement

Female military service makes some exploiters uncomfortable


May 2007, by Whirlingsnow and ed.

Right before Iran detained the fifteen British soldiers in March, and before Iran president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad pointed out Faye Turney was a mother and suggested the West didn't respect family values and managed to whip up the debate about wimmin in the military in the Western media, the role of wimmin in the military was being discussed in the British media.(1)(2) It would seem Ahmadinejad was more aware of the situation of public opinion in the Western imperialist countries, including Australia, than so-called radicals in these countries attacking Islamic countries over sexism as if pandering to anti-Islamic chauvinism would end the Iraq War, only to generate momentum among the white rabble for a new imperialist government in 2008 and more chauvinism against and exploitation of Third World nations. The deaths of the female imperialist soldiers in Basra, Iraq, in early April, the day after Ahmadinejad's speech, at the hands of Iraqis also helped stir up contradictions in the West over sending females to war. U.$. and British female soldiers already receive some training for combat and are often armed while on duty even when they're not in combat.

Ahmadinejad and the Iraqi activity in effect divided the exploiters over the question of sending females to war or at least to "front-line" or "direct" combat. The question is relatively timeless and could affect how the imperialists carry out any future war and what would happen if more female imperialist soldiers started coming home dead or injured. If there is another occurrence like the two British female soldiers dying in Basra, the effects of Ahmadinejad's speech on April 4 will resonate. The female soldier issue is a permanent wedge that has been driven into conservatives' backing for war. As Ahmadinejad's statement recognized, "family values" conservatives are going to think twice before supporting a war exposing females to harm and capture. Thus, some opposition to war is likely to come from those opposed to liberalism in the military, as well as white females worried about sexual situations involving the military.(3) As Janet Napolitano type fears about sexual abuse in the military converge with dissatisfaction with the amerikan body count, there is a basis for fewer people to get involved in pseudo-feminist warmongering against Islamic nations. On the other hand, as Ralph Nader, another left-wing white nationalist, illustrates, calls to investigate abuse of females in the u.$. military can easily turn into supporting career opportunities for females in the military and the Pentagon.(4) What's needed is opposition to militarism, not law enforcement to back female participation in imperialist militaries.

Compared with male soldiers, dozens of, but relatively few, female imperialist soldiers have died in Iraq. The attention they're getting is indicative of the problems imperialism faces, but the amount of media coverage they're getting may be low even given their small numbers. The situation varies by country, with females less integrated in some imperialist country militaries than others and this making increased integration more new and controversial. However, the bourgeois debate about females in the imperialist military has long-term potential for exploiter division, especially as the imperialists become overstretched militarily and the imperialist nation female-biology adults become more and more men-like and more amenable to taking part in combat. By contrast, bashing Iran, Afghanistan or even Russia just to rally the white labor aristocracy and middle-class mob for an exploiter united front against a government, already unpopular because of Third World resistance, is going to have long-term effects that support militarism.

In Israel, the debate on females in combat has been renewed amid interest in making more areas of the Israeli military co-ed. What passes for feminism in an Associated Press article is the idea of giving females more opportunities in Israeli combat units.(5) Having a gender-integrated military is also seen as giving females opportunities in the larger society. In Israel, some of the concerns about females in the military are similar to those in the united $tates.

Interestingly, the University of Haifa did a study reportedly showing that Israeli females become more hawkish during military service.(6)(7) This alone is reason enough to oppose female military service in MIM's book. As even pro-central government federalists such as Alexander Hamilton recognized, war establishments create people with war establishment views. We are not about growing the military and its influence in imperialist countries.

Regardless of female/male biological differences, effective female-only units don't seem out of the question. If female military participation actually created problems for imperialism, that might not be a bad thing, but this doesn't seem to be the case. It might just be a problem for conservatives with unrealistic ideas about putting wimmin back in the home. Really creating a problem that benefits the international proletariat would be cutting the size of the military.

Attitudes toward female/male equality and gender roles are problems for imperialism insofar as it needs females in the military and combat. Religious thinking can be inconvenient for imperialism, but there is Liberalism on both sides of the debate, even among those opposing female participation. On the one hand, people are saying female inclusion in the military (whether integrated with or segregated from males) is a mark of civilization, others, that it is the mark of an uncivilized society, that it belongs almost in the same category as child soldiers.(8) In this context, liberalism is the idea that there can be equality without power struggle. At the most, it can only be equality for some, not all of a group. Saying that the existence of female soldiers is uncivilized is liberalism, too, of an international form, because it ignores the relative economic and political disadvantages of Third World nations.

Ultimately, First World nations have a population disadvantage, which is going to be a short-term motivation female imperialist military service and a long-term motivation against it. (Although, Germany didn't draft females even when it was being defeated by the proletariat during World War Two. Thousands of wimmin served in the Soviet Red Army in combat.) It also raises the possibility of First World nations' making female participation in combat illegal internationally, but this seems unlikely given the degree of integration that already exists in different imperialist militaries and the blurred distinction between combat and non-combat soldiers. Females can bomb Third World people from the sky in imperialist militaries; the question about females in the military lately is usually in the context of mixed-sex situations and ground combat.

Mao teaches us that reality is dialectically interconnected and messy, uneven. There is no even leap into communism right now, so the idea of supporting females in the military in all contexts is reactionary. The issue of females in the military is secondary to the oppression of nations by imperialism. Therefore, Iran is right to make the West pay the maximum once the West sends the female soldiers into combat. Grasping the principal contradiction means supporting different policies in different contexts. We support the Iranians on the female soldiers question and we also support the U.$. universities that ban military organizations entirely for not accepting gays without discrimination. Depriving the imperialist military is our consistent guiding principle.

Many organizations are unwilling to take stands on such issues, because they speak vaguely about alleviating class, gender and national oppression, but today even Liberalism has created post-modernist identity politics that is no threat to oppression. Vagueness always benefits the bourgeoisie in its efforts to bind the exploited to the exploiters and the oppressed to the oppressors. To distinguish ourselves from Liberals and others, it is necessary to specify the path out of oppression and make the judgment calls that can make an organization unpopular. Although MIM does this more than any other organization, it is read by more people than any party in North America calling itself "Marxist." So people enjoy reading about detailed if unpopular paths out of oppression. Vagueness from so-called Marxists is only opportunism.

Notes:
1. http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/tm_headline=agony-as-bomb-kills-brit-women-soldiers--&method=full&objectid=18866382&siteid=66633-name_page.html
2. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/04/07/wiraq307.xml
3. http://www.azstarnet.com/allheadlines/180418
4. http://www.counterpunch.org/nader04162007.html
5. http://mdn.mainichi-msn.co.jp/international/news/20070429p2g00m0in010000c.html

"Says feminist Chazan: "People ask me, do you really want your daughter to serve in a unit like that? Well, I want my daughter to be able to decide, just like your son.""

6. http://web.israelinsider.com/Articles/Politics/11250.htm

"Male IDF soldiers who serve in combat units become less martial and more inclined to seek compromises on security matters over the duration of their service.

"Conversely, female soldiers become more hawkish and more right-wing during their service, according to the study, conducted by Haifa University's School for Political Science."

7. http://www.upi.com/International_Intelligence/Briefing/2007/04/25/combat_moderates_israeli_soldiers_views/

8. Susan Martinuk, "Make combat men-only," Ottawa Citizen, 2003 May 7, p. A19.

"Each woman is now admired for her selfless courage and sacrifice. But their stories also make us wonder why a progressive, civilized country would send women to fight against one of the world's most oppressive, cruel regimes. Has political correctness triumphed common sense?"

9. Nick Papps, "Should women soldiers be dying in Iraq," Sunday Telegraph, 2005 July 10, World / p. 44.

"It's a view shared by Elaine Donnelly of the Centre for Military Readiness who says it's uncivilised to send women into battle."

"But with recruiting numbers plummeting in the US, there may be one more compelling reason women may soon be allowed in combat -- the US army won't have the numbers to keep them out of harm's way."