Once Again, No Female Marines Will Graduate from the Infantry Officer Course

When reality is allowed to confront ideology, reality wins:

The only female officer enrolled in the Marine Corps’ Infantry Officer’s Course has dropped out after failing to complete two conditioning hikes last month, according to the Marine Corps’ Training and Education Command.

“At this time, there are no female officers enrolled or slated to attend (the Infantry Officer’s Course),” Marine spokesman Capt. Joshua Pena told CNN.

He added that 33 additional officers have been dropped from the course out of a starting class comprising 97 officers. The course started on July 6 and is scheduled to finish on September 20.

This was the female officer’s second attempt at passing the course. She will now be given another specialization for her career as an officer in the Marines.

Female Marines — some of the toughest women on the planet — have had a terrible time passing the course. As of last year, 29 had tried and failed. The Army — which generally imposes less stringent standards — has fielded exactly one female infantry officer. 

Marine General John Kelly is exactly right: “If we don’t change standards, it will be very, very difficult to have any numbers — any real numbers come into the infantry.” Given this reality, what is the more likely course of action? That the armed forces will hold the line of physical standards even if it means that women rarely ever make it into the infantry? Or that social justice warriors will eventually “persuade” the military to creatively bend or change its rules?

Indeed, this has always been the prime concern. Maintain consistent, high physical standards and the decision to open ground combat roles to women would be largely (though not entirely) moot. Women wouldn’t be able to qualify anyway. But since the decision to open ground combat to women was driven by ideological and not military concerns, there is no basis for believing that physical standards will remain the same. To the social justice warriors, the priority is and always has been access to the best military careers, not combat effectiveness.

The change in standards won’t happen right away. It’s politically untenable, for now. But give it time. Unless the military and its civilian leaders exercise iron will (or, God forbid, war intrudes) political feminists will eventually prevail.