Even if you want to try to trivialize the role women have had during combat operations, you would really have to live in some kind of world all your own to not understand just how significant their duties were. This is just an idea of what they did during Vietnam alone.
Approximately 11,000 American military women were stationed in Vietnam during the war. Close to ninety percent were nurses in the Army, Navy, and Air Force.
Others served as physicians, physical therapists, personnel in the Medical Service Corps, air traffic controllers, communications specialists, intelligence officers, clerks and in other capacities in different branches of the armed services. Nearly all of them volunteered.
By 1967, most all military nurses who volunteered to go to Vietnam did so shortly after graduation. These women were the youngest group of medical personnel ever to serve in war time.
Because of the guerilla tactics of Vietnam, many women were in the midst of the conflict. There was no front, no such thing as "safe behind our lines." Many were wounded; most spent time in bunkers during attacks. The names of the eight military women who died in Vietnam are listed on the "Wall."
Medical personnel dealt with extraordinary injuries inflicted by enemy weapons specifically designed to mutilate and maim. During massive casualty situations, nurses often worked around the clock, conducted triage, assisted with emergency tracheotomies and amputations, debrided wounds and inserted chest tubes so surgeons could get to the next critical patient. Over 58,000 soldiers died in Vietnam; 350,000 were wounded.
read more here
http://www.vietnamwomensmemorial.org/vwmf.php
Lieutenant Colonel Annie Ruth Graham,
Chief Nurse at 91st Evacuation Hospital, Tuy Hoa.
Colonel Graham, from Efland, NC, suffered a stroke in August 1968 and was evacuated to Japan where she died four days later. A veteran of both World War II and Korea, she was 52.
First Lieutenant Sharon Ann Lane
Lieutenant Lane died from shrapnel wounds when the 312th Evacuation Hospital at Chu Lai was hit by rockets on June 8, 1969. From Canton, OH, she was a month short of her 26th birthday. She was posthumously awarded the Vietnamese Gallantry Cross with Palm and the Bronze Star for Heroism. In 1970, the recovery room at Fitzsimmons Army Hospital in Denver, where Lt. Lane had been assigned before going to Vietnam, was dedicated in her honor. In 1973, Aultman Hospital in Canton, OH, where Lane had attended nursing school, erected a bronze statue of Lane. The names of 110 local servicemen killed in Vietnam are on the base of the statue.
Second Lieutenant Carol Ann Elizabeth Drazba
Second Lieutenant Elizabeth Ann Jones
Lieutenant Drazba and Lieutenant Jones were assigned to the 3rd Field Hospital in Saigon. They died in a helicopter crash near Saigon, February 18, 1966. Drazba was from Dunmore, PA., Jones from Allendale, SC. Both were 22 years old.
Captain Eleanor Grace Alexander
Captain Alexander of Westwood, NJ and Lieutenant Orlowski of Detroit, MI died November 30, 1967. Alexander, stationed at the 85th Evacuation Hospital and Orlowski, stationed at the 67th Evacuation Hospital, in Qui Nhon, had been sent to a hospital in Pleiku to help out during a push. With them when their plane crashed on the return trip to Qui Nhon were two other nurses, Jerome E. Olmstead of Clintonville, WI and Kenneth R. Shoemaker, Jr. of Owensboro, KY. Alexander was 27, Orlowski 23. Both were posthumously awarded Bronze Stars.
First Lieutenant Hedwig Diane Orlowski
Captain Alexander of Westwood, NJ and Lieutenant Orlowski of Detroit, MI died November 30, 1967. Alexander, stationed at the 85th Evacuation Hospital and Orlowski, stationed at the 67th Evacuation Hospital, in Qui Nhon, had been sent to a hospital in Pleiku to help out during a push. With them when their plane crashed on the return trip to Qui Nhon were two other nurses, Jerome E. Olmstead of Clintonville, WI and Kenneth R. Shoemaker, Jr. of Owensboro, KY. Alexander was 27, Orlowski 23. Both were posthumously awarded Bronze Stars.
Second Lieutenant Pamela Dorothy Donovan
Lieutenant Donovan, from Allston, MA, became seriously ill and died on July 8, 1968. She was assigned to the 85th Evacuation Hospital in Qui Nhon. She was 26 years old.
U.S. Air Force
Captain Mary Therese Klinker
Captain Klinker, a flight nurse assigned to Clark Air Base in the Philippines, was on the C-5A Galaxy which crashed on April 4 outside Saigon while evacuating Vietnamese orphans. This is known as the Operation Babylift crash. There are also US Air Force and Air Force Association web pages about Operation Babylift. From Lafayette, IN, she was 27. She was posthumously awarded the Airman's Medal for Heroism and the Meritorious Service Medal.
Keep in mind as important that work is, there is much more they have done and continue to do serving side by side with their brothers, especially when considering there are no safe zones in Iraq any more than there are safe zones in Afghanistan. In other words, their lives are on the line just as much as males risk their's but bullets and road side bombs are not all they have to worry about. Being sexually attacked by their "brothers" is yet one more trauma they face.
Army Spc. Alyssa R. Peterson, 27, died Sep 14 from what was described as a "non-combat weapons discharge."
Pfc. Analaura Esparza Gutierrez, 21, of Houston, Texas, was killed on Oct. 1 in Tikrit, Iraq. Pfc.Esparza Gutierrez was in a convoy that was hit by rocket propelled grenades.
Pfc. Rachel Bosveld, 19, was killed Sunday Oct 26th during a mortar attack in Baghdad. Pfc. Bosveld, a member of the 527th Military Police, is from Waupun, Wisconsin.
Pfc. Karina S. Lau, 20, Livingston, California ,was killed in the helicopter crash in Iraq.
Spc. Frances M. Vega,20, of Fort Buchanan, Puerto Rico. Vega assigned to the 151st Adjutant General Postal Detachment 3, Fort Hood, Texas, was killed in the helicopter crash.
Chief Warrant Officer (CW5) Sharon T. Swartworth , 43, of Virginia was killed when the UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter was shot down Nov. 7, 2003, in Tikrit, Iraq. CWO Swartworth was the regimental warrant officer for the Judge Advocate General Office, based at Headquarters Department of the Army, Pentagon.
Capt. Kimberly N. Hampton, 27, of Easley, S.C., was killed on Jan. 2, 2004, in Fallujah, Iraq. Capt. Hampton, was the pilot on a Kiowa, OH-58, Observation Helicopter when it was shot down by enemy ground fire and crashed. She was assigned to 1st Battalion, 82nd Aviation Battalion, 82nd Airborne Division, Fort Bragg, N.C.
Sgt. Keicia M. Hines, 27, of Citrus Heights, Calif., died on Jan. 14 when she was struck by a vehicle on Mosul Airfield in Mosul, Iraq. Hines was assigned to the 108th Military Police, Combat Support Co., Fort Bragg, N.C.
SPC Rachel Lacy, 22, died in 2003 after receiving a series of shots in preparation for deployment to Afghanistan. She became ill right after the inoculations, Two independent panels of medical experts found that the vaccinations may have triggered the illness that killed Spc. Rachel Lacy the Defense Department said.
Helicopter crew chief instructor Staff Sgt. Lori Anne Privette, 27 died when a UH-1N Huey helicopter crashed during a training flight. SSgt. Privette joined the Marine Corps in August 1994 and just returned from serving in Operation Iraqi Freedom.
you can read a lot more of these stories here
http://userpages.aug.com/captbarb/lives.html
As you can see, as important as it is for them to be taking care of the medical needs, they also risk their lives. Had this been the other way around, do you think a male would ever put up with having to have a prostrate exam in the middle of a maternity ward? Believe it or not, some women have gone to the VA and then end up being told they have to have a prostrate exam because it's on the list of tests to do. Never mind having to have a gynecological exam with no privacy at all. We also have homeless female veterans but along with too many of them come children the veterans shelters, even when they do manage to set aside beds for females, can't take in children with them. They have to go to the regular shelters instead of being given what they need to get back on their feet.
So here is what you may have thought was a rant from a female veteran but now maybe you understand how wrong it is for them to come home and receive less.
Standing up for female warriors
By Angela Peacock Posted: Sunday, May 9, 2010
I read your April 11 article, “A path to inner peace,” about the Pathway Home in Yountville with interest.
I am an Iraq veteran from 2003 and served with the Army’s First Armored Division, in Baghdad, Iraq, right after the war began. I was later diagnosed with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder from numerous incidents that occurred in theater. In fact, I served in the same area, during the same time period, as one of the soldiers quoted in the story. If you’ve ever seen the documentary “Lioness,” you can see that many women served in combat areas and were exposed to the same dangers that our male veterans face.
I took an interest in the Pathway Home as a possible residential treatment program that I could attend as an option for my combat-induced PTSD. After sending them an e-mail as to my interest in their program, this was their response:
“We are actually still trying to find funding for a women’s program. We are aware of the great need for this type of program and are working diligently to make it happen. When we do start the program though, it will be advertised at the VA, Vet Centers, military installations, and on our website.”
The response disappointed me greatly. I then looked for another residential program with a combat PTSD focus for women veterans, with no luck. Instead I had to drive 2,100 miles from St. Louis, Mo., to Long Beach, Calif., to attend an Military Sexual Trauma-focused program at the VA to treat my PTSD. (Where, I might add, we were housed with male veterans at a homeless shelter. Almost all the women in the program relapsed into addiction while we were there because of that stressor. I was only able to stay strong because of my years of yoga and meditation before ever going.)
read more here
Standing up for female warriors
Posted to Great Americans by NamGuardianAngel on September 10, 2009
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