The Pentagon Right to Reassess Women’s Effectiveness in Combat

Written by Michelle Thibeau and Amber Smith | Published by

WashingtonTimes.com on January 26, 2026

Read the OpEd at WashingtonTimes.com

We are women who served in the United States military. We are proud of that service, proud of the men and women we stood beside and deeply aware of what war demands of those sent to fight it. That is precisely why we support the Pentagon’s decision to review the effectiveness of women in ground combat roles.

This review is not an insult to women in uniform. It is not a rollback of dignity or respect. It is a necessary act of responsibility by an institution whose sole purpose is to fight and win wars.

Anyone who has served knows this truth: The military is not designed to make statements about social progress. It exists to prepare young Americans for the most violent and physically punishing task a nation can ask of them. Combat isn’t theoretical or symbolic. It is governed by biology, exhaustion, fear, injury and death. Policies that ignore those realities do not empower service members; they endanger them.

For nearly a decade, after a 2015 decision driven as much by political pressure as by military necessity, women have been formally integrated into ground combat roles. At the time, many leaders and service members raised concerns grounded in data and experience. Studies showed that mixed-gender combat units were slower and less lethal and suffered higher injury rates than all-male units.

Those findings were uncomfortable, and rather than confront them honestly, the institution largely moved on.

That doesn’t make the data disappear. Nor does it make the consequences hypothetical.

As women who served, we reject the idea that acknowledging biological differences is an attack on our character or capability. Men are stronger and more physically resilient under sustained load and repeated trauma. That’s not a value judgment; it’s a fact. War doesn’t reward good intentions or equal aspirations. It rewards strength, speed, endurance and cohesion under fire.

We also reject the comforting myth that combat integration is purely a matter of holding everyone to the “separate but equal standards.” In practice, the military has long used sex-based fitness benchmarks. When women struggled to meet combat requirements, the solution was often to reinterpret or adjust standards rather than reassess the policy itself. Calling that equality does not make it so. It creates a risk for units with no margin for error.

Ground combat is not only about individual performance. It’s also about unit cohesion, instinctive trust and singular focus on mission. Anyone who has served understands that introducing sexual dynamics, protective instincts and additional administrative burdens into already strained environments complicates leadership and fractures cohesion. This is simply reality.

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has been criticized for insisting that combat standards be uniform, elite and uncompromised. We agree with that position, not because we doubt women’s courage but because we respect the cost of combat failure. If a woman meets the highest standard without exception, then she has earned her place. If not, she should not be passed through to satisfy ideology or optics. War doesn’t make allowances for political narratives.

Critics argue that this review is an attempt to exclude women. We see it differently. Refusing to review a policy that carries life-and-death consequences would be the real act of irresponsibility. Any military serious about readiness must be willing to revisit decisions, examine outcomes and correct course when necessary.

This review is not about turning back the clock. It’s about restoring honesty and reaffirming that the military’s loyalty is to mission success, not cultural trends. It’s also about ensuring that the next generation of service members, men and women alike, are led by an institution willing to put truth ahead of politics.

We served a military that asked much of us. It is not wrong for the nation to ask the same of its leaders now.

War does not care who we want to be. It cares only whether we are prepared. The Pentagon is right to make sure we are.

Michelle Thibeau is a Catholic wife, a homeschooling mother of four young children and a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point who deployed to Afghanistan in support of Operation Enduring Freedom.

Amber Smith, a military advisor for the Coalition for Military Excellence, is a former U.S. Army combat helicopter pilot and former deputy assistant to the Secretary of Defense.