A recent article published by the ACLU was by-lined “Colleen Farrell, Captain, U.S. Marine Corps Reserves.”  Captain Farrell slammed the US military for its “charade” in following the now-rescinded policies prohibiting women from certain combat roles.  As Captain Farrell describes it, the policies were not that females couldn’t serve in combat roles; as executed, the policies prevented females from serving greater than 45 days in a combat role:

Because of the combat exclusion policy, women Marines were not allowed to physically “co-locate” with a direct ground combat unit. In order to comply with this policy, my team was forced to return to the main Marine base in Afghanistan every 45 days for a single night and catch the next convoy or flight to return to our patrol bases.

We did not return to that main base for any operational purpose; it was simply a charade so that we met the letter of the law. This excessive and unnecessary travel between the bases put all of my Marines in danger for a legal façade…

Capt Farrell essentially accused her own Marine Corps of violating Department of Defense policies regarding women in combat — but getting around it by having them stay the night at another base once every 45 days.  This isn’t actually the first time this has been said.  In fact, the mantra that ‘women are already serving in combat, unofficially’ was one of the justifications for lifting the exclusion.  (In other words, the policy isn’t being followed anyway, so just rescind it.)

Just to hammer home the point, the article includes the endnote that “Colleen Farrell is now a Captain in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves.”  She was also the ACLU’s plaintiff in a lawsuit to remove the combat exclusion policy.

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