Indian Defence Review

Findings of the British Equal Opportunities Commission

A joint survey was carried out by the Ministry of Defence and the Equal Opportunities Commission to determine the nature and extent of sexual harassment and sexualised behaviour in the British armed forces. Sexualised behaviour was described as ‘unwanted sexual contact, sending of explicit material, unwelcome comments and sexual assaults’.

The findings were released on 22 March 2006 and have caused widespread consternation. Almost all (99%) who responded had been in situations where such sexualised behaviours had taken place in the previous 12 months, with two-thirds (67%) having had such behaviours directed at them personally and 15% having had a ‘particularly upsetting’ experience.

Some of the other major findings of the survey are as follows:

Sexual Harassment of Women Soldiers in the US

The US society is highly emancipated and liberal with women having equal status in all walks of life. However, the recent case of Specialist Suzanne Swift of 54th Military Police Company has traumatised the entire nation and exposed the degree of ill-treatment meted out to women in the US forces. Swift has declined to serve in Iraq during her unit’s second tenure of duty there.

During her first tenure in Iraq, she was one of three women in her unit and has accused her superiors of intense sexual harassment using ‘war zone as a pretext’. She has claimed that she was sexually harassed and assaulted by three sergeants in Iraq. Intense publicity received by the case has forced the authorities to take a fresh look at the problem that they all knew existed but preferred to ignore. Sexual harassment and assaults of women soldiers is known to be blatant and quite prevalent. The Defence Department has conceded that reports of sexual assaults rose 40 percent to 2,374 in 2005.

The extent to which the malaise of sexual harassment pervades can be gauged from the fact that a sexual harassment hotline set up at Aberdeen received 6,825 calls from women from all branches of the military in just two months. Many women have been too traumatised to lead a normal life afterwards and need continuous counselling and medical attention.

According to Miles Foundation, a non-profit organisation that provides service to victims of military violence and advocates stricter implementation of protective laws, approximately 508 women have complained of sexual assault in the forces since the beginning of Iraq war in 2003. Due to the ongoing hostilities, rape victims are neither given any medical treatment nor can any test be carried out in field conditions to collect medical proof of rape for pressing criminal charges.

Many women dread duty in war zone. Several young women prefer to be declared ‘absent without leave’ due to their fears of sexual assaults. But most of them are too scared to speak out. The case of Colleen Mussolino, who served as a cook at Women’s Army Corps, is symptomatic of the fear stifling women’s complaints. She was gang raped, beaten and left for dead. Under continued threats, she ultimately signed an undertaking promising not to press for prosecution.

‘Command rape’ has come to be accepted as a common phenomenon in the military. A superior official, under the might of his command authority, can force a subordinate woman soldier to accede to his sexual demands. Many feel that women in the military are no good as soldiers and their real value lies in their contribution to keep the organisation in good cheer.

Women Soldiers and the Liberated Societies

During the recent debate over the issue of women’s induction in the Indian defence services, the military brass came under severe criticism for it’s allegedly anti-women bias. Many senior officers are reluctant to have women subordinates because of their concern for their safety and dignity. They are over-cautious in assigning duties to them lest they be exposed to any harm. Most superior officers take it as their personal duty and moral obligation to ensure the well-being of women in their command.

Indian senior brass takes pride in the fact that there have hardly been any cases of sexual harassment in the Indian defence forces despite the fact that the Indian soldier is drawn from rustic stock where women to date are consigned a lesser status.

They refer to the indignities inflicted on women in the militaries of the so-called liberated societies. There are a number of websites where women soldiers from these societies exchange their experience and seek counseling to get over their trauma. Extracts from some of the letters appearing on the websites are given below:

“I can understand because I was molested by five different people and then raped in 1999.”

“Just want to add my name to the list of female veterans that suffered sexual discrimination/harassment and a rape while in the Navy. I have not been able to get any type of compensation for what happened to me, but it is good to read that some females in each branch of the military services are receiving some type of compensation.”

“I joined the US Army at the age of 17. I endured much more in the Army than I had ever bargained for. I cried many nights during basic training, but I was a survivor, and determined to make it through. At the base, I was escorted to my room by the staff duty NCO, who later demanded a reward for his kindness. He pushed me onto the bed, forced himself upon me and did ‘his business’.”

“I grew up in a patriotic family. The thought of serving in the military was as natural as breathing. Today I live with so many conflicting emotions. I hate the military and what it allows to happen to women. It does condone rape. If it didn’t, there wouldn’t be so many cowards and rapist still wearing uniforms. Whenever I see any news item concerning the US stance of condemnation against foreign militaries that assault and rape, I get sick. Why in the hell don’t they clean up the mess in our military before they pound on someone else? I was even denied access to records about my assault case.”

“I was one of several single female officers (nurse corps) on a Southwestern air base in the middle of nowhere in the early 1990s. A famous squadron was performing at the upcoming air show and needed escorts. They preferred single female nurses in something short, sexy and black. This suggestion made me feel dirty and I felt as if the Air Force was asking me to be a prostitute. I was told that it was expected that the female nursing officers sleep with pilots. And it’s unsetting when I think that this was and could still be a standard practice. How many women and men had their military careers cut short because of adultery and then the Air Force seems to encourage it in the elite pilot corps.”

“I am an Army veteran now. During my time in the service I was raped and assaulted and nobody did anything. They did some corrupt things and didn’t even counsel me correctly. They covered everything up. They did not believe me. I was harassed repeatedly and everyone thought I was crazy.”

“I joined the reserves when I was 17. I decided to join the regular force as an artillery person and moved to my new base. There were some people who, not much later on, ended up harassing me, both sexually and physically. A year and the court case is still going on. It has drawn attention to me, to my name, to my reputation amongst and to my sex so much that I no longer want to be a soldier in the Canadian armed forces, something which at one time I use to love very much. They say it’s getting better, what they mean is we’re telling you less about it now!”

“When I joined the Army, I was a 21 year old very enthusiastic female who enjoyed the challenges of military life. Reality came quickly. Drill sergeants flirted and had sex both consensual and not with recruits and so the story begins in basic training. Being a strong minded individual or so I thought I shrugged off my share of flirtations, propositions and dates, that is until 1991, when a supervisor I had in a very high position continually harassed me nonstop for 2 years and was always propositioning me for sex. Things got out of hand on a duty trip to Atlanta where he finally forced his way into my hotel room, which he booked next to his, and he raped me. I requested out of the military after 14-15 years of service, because I felt trapped.”

I am a 35 year old prior service Army veteran who left the military after a period of sexual abuse that ended with my suicide attempt. My attacker is a married white senior NCO who continues his career unscathed 6 years after my initial report of the abuse and 5 years after the first substantiated investigation report. If the regulations tell you a sexual harassment case should be decided within 120 days of the investigation, why has the Army National Guard kept me on hold for eight years?”

Many still recall the shameful Tailhook Incident of 1991, where naval aviators at their annual convention surrounded over 80 ladies including 14 women naval officers stripping them and assaulting them sexually. According to most women, the incident reveals an attitude of contempt towards women and worse, it is tolerated by the military leadership. The naval enquiry tried to downplay the whole incident but the subsequent public uproar forced the US Government to act tough. A number of senior naval officers were forced to retire.