Female Soldier

Women have served in the military in many different roles in various jurisdictions throughout history. Women in many countries are no longer excluded from some types of combat missions such as piloting, mechanics, and infantry officer. Since 1914, in western militaries, women have served in greater numbers and more diverse roles than before. In the 1970s, most Western armies began allowing women to serve in active duty in all military branches. In 2006, eight countries (China, Eritrea, Israel, Libya, Malaysia, North Korea, Peru, and Taiwan) conscripted women into military service. In 2013, Norway became the first NATO country to draft women, as well as the first country in the world to conscript women on the same formal terms as men. In 2017, neighboring Sweden followed suit and in 2018, the Netherlands joined this line-up (although in the Netherlands there is no active peacetime conscription).

As of 2022, only three countries conscripted women and men on the same formal conditions: Norway, Sweden, and The Netherlands. A few other countries have laws allowing for the conscription of women into their armed forces, however with some differences such as service exemptions, length of service, and more.

History

Viking Age

Although still under debate, there is some historic, as well as archaeologic evidence for female warriors (Shield-maidens) in the Viking Age, Scandinavia. One of the most prominent Viking archaeological sites is the Birka burial containing remains of a female skeleton accompanied with the accoutrements of an elite professional Viking warrior in a 10th century chamber-grave. Shield-maidens are also mentioned in ancient Norse sagas.

World War I

During the First World War, the United States was in total warfare efforts. Every person had to contribute to the war effort, however, this did not necessarily mean that everyone had to fight. The country needed to continue to fund its troops and support the war financially while soldiers were fighting. To this end, the United States relied on organizations for support. Women joined organizations such as the Committee on Public Information in order to educate people about the war. This committee additionally promoted nationalism. In addition to working for committees having to do with education, women worked in all sorts of positions. Many women became YWCA members and went overseas to help soldiers. This was the first time in history that women of all classes were working together to help the war efforts. Upper-class women founded many voluntary war organizations while middle and lower-class women worked in these organizations by working as nurses or by filling in the jobs of men.

Russia

The only nation to deploy female combat troops in substantial numbers was Russia. From the onset, female recruits either joined the military in disguise or were tacitly accepted by their units. Perhaps the most prominent was a contingent of front-line light cavalry in a Cossack regiment commanded by a female colonel, Alexandra Kudasheva.
*Madame Colonel Alexandra Kudasheva (1873–1921?) was the commanding officer of a Russian light cavalry regiment from 1915 - 1917 during both WWI and also during the Russian Revolution. This cavalry regiment may have been the first gender-integrated regiment in Russian history. She was also noted for her endurance riding feats.

Others included Maria Bochkareva, who was decorated three times and promoted to senior NCO rank, while ''The New York Times'' reported that a group of twelve schoolgirls from Moscow had enlisted together disguised as young men. In 1917, the Provisional Government raised a number of "Women's Battalions", with Maria Bochkareva given an officer's commission in command. They were disbanded before the end of the year. In the later Russian Civil War, they fought both for the Bolsheviks (infantry) and the White Guard.

Others

In Serbia, a few individual women played key military roles. Scottish doctor Elsie Ingles coordinated a retreat of approximately 8,000 Serbian troops through Romania and revolutionary Russia, up to Scandinavia and finally onto transport ships back to England. Another woman, Milunka Savić, enlisted in the Serbian army in place of her brother. She fought throughout the war, becoming possibly the most decorated woman in military history.

In 1918 Loretta Walsh became the first woman to enlist as a woman. A 1948 law made women a permanent part of the military services. In 1976, the first group of women were admitted into a U.S. military academy. Approximately 16% of the 2013 West Point class consisted of women. In the 1918 Finnish Civil War, more than 2,000 women fought in the Women's Red Guards.

During the Spanish Civil War, thousands of women fought in mixed-gender combat and rearguard units, or as part of militias.

Second Sino-Japanese War

Several women's battalions were established in China during the Second Sino-Japanese War. These included the Guangxi Women's Battalion, the Yunnan Women's Battlefield Service Unit, Zhejiang Women's Guerrilla Band, Hunan War Service Corps, and others.

World War II

All the major participating nations in World War II enlisted women. The majority served in nursing and clerical or support roles. Over 500,000 women had combat roles in anti-aircraft units in Britain and Germany, as well as front-line units in the Soviet Union.

British India

In 1942, the Indian National Army (Azaad Hind Fauj) established Rani of Jhansi Regiment, India's first all-women regiment to fight for Indian independence under the leadership of Subash Chandra Bose, with Japanese assistance. It is estimated that over 1,000 women served in the regiment.

United Kingdom

In 1938, the British established uniformed services for women (small units of nurses had long been in service). In late 1941, Britain began conscripting women, sending most into factories and some into the military, especially the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS) attached to the army. The ATS began as a women's auxiliary in 1938. In 1941, the ATS was granted military status, although women received only two thirds of male pay. Women had a well-publicized role in handling anti-aircraft guns against German planes and V-1 missiles. The daughter of Prime Minister Winston Churchill was there, and he said that any general who saved him 40,000 fighting men had gained the equivalent of a victory. By August 1941, women were operating fire-control instruments; although they were never allowed to pull the trigger, since killing the enemy was considered to be too masculine. By 1943, 56,000 women were in Anti-Aircraft Command, mostly in units close to London where they faced a risk of death, but not of capture. The first death of a woman in Anti-Aircraft Command occurred in April 1942.

Germany

The Third Reich had similar roles for women. The SS-Helferinnen were regarded as part of the SS if they had undergone training at a Reichsschule SS. All other female workers were contracted to the SS and chosen largely from concentration camps. Women served in auxiliary units in the navy (Kriegshelferinnen), air force (Luftnachrichtenhelferinnen) and army ( Nachrichtenhelferin).Gordon Williamson, ''World War II German Women's Auxiliary Services'' (2003).

In 1944-45 roughly 500,000 women were volunteer uniformed auxiliaries in the German armed forces (Wehrmacht). About the same number served in civil aerial defense, 400,000 volunteered as nurses and many more replaced drafted men in the wartime economy. In the Luftwaffe they served in combat roles helping to operate anti-aircraft systems to shoot down Allied bombers. By 1945, German women held 85% of the billets as clerics, accountants, interpreters, laboratory workers and administrative workers, together with half of the clerical and junior administrative posts in high-level field headquarters.

The German nursing service consisted of four main organizations: one for Catholics, one for Protestants, the secular DRK (Red Cross), and the "Brown Nurses" for committed Nazi women. Military nursing was primarily handled by the DRK, which came under partial Nazi control. Frontline medical services were provided by male medics and doctors. Red Cross nurses served widely within the military medical services, staffing the hospitals close to the front lines and at risk of attack. Two dozen nurses were awarded the Iron Cross for heroism under fire. Brown Nurses were forced to look away while their incapacitated patients were murdered by war criminals.

Hundreds of women auxiliaries (Aufseherin) served in the SS in the camps, the majority of which were at Ravensbrück.

In Germany, women worked and were told by Hitler to produce more pure Aryan children to fight in future wars.

Japanese American Women

During the second world war, many Japanese American women lost their jobs or pay because they were sent to relocation camps. Japanese immigrants and Japanese Americans were faced with discrimination. Many Americans called it the "yellow peril" and called Japanese people " japs". In 1913, California passed the Alien Land Law which prohibited "aliens ineligible for citizenship" from owning land to grow crops on. Despite the discrimination, many Japanese American women volunteered to serve in the Women's Auxiliary Army Corps. Sexism along with racism was something that these women faced when they joined WAAC. Even while dealing with discrimination, Japanese American women were able to greatly help the United States. Many women were hired as interpreters, translators, and interrogators in the Military Intelligence Service. In 1948, the Women's Army Corps was permanently established and remained until 1978 when women were allowed into the army.

Italy

In Italy, during the second world war, the Female Auxiliary Service (Italian: ''Servizio Ausiliario Femminile'', SAF) was a women's corps of the armed forces of the Italian Social Republic, whose components, all voluntary, were commonly referred to as auxiliaries. The commander was the Brig. Gen. Piera Gatteschi Fondelli.

Yugoslav Partisans

The Yugoslav National Liberation Movement had 6,000,000 civilian supporters; its two million women formed the Antifascist Front of Women (AFŽ), in which the revolutionary coexisted with the traditional. The AFŽ managed schools, hospitals and local governments. About 100,000 women served with 600,000 men in Tito's Yugoslav National Liberation Army. It stressed its dedication to women's rights and gender equality and used the imagery of folklore heroines to attract and legitimize the fighters. After the war, although women were relegated to traditional gender roles, Yugoslavia's historians emphasized women's roles in the resistance. After Yugoslavia broke up in the 1990s, women's contributions to the resistance were forgotten.

Vietnam War

Though relatively little official data exists about female Vietnam War veterans, the Vietnam Women's Memorial Foundation estimates that approximately 11,000 military women were stationed in Vietnam during the conflict. Nearly all of them were volunteers, and 90 percent served as military nurses, though women also worked as physicians, air traffic controllers, intelligence officers, clerks and other positions in the U.S. Women's Army Corps, U.S. Navy, Air Force and Marines and the Army Medical Specialist Corps. In addition to women in the armed forces, an unknown number of civilian women served in Vietnam on behalf of the Red Cross, United Service Organizations (USO), Catholic Relief Services and other humanitarian organizations, or as foreign correspondents for various news organizations.

In addition to the U.S. military women who served in Vietnam, an unknown number of female civilians willingly gave their services on Vietnamese soil during the conflict. Many of them worked on behalf of the American Red Cross, Army Special Services, United Service Organizations (USO), Peace Corps, and various religious groups such as Catholic Relief Services.

Other American women traveled to Vietnam as foreign correspondents for news organizations, including Georgette "Dickey" Chappelle, a writer for the National Observer who was killed by a mine while on patrol with U.S. Marines outside Chu Lai in November 1965. According to the Vietnam Women's Memorial Foundation, 59 female civilians died during the conflict.

Democratic Republic of the Congo

The Democratic Republic of the Congo began training an initial 150 women as para-commandos for the Armée Nationale Congolaise in 1967. Many more were trained subsequently, over a period of years. The women received parachute and weapons training, although it is unclear to what extent they were actually integrated into the combat units of the Congo.

Eritrea

In 1999, the BBC
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