Home » Archives » "Women distinguish themselves in Iraq"

Women distinguish themselves in Iraq

Mar- 8-2004 » Filed Under: Iraq News

Although women cannot serve in the infantry and certain other military units, many are still seeing combat in Iraq...and holding their own.

[Link to Full Article]
Chuck Yarborough
Plain Dealer Reporter

Tikrit, Iraq - It was hot, and his unit had just finished its lunchtime weave through the concrete maze into the Iraqi police station in Samarra, a town where dump, slums and suburbs are all the same place.

No one could blame the young soldier for taking off his Kevlar helmet - only for a moment - in the midday heat.

No one, of course, except his company commander. The West Point graduate began a profanity- filled tirade that had three effects: One, it showed the scope of physiological and literary allusions taught at the U.S. Military Academy. Second, it got the soldier to put his helmet back on right now. And finally, it delivered the lesson that neither he nor anyone who heard the lecture would ever cross Capt. Jennifer Knight. She can make you wish your parents had never been born...

Poirier said that during this conflict, Knight's company and its platoons have faced more combat than any other in the battalion.

"If my sons want to join the Army, I'd be happy if they were led by Jennifer Knight," he said.

Poirier assigned the tall, angular 28-year-old New Jersey native to turn the city of Samarra - Iraq's version of Tombstone, Ariz. - into a peaceable place. It was not easy. Samarra was the site of some of the worst fighting the battalion faced in its year in Iraq.

In one instance, violence erupted in the streets while Knight was on the job. Some members of the new Iraqi police force turned tail and fled.

"She got fire in her eyes and grabbed the Iraqi police chief. She fired the guys who ran," Poirier said. "She used a lot of talent in her company to tame that town of Samarra. A town that hadn't been 'fixed' in 10 months, she fixed within 30 days."

Go read the rest.


Advertisements