Military Thursday

Found via the author Chris Hernandez, here are some articles of military interest. First, Chris's three-part personal report on the French military's (highly effective) fighting skills in Afghanistan (Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3). For those not clicking through, Chris found the French both willing and able to fight. Second, Chris has an article based on a female Danish infantryman (her words). The article led Chris (a former infantryman himself) to say Females in the Infantry? Er…Yes, actually.

All of the articles are well worth the read, but I found a few common threads between them. The militaries profiled (French and Danish):

1) Recognize that men and women will have sex. Birth control, to include morning-after pills, are readily available in both militaries. Thus, despite the sex, women being evacuated for pregnancies are rare.

2) Have in general a more relaxed attitude with regards to sex. This is somewhat a European thing, but allows the telling of mild sexual jokes and the like. As a French officer told Chris, the only rule about sex is "be smart."

3) Booze is available to troops. Again, the rule is "drink smart."

4) Europeans have fewer vehicles, which yields more physically fit troops.

In short, an interesting series of articles.