With wars dragging on in Iraq and Afghanistan and the dangers faced every day by soldiers— including female soldiers, in many cases—is the military still a viable option for girls starting out in life? For many, it is.
According to the Department of Defense, as of January, there were 194,277 females in active duty out of 1,360,419 troops total, or 14.2 percent. Also, there were 25,793 females serving in support of the operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, or 9.7 percent of those deployed.
Clearly, females have a role to play in the military. For Army Captain Megan Keuss, based out of Iron Mountain, serving her country was the reason she enlisted.
“I can tell you what was most motivating for me, and that was the potential and the ability to give something back to my country,” she said. “So duty to my country is something that motivated me, and just being patriotic, I want to serve.”
Meanwhile, for Michigan National Guard Private First Class Ashley Narhi, nineteen, of Ishpeming, she wanted a change of lifestyle and also to serve her country.
“I joined because I was living a really bad lifestyle, and I needed a change, and after what happened on [September 11, 2001], I really wanted to just help out,” she said.
Traditionally, one of the reasons women, and men as well, enlist is to get money for education, job training and opportunities to travel. Keuss, for example, was stationed in Italy for three years and was able to see a lot of the country. Another plus, according to Keuss, is that—unlike the civilian world—in many cases, women get pay and benefits equal to men.
“A male that would hold my position would get paid the exact same thing that I do and get the exact same benefits,” she said.
Army Reservist Julie Dove, eighteen, of L’Anse, who serves with the 652nd Engineers in Harvey, was looking for “structure” in her life.
“[The military] is a good structured place for people,” Dove said. “When you go to basic training, and my special training after that, it gives you…a structure in your life,” she said. “It teaches you…pretty much how to be a better person.”
Narhi agrees with Dove that a person learns a lot from being in situations he or she wouldn’t otherwise be in.
“You learn a lot,” she said. “You get to meet people that you’d never think that you’d get along with as a civilian and you just learn how to cope with different problems and just things that you’d never learn any other way.”
Along with those positives are one big negative for many––going to war. Even though females are not allowed to serve in most combat and “forward” roles, we have all heard the news reports of women injured in Iraq.
Narhi’s younger sister Danielle, sixteen, who is a junior at the Ishpeming High School, is considering following her sister into the military after graduation, but admits to some fear of the possibility of serving in a war zone.
“It scares me a lot,” she said, laughing nervously.
Diane DeMillio, is a counselor at Ishpeming High School. She estimates that in any given high school class, two or three girls show some interest and want to talk to the military recruiters when they come to the school. DeMillio pointed out, however, that it is rare in her experience to have a female student actually enlist. According to DeMillio, the current wars have not helped the female enlistment rate among students from her school.
“We had an alumnus in the National Guard, and I heard that she had to leave the Guard because she was suppose to go to Iraq and refused,” DeMillio said. “It used to be that I would encourage students to go into the National Guard if they needed money for college because war wasn’t going to be part of the National Guard picture when I started this job. Now, it’s holy smokes! They didn’t really want to do that.”
Keuss is quick to point out that the current combat operations have not changed the roles of women in the Army.
“I don’t think that the current combat situation changed the roles of women in the army at all. I do think that we train to do our job in garrison, which is not forward in war. So when we go to war we do the same job we trained to do back in the rear,” Keuss said.
Keuss knows from experience; she served in Iraq for two months and in Afghanistan for a year. She is trained in finance, so she ran a military bank. The bank took the money that was recovered from Saddam Hussein and placed it back into Iraq’s economy. This allowed Keuss to witness the positive outcomes a war can have.
“I got to see some wonderful things done in Iraq, and some very similar in Afghanistan,” she said.
Ashley Narhi said she is prepared to deploy if and when that time comes . . .

—8-18 Media

Editors Note: This story was written by Lane Whitley, 13, and Erin Bozek-Jarvis, 14.