Pregnant US Troops Could Face Jail Time
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| Mon, 12-21-2009 - 10:24am |
Good morning! I'll be covering for CMBrenda this week so you'll see me around to say "hello", "Merry Christmas week" and just to post general topics of interest...
This article caught my attention and I'm interested to know your thoughts.
Thanks in advance!
Pregnant US Troops in Iraq Could Face Jail Time
(Dec. 20) -- Members of the U.S. military who become pregnant while serving in northern Iraq now face the possibility of a court-martial or jail time, Stars and Stripes newspaper reports.
Maj. Gen. Anthony Cucolo III, who oversees the area that includes Kirkuk, Tikrit, Mosul and Samarra, set a policy in place last month that makes pregnancy a punishable offense.
The rule applies to anyone who becomes pregnant or impregnates another service member, even if they are married.
Standard military policy calls for a pregnant soldier to be removed from the battle area within two weeks.
The northern Iraq policy, which was reviewed by military attorneys, takes that a step farther.
"The redeployment of the pregnant soldier creates a void in the unit and has a negative impact on the unit's ability to accomplish its mission. Another soldier must assume the pregnant soldier's responsibilities," Army spokesman Maj. Lee Peters told the newspaper.
The policy has drawn fierce criticism. Eugene Fidell, who teaches military law at Yale Law School, told London's Daily Mail newspaper that it poses serious ethical questions.
"Here you really have issues that go to the core of personal integrity: reproductive rights," he said.
Cucolo has defended the policy, calling it a "black and white issue."
"I've got a mission to do," he said. "I'm given a finite number of soldiers with which to do it and I need every one of them. So I'm going to take every measure I can to keep them all strong, fit and with me for the twelve months we are in the combat zone."
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Patricia Timmermans
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Hi Pat!
I agree with that completely. The military spends a lot of money on training and whatnot and you are there to do a job. It is just as if you hired someone to do a job for you and they did something to compromise that job, you would fire them.
They need to leave some space for women who are raped. Rape isn't something that is easy to prove and i don't want to come across as insulting the intelligence of the military. I'm sure they are aware of the high number of women who experience sexual harassment/assault from fellow soldiers. But because consent, or a lack of it, isn't something that is easily proven, they should leave plenty of room for people who can just be removed from combat without penalty. But with no penalty at all, people could easily become pregnant/impregnate in order to get out of their tour.
What a sticky situation...literally.
Thank you for your comments on this. I also fall into the 'undecided' group. Jail time seems a bit harsh however; there are many disciplinary options, jail time just seems unreasonable to me.
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Patricia Timmermans
Sr Community Moderator
iVillage Network
Thank you for your comments, I agree with your points but like I said above, jail time seems harsh.
I'll never forget my interview in the 70s for my job at the phone company -- one of the questions was 'when are you planning to start a family?' and my answer was that I hadn't considered it. Whether asking the question in the interview was ok or not is beside the point, their bottom line being not wanting to invest time and training on an employee who would be on maternity leave once hired.
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Patricia Timmermans
Sr Community Moderator
iVillage Network
My husband was deployed
I agree with