Research Catalog

Title

Women in the military : an unfinished revolution / Jeanne Holm.

Author

Holm, Jeanne, 1921-

Publication

Novato, CA : Presidio Press, c1992.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

xvi, 544 p. : ill.; 24 cm.

Summary

This revised edition of Maj. Gen. Jeanne Holm's classic work on the history and role of women in the U.S. armed forces brings the reader up to date by covering the role of American military women in all post-Vietnam military operations - including the recent Persian Gulf war. Just as important is her discussion of the changing role of women in the military during the 1980s and the current debate over combat exclusion law and policies. From the day Molly Pitcher fired her cannon without congressional sanction at the Battle of Monmouth in 1778 until 1948, when women were accorded full legal status in the regular armed services, the military was viewed as a wholly masculine preserve. During the Revolution and Civil War, women were forced to disguise themselves as men order to gain access to the ranks. The fight against the "built-in institutional resistance of the tradition-bound military subculture" is a large part of General Holm's story. Women's battle for status and recognition is the other part. Women always had to be superior to male counterparts in education and moral standing. Uniforms and accommodations were major stumbling blocks. The "emphasis was most often on bathrooms, not bullets," General Holm observes. Although women are now an integral part of each of the services, the controversy is far from over; the revolution continues. But, as recent events have so aptly demonstrated, it is now impossible for America to go to war without its women.

Subject

• United States > Armed Forces > Women

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (p. 518-525) and index.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

Contents

pt. I. Revolution Through World War II. 1. In Molly's Wake: The Early Years. 2. Between the Wars: Demobilization 1919-25. 3. The First Breakthrough: World War II. 4. Getting It Together. 5. The Big Push. 6. Consolidation. 7. Attitudes and Changing Customs. 8. Overseas. 9. War's End -- pt. II. Integration Through Vietnam. 10. Integration: 1948. 11. The Fledgling Air Force. 12. The Fifties: Korea and the Cold War. 13. WAF: An Endangered Species. 14. The Sixties: Typewriter Soldiers. 15. A New Beginning. 16. Vietnam. 17. Tet Offensive: The Test -- pt. III. Expanding Seventies to Uncertain Eighties. 18. The Seventies: A Decade of Expansion. 19. Policies Catching Up With Realities. 20. Family Policy. 21. The Service Academies. 22. Taking to the Air and the Sea. 23. Registration and the Draft. 24. Issues and Decisions -- pt. IV. Blazing New Trails. 25. The Eighties: A New Period of Uncertainty. 26. Combat and the Humpty Dumpty Factor. 27. The Persian Gulf War. 28. The End Game.

ISBN

0891414509

LCCN

^^^92017981^

OCLC

26012907

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library