She's a Warrior

James Webb's "Women Can't Fight" article caused grief, anguish, and personal hardship for the pioneering women of the U.S. Naval Academy class of 1980 and beyond -- to include as far forward as for the women in the author's class of 1998. With decades of distance from when the article was first published, there exists an opportunity to reconcile the arguments he championed as a means to prove how far we have come as a military and a nation, and how the service academies have developed as gender-cohesive, federally funded military institutions of higher learning. This article dissects Webb's infamous, controversial article and argues that the integration of women at the service academies has had reverberating, positive effects, and that women are capable warriors.