Women at war - Entertainment, Movies - Marine Corps Times

Women at war

Near the end of “Lioness,” a new documentary in the PBS “Independent Lens” series, an Iraq war veteran talks about the emotional toll exacted by the act of sighting down the barrel of a weapon and killing another human being.

“You never get over it ... you just get on with it,” the soldier says. “I’m glad to be home, glad to be alive ... but I lost part of myself over there. The experience of war stays embedded in your memory every single day.”

Warriors have expressed similar sentiments, even if only to themselves, since the dawn of warfare. The difference here is that this warrior is female — former Army Spc. Shannon Morgan, an Arkansas country girl who became one of the first women in U.S. history to take part in direct ground combat.

She is the most affecting of the five women at the heart of the film, all members of an ad hoc unit called “Team Lioness.”

The unit was quietly created in the early days of the Iraq war, when commanders realized female troops were best suited to calm, reassure and pat down Iraqi women during patrols and house searches.

The five women featured in “Lioness” were among 25 drawn from the Army’s 1st Engineer Battalion and, under the supervision of Maj. Kate Guttormsen, commander of the battalion’s Headquarters Company, attached to Marine units as needed.

But the unconventional nature of the Iraq insurgency — with no discernible front lines or rear areas — quickly erased any hope among U.S. commanders that the “lionesses” could be kept out of the line of fire, as called for by laws that forbid women from direct ground combat roles.

So it was that Morgan and Staff Sgt. Ranie Ruthig — vehicle mechanics by training — found themselves with squad automatic weapons in Ramadi in April 2004, protecting the rear of a Marine patrol moving into the city.

The squad turned a corner and ran into an ambush by hundreds of insurgents, igniting a battle that would spread like wildfire into a week of intense urban combat across the city.

Amid the firefight, the Marines withdrew without alerting Morgan. With bullets pinging all around her, she ran for her life — and her recounting of what happened when she caught up with her Marine squad is one of the film’s highlights.

Through the experiences of Morgan; Guttormsen; Ruthig; Spc. Rebecca Nava, a supply clerk; and Capt. Anastasia Breslow, a signal officer, “Lioness” shows modern warfare is blurring, if not obliterating, the traditional role of women in the U.S. military.

“When we go outside the wire, the enemy doesn’t care what gender you are,” says Guttormsen, whose husband is also an Army officer.

“There’s a big disconnect” between what women are allowed to do by law and what they are doing in Iraq, says retired Navy Capt. Lory Manning of the Women’s Research and Education Institute. “We are waiting for policies to catch up with real-world practice.”

“Lioness” doesn’t mention the current status of the program, but a Multi-National Force-Iraq news release issued in June indicates it’s ongoing.

Through the voices of five women who served their country in direct combat with honor and valor, “Lioness” offers a poignant look at a little-known but groundbreaking chapter in U.S. military history.