The move recommended by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, overturns a 1994 rule that banned women from being assigned to smaller ground combat units. Some of the changes will occur this year, while decisions concerning special operations forces will probably take longer.

Women make up about 14% of the 1.4 million active military personnel. More than 280,000 women have been sent to Iraq, Afghanistan or to jobs in neighboring nations in support of the wars. Of the more than 6,600 U.S. service members who have been killed, 152 have been women.

Retired Army Lt. Gen. William G. Boykin said that infantry and other front-line units are not the proper place for women and the reason is not because they lack the capabilities or courage. Boykin, former head of the U.S. Special Forces Command observed:

“The people making this decision are doing so as part of another social experiment, and they have never lived nor fought with an infantry or Special Forces unit. These units have the mission of closing with and destroying the enemy, sometimes in close hand-to-hand combat. They are often in sustained operations for extended periods, during which they have no base of operations nor facilities. Their living conditions are primal in many situations with no privacy for personal hygiene or normal functions.”

Incorporating the genders in direct-combat situations “places additional and unnecessary burdens on leaders at all levels,” Boykin said. “While their focus must remain on winning the battles and protecting their troops, they will now have the distraction of having to provide some separation of the genders during fast moving and deadly situations.”

Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness, calls it a mistake to treat the military like just another civilian equal-opportunity employer. She said, “If a soldier is wounded in battle…a collocated support soldier may be the only person in a position to evacuate the wounded soldier on his own back. In this environment, women do not have an equal opportunity to survive, or to help fellow soldiers survive. Lives should not be put at needless risk just to satisfy ‘diversity metrics’ for the career ambitions of a few.”

In statement last February, Donnelly said; “By formally eliminating rules affecting units collocated with infantry battalions, the Defense Department is imposing needless complications and burdens on direct ground combat units. The Pentagon also is inviting another ACLU lawsuit challenging young women’s exemption from Selective Service registration, which the courts have upheld as constitutional because women are not assigned to direct ground combat.”

Advocates for the treaty are counting on senators to do what they did when considering the new START Treaty a couple of years ago: take the president’s word for it; be enamored with all the pro-treaty testimonials, lobbyists, and special interest groups; and fail to provide the educated checks-and-balances intended when the Founders framed our form of government.

However, if members of the U.S. Senate trouble to take the time to at least read the text of LOST, they will surely see it for what it is. The treaty is a throwback to the Cold War era when the Soviet Union and their fellow Third World travelers championed an agenda that sought to:

• Establish control over 70% of the world’s surface;
• Create an international governing institution that would serve as a model for bringing nation states like ours to heel; and
• Redistribute the planet’s wealth and technology from the developed world to themselves.

Fortunately, even if the senators fail to do their homework, others have not. Dick Morris and his wife, Eileen McGann, have just published an important new book that addresses LOST as a prime example of the title: Screwed! How Foreign Countries are Ripping Off America and Plundering Our Economy – and How Our Leaders Help Them Do It.

In addition to their proven track-record as best-selling authors, Dick Morris’s regular appearances on Fox News ensure that millions who might otherwise be unaware of what is afoot will be on notice and on guard.  That markedly improves the chances that those who might try to slip such an assault on our sovereignty through in the dark of night will be challenged and held accountable.

A documentary by Ami Horowitz is also airing in theaters nationwide this June that exposes the United Nations as a corrupt, self-dealing, inept, and essentially anti-American institution. It is hard to believe that anyone who sees this film will want to entrust any more resources or legitimacy to such an organization or the agendas it pushes.

Under the leadership of freshman Representative John Duncan (Republican-TN) and Rep. Jim Jordan (Republican-OH), who chairs the House Republican Study Committee, the House of Representatives voted last Friday 229-193 to bar millions of dollars the administration had sought to contribute to the funding of LOST organizations.  This is the first time either chamber has formally voted in opposition to this.

Thankfully, Republican opponent to the president, Mitt Romney, is no fan of this accord. According to an October 2007 report, a spokesman declared that “Governor Romney has concerns with the Law of the Sea Treaty.  He believes giving unaccountable international institutions more power is a serious problem.”