The Many Roles of Women in War: Sniper, Pilot, Death Camp Guard

Wondering if the museum exhibit includes Leni Reifenshtall, a very talented German woman AND Adolph Hitler's photographer and movie director. All his propaganda films were done by her...much too effectively.

Thank you for sharing your experience at this museum and your personal and family experience too. I live less than 5 miles from this museum and didn’t know it existed. My mother was part of a small team that traveled across the country during WWII to put up private phone lines for the Army’s use. She told us her cover story for decades. She passed away at 95 last year and amongst the very few non family items she carefully stored we found her Id and a letter of commendation. She was very proud of her service. I see the museum is open tomorrow and I plan to be there when it does.

Very well written.

War should be an "all hands" evolution, regardless of the hands' gender. To borrow a phrase, war is to important to be left solely to males... USN 1967 - 71 Viet Nam 1968

Worth considering the role of women who have fought in irregular armies, from the Viet Cong and various organized WWII resistance movements, to today's Peshmurga.

Now that women are at least theoretically subject to the draft, curious if politicians will be so quick to launch another war of choice.

British women, including my stepmother, were drafted into the British Armed Forces starting in 1941 and over 650,000 served from September 1939-September 1945. By 1945, 450,000 were still serving, the number having peaked in 1944 at over 470,000. There were 1,486 female Armed Forces casualties including 722 dead and missing. Many were awarded medals for bravery under fire during the German air raids. They were on the front line at air bases and as anti-aircraft gunners as well as delivering aircraft from factories to operating bases. Britain's RAF repelled an attempted Nazi invasion in 1940 and as a result of winning the Battle of Britain suffered hundreds of thousands of civilian casualties including about 90,000 deaths from the intense bombing and coastal shelling that followed for months afterwards The UK population was then about 35% that of the USA in 1945. As Mat noted another 80,000 were in the Womens Land Army. This total of the Womens Services was over 10% of the UK Armed Forces total of 5.0 million in 1944 and about 8-10% of the military age female population. Many more did their mandatory National Service in factories and other War work. The figures are gleaned from the UK Central Statistical Office" Fighting with Figures, "A Digest of the Second World War"

British women, including my stepmother, were drafted into the British Armed Forces starting in 1941 and over 650,000 served from September 1939-September 1945. By 1945, 450,000 were still serving the number having peaked in 1944 at over 470,000. There were 1486 female Armed Forces casualties including 722 dead and missing. Many were awarded medals for bravery under fire during the German attacks that killed over 90,000 civilians. The UK population was about 35% that of the USA in 1945. As Mat has noted another 80,000 were in the Womens Land Army. This total in the Womens Services was over 10% of the UK Armed Forces of 5.0 million in 1944 and about 8-10% of the military age female population with many more doing their National Service in factories and other War work. The figures are gleaned from the UK Central Statistical Office "A Digest of the Second World War"

Everyone does not have to have a role in war. We can each have a role in stopping it, and many women (and men) do.

In WWII, my dad's unit (in France) shot a German sniper who turned out to be a woman. They think she had also served in Africa as she had photgraphs on her and the background looked like it.

Thank you, Ms. Goldstein, for your service and for heralding that of countless other women. Can we follow this heroic example? Will we halt the "mundane steps" already be taking us to the next conflagration?

You are amazing Ms Goldstein, a patriot worthy of the highest respect. I am the mother of a T-38 AF pilot who would sacrifice all for her county, and also has beauty and brains along with character. Accomplished as she is, including academically with a Masters, she would be appreciative and in awe of your talents and abilities. The Pat Tillman scholarship is such an honor, and you very much deserve it. Thank you for devoting yourself to our country, you could have gone anywhere and done anything right out of college, but chose to serve. Generations of Americans will reap the benefit of your dedication.

"The march to war is conducted step by mundane step. Everyone has a role, whether through action or inaction." Well put.

Also worth pointing out that in the UK we had the WAAF, the WRN and the ATA alongside the ATS. The ATA - Air Transport Auxiliary included numerous women employed in ferrying aircraft and, unusually for the 1940’s, received equal pay to the men. These weren’t backroom jobs either, the UK was on the frontline for several years, the WAAFs plotted and directed fighter aircraft, monitored radar, armed and refuelled aircraft or marked UXBs - sometimes while under direct air attack. Outside of the military we also had the Land Girls, women recruited to work in farms to replace the male workforce. We had all-male civilian forces too, like the Bevan Boys. Then there’s the women who, erm, manned (!?) the factories. And who worked in codebreaking at Bletchley. Lots of roles really, for the time.

If young women had been conscripted in WW1 and had had to drown in the mud of the trenches alongside their brothers, lovers and fathers, then WW1 wouldn't have lasted six years and destroyed a generation. If fathers and mothers had been forced to fight alongside their sons and daughters in the trenches, WW1 would have been over within a year. And if politicians had been forced to put on a uniform and die alongside their constituents, then the war would have been over in a month. Wanna war? Fine – then go and fight it in person, heel spurs or no heel spurs.