There\u2019s not a job in the Army that isn\u2019t open to women, but there are still only a couple of places to serve for those female soldiers who have joined the infantry, armor and fire support specialist communities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To date, the Army has integrated combat units at Fort Hood, Texas, and Fort Bragg, North Carolina. Officials are now looking for the next installations to open up, the Army G-1\u2019s chief of command policy told Army Times on Wednesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve already expanded past the initially identified brigades on Fort Hood and Fort Bragg and have moved into other brigades on those posts,\u201d Lt. Col. Naomi Mercer said. \u201cWe are also preparing to open up other posts, but probably within the next year. We\u2019re not sure yet.\u201d
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Army started off by putting NCOs and officers, at least two total, into individual combat arms companies and expanding from there. Today, the 82nd Airborne Division\u2019s 2nd and 3rd Brigade Combat Teams at Fort Bragg are integrated, as are 1st Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division and the 3rd Cavalry Regiment at Fort Hood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That adds up to about 550 women total, Mercer said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The plan to expand will mirror what the Army did beginning in 2012, when 12B combat engineers and 91-series maintenance technicians were integrated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSo we\u2019ve already prepared a lot of these posts by opening them up to other gender integration programs, and it\u2019s just flowing on from there,\u201d Mercer said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Larger posts are at the top of the list, she added, but the major consideration is the mix of units in an area.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe consideration is the opportunities for the personnel who go there,\u201d she said. \u201cThe reason that we picked Fort Hood and Fort Bragg in the first place is that those are armor and infantry hubs. There are lots of job opportunities, so there\u2019s not just one infantry company. There\u2019s places for people to go.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Going forward, first-time infantry officers and newly reclassed NCOs will probably continue to start out at those hubs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWhat will probably happen is our leaders will do their tour at a larger post and then be assigned to a smaller post,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
There\u2019s not a job in the Army that isn\u2019t open to women, but there are still only a couple of places to serve for those female soldiers who have joined the infantry, armor and fire support specialist communities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":52710,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":70,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":{"10":{"categories":["digital-show-daily","newsletters","ausa","digital-show-dailies","daily-news-roundup"],"primary_category":"ausa"}}},"categories":[100,12,25,70],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3301],"class_list":["post-24646","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-news-roundup","category-news","category-newsletters","category-your-army"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"2FTNHTT2DBH4DGR3D5SY3KQK2Q","arc_canonical_url":"\/news\/your-army\/2017\/10\/11\/army-scouting-next-posts-to-accept-women-in-infantry-armor-artillery\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n