around me in war zones are women. it seems like the military is finally catching up to that. what it means in practice, tearing down some of those internal divisions, there are still some folks in command out there who need to be taught about what we can do. yeah. so i love that comparison, kim, because, you know, obviously women are right there on the front lines, not only as soldiers, but obviously embedded with our troops, and yet, genevieve and kayla, it feels like the pentagon is behind in simply recognizing women are already there. so both of you have been very near to combat. what does that mean to say you were near to combat since you were officially in combat? i think that it is a little confusing for people outside the system to understand the difference. women weren t banned from combat. they re banned from combat jobs and from being assigned to combat units at certain levels. but as you pointed out, over 140 women have died in combat so clearly they were in combat and
in the u.s. army. and genevieve chase who won a purple heart. still with us salamishah tillet and in d.c., kimberly dozier, former cbs news baghdad correspondent. thanks for all of you being there. kim, i want to start with you since you re there in the d.c. can you tell us how significant are the recent changes in opening up roles for new women? they re already on the ground dom some of these jobs. on the ground in afghanistan they might not have had the official assignments but because of the way the battle lines change, just driving across the country puts you in the middle of a war zone. the other thing is when i look around at my colleagues, diplomats, journalists, a good quarter of the third of people
the new battle space front, what they re talking about essentially and what we have used as a phrase as kouc counterinsurgency, in the hearts and minds, getting into societies and cultures, we have a natural capacity to be able to go and talk to women, to be able to appeal to the other side of the culture. and to be perfectly honest, i talked to many men in the local communities. so, you know, we have a lot of strengths, we have a lot of things to offer beyond just the physical aspect of it. and that s something that many commanders are beginning to recognize. genevieve is absolutely right. and i think it s important to remember that in the muslim countries, women and counterinsurgency operations can play a vital role. it can be much more challenging for our malcolm rads to have access to. i want to talk about the challenges that you re facing not only in the face of combat
school. she wasn t as wise in the ways of that type of military culture. so there s so much we can do on the front end as well that i think should be preventive, and we stopped having these very uncomfortable discussions with our children in our culture. i think in some ways we still carry that on. and with respect to the higher reporting rates, we want to see that. we want to see more people feeling comfortable and confident enough to come forward knowing that they re going to be taken care of and that transferser of the to when they get out and come home. when they feel they can t openly talk about things, they re not going receive the care and treatment they need, all of that stuff spirals down into the suicide rate. so from recruits to soldiers to veterans, making sure we re taking care of at every point. genevieve, kayla, salamishah, and kim, thank you all so much for being here. and coming up, i ll introduce you to one man s story you re probably going to hear a lot more about,
called the invisible war. it affects both while they re there and when they come home, i mean if we can re-imagine it differently, thing it goes a long way when you harm the soldier, you re harming the nation. a radical reconfiguring how we think about sexual say sault. genevieve, you re working with veterans. i do. what do you do as more as more are coming home. they re drawing down now. right. there are a number of issues. i was on the phone great deal yesterday and have been over the last couple of weeks with women who are trying to transition out of the military and we re starting to see things and hear things that are extremely disturbing. having been diagnosed with po post-traumatic stress, vchb been freertd that for half a year and having that diagnosis changed to adjustment disorder which is sort of a discharge, get them off active dutsty as quickly as