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23 Jul 2021
An Army commander recently decided to mandate wearing masks indoors for service members and civilians under his command, citing the delta variant of the coronavirus and breakthrough cases of infection among those vaccinated.
Maj. Gen. Dennis LeMaster, commanding general of the U.S Army Medical Center of Excellence (MEDCoE) at Fort Sam Houston in Texas announced on social media accounts that he has mandated mask-wearing indoors beginning Sunday.
He tweeted Monday: “It’s all about readiness. While local #COVID19 [Chinese coronavirus] cases increase I have, once again, mandated mask wear indoors. Wear your masks and #GetTheShot. It’s all about protecting each other and #Soldier readiness!”
Like every guy else on this site who has served in a uniform, as a DOD or Service civilian, or in the US intelligence community, we’ve all served with women. And not just in support positions regardless of what the official designators were. In the wars we’ve been fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan for the past 20 and 18 years respectively, no matter where we put the phase lines on the map, there were no defined lines that indicated where the fighting would and wouldn’t be. Women Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, and Marines, despite being designated in combat support roles for almost the entirety of these wars, often saw as much combat as their male counterparts. Every convoy of supplies, every Civil Affairs Team-Alpha mission, every Medical or Veterinary Operation could, at any moment, go from being a support or enabling mission to a combat one.