Submarines and Females

[spekkio]

Although I agree with much of what the report says a conversation with a retired admiral mitigated my negative opinion to a point. He stated that there is also a need for quality personnel to staff the boats and excluding women precludes many capable personnel in a very competitive and difficult to staff service.

I have heard this argument; this assumes that the hit to men who volunteer for submarines or continue a career in submarines is equal or less than the women who want to serve in the submarine force.

I'm skeptical of that, particularly because as I pointed out, I haven't encountered any women who were itching to serve in the submarine service. But, for better or worse, I have encountered a lot of enlisted submariners who volunteered strictly to be in a rating that doesn't have to work with women. It's anecdotal evidence, sure, but I'd be interested to see a poll on that across the fleet and some data on what actually happens.

As far as the quality of an entrant: If the submarine force has X slates for women, and Y women volunteer, and Y < X, then your quality will go down, not up. It is the same problem that the nuclear Navy and submarine force faces with men, you're just splitting the quota by gender now. The first group of women had a 100% selection rate from USNA -- not a super-selective process. But maybe every single woman who applied had a 3.5+ GPA and was a rockstar. I have seen what happens when the sub force 'drafts' new Ensigns and it was essentially a gigantic waste of taxpayer money trying to force people, some of whom had reasonably high GPAs in non-technical majors, through a program that they had no business actually being in.

It also takes more female JOs to make a DH because females leave the Navy at a higher rate than men. DH are the critical officer billets that the sub force typically has trouble manning. That means that you either have to A) pick more women and increase the number of JO billets or B) lower the DH (and eventually CPO) screening requirements when your overall retention suffers from women leaving the Navy at their historical rates.

[hamsamich]

What about 21 man (women!) on 688s?  seems like a reasonable amount of privacy having their own berthing space.  not connected to a bathroom though!  but close.

[Fermi2]

I have heard this argument; this assumes that the hit to men who volunteer for submarines or continue a career in submarines is equal or less than the women who want to serve in the submarine force.

I'm skeptical of that, particularly because as I pointed out, I haven't encountered any women who were itching to serve in the submarine service. But, for better or worse, I have encountered a lot of enlisted submariners who volunteered strictly to be in a rating that doesn't have to work with women. It's anecdotal evidence, sure, but I'd be interested to see a poll on that across the fleet and some data on what actually happens.

As far as the quality of an entrant: If the submarine force has X slates for women, and Y women volunteer, and Y < X, then your quality will go down, not up. It is the same problem that the nuclear Navy and submarine force faces with men, you're just splitting the quota by gender now. The first group of women had a 100% selection rate from USNA -- not a super-selective process. But maybe every single woman who applied had a 3.5+ GPA and was a rockstar. I have seen what happens when the sub force 'drafts' new Ensigns and it was essentially a gigantic waste of taxpayer money trying to force people, some of whom had reasonably high GPAs in non-technical majors, through a program that they had no business actually being in.

It also takes more female JOs to make a DH because females leave the Navy at a higher rate than men. DH are the critical officer billets that the sub force typically has trouble manning. That means that you either have to A) pick more women and increase the number of JO billets or B) lower the DH (and eventually CPO) screening requirements when your overall retention suffers from women leaving the Navy at their historical rates.

Research shows officers with non technical degrees do better in the nuclear field than officers with technical degrees...

[Marlin]

What about 21 man (women!) on 688s?  seems like a reasonable amount of privacy having their own berthing space.  not connected to a bathroom though!  but close.

   You would need 21 women that would have to be replaced with a woman with the same NEC. Sea-Shore rotation would be a nightmare.

[spekkio]

Research shows officers with non technical degrees do better in the nuclear field than officers with technical degrees...

Do you have a source for that? You'd think the Navy would've caught on if that were the case. Or are you talking about transitioning to civilian utilities?

Regardless of what their degree was, you could easily tell that a lot of these guys weren't cut out for the program and we had much higher than average attrition as a result.

[HydroDave63]

What about 21 man (women!) on 688s?  seems like a reasonable amount of privacy having their own berthing space.  not connected to a bathroom though!  but close.

We analyzed for that about 3 years ago on NW...

http://www.nukeworker.com/forum/index.php/topic,25368.msg142587.html#msg142587

[hamsamich]

Yeah I remember about the 21 man discussion, but someone commented on subs not being designed for 2 genders; 688s seemed like they were at least partially.  We kept all the dou, um I mean first classes down there.

[ChiefRocscooter]

Anyone who has "real world experience" in the integration of females into ship crews can see that there are going to be very big "problems" with this process.  The numbers that come out in the publicity material are colored to make things look peachy, but if you take a look at the number of crew members who go on deployment (the number one job of a US warship) and trace it back thru the training cycle thing become a little less so.  Every boat expects to lose a guy or two in the run up to deployment (carriers crews are so big that this discussion really matter much less to them), but every time a guy drops from the roster the pain for the rest of the sub division he was in grows exponentially.  The how to handle the living arrangements problems will pale (IMHO) in the long run with the attrition issues that are special to females, yes guys fall out of the system too but they have to do it by getting hurt or in trouble where in some cases a female can do it by choice and suffer no repercussions.  The Navy will invest a lot of time and money into many of the sailors to have them "walk" away without filing the role they got them for, Sailor on ship headed to sea for deployment.

As for the living arrangements well equal means equal, ever see Starship Troopers?? I am all for that arrangement... the wives and husbands well maybe not so much!

[drayer54]

the wives and husbands well maybe not so much!

Nukes never cheat....

[HydroDave63]

As for the living arrangements well equal means equal, ever see Starship Troopers?? I am all for that arrangement... the wives and husbands well maybe not so much!

There's only room for one person at a time in sub shower stalls for a reason, Starship Troopers or not! 

 

[Wojo]

It may be different now but when I reported to my first boat, I didn't even rate a rack.  I wasn't worthy of a rack until I qualified for my dolphins.  Until then, my "rack" was a Mark 48.  And I "hot-racked" that bunk as well.  So the question is, will a female have to go through the same?  And if yes, how does that work?  and if no, then how do you volunteer for submarines and not cry "bull-s**t"!