Women in The United States Navy - Careers

Careers

In the Navy, women are currently eligible to serve in all ratings, except as a SEAL or Special Warfare Combatant-craft Crewman (SWCC). In 2013 Leon Panetta removed the U.S. military's ban on women serving in combat, overturning a 1994 rule prohibiting women from being assigned to smaller ground combat units. Panetta's decision gives the U.S. military services until January 2016 to seek special exceptions if they believe any positions must remain closed to women. The services have until May 2013 to draw up a plan for opening all units to women and until the end of 2015 to actually implement it.

The former policy set by Congress and the Secretary of Defense, effective 1 October 1994, excluded women from direct ground combat billets in the military:

"Service members who are eligible to be assigned to all positions for which they are qualified, except that women shall be excluded from assignment to units below the brigade level whose primary mission is to engage in direct combat on the ground as defined below. "Direct ground combat is engaging an enemy on the ground with individual or crew-served weapons, while being exposed to hostile fire and to a high probability of direct physical contact with the hostile force's personnel. Direct combat take place well forward on the battlefield while locating and closing with the enemy to defeat them by fire, maneuver, or shock effect." However, qualified and motivated women are encouraged to investigate the diver and explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) fields."