Equal opportunities in the armed forces, how NATO rethinks gender equality

In the image of her CV, Mrs Fellin has nothing military about her. She receives the writer in a brand new TV studio, where the grey of the camouflage has been replaced by the blue of the sky. She explains d'emblée to her visitor: 'If an increasing number of women want to join the armed forces, my task is to listen to them and meet their wishes. We must listen to them, without prejudice. People are not all the same and there are differences. My task at NATO is to be the bearer of this diversity of needs'.

Some statistics provide a picture of the situation. Between 2014 and 2020, the percentage of women in the allied armed forces rose from 10.5% to 13%. In first place is Hungary (with 20 per cent of enlisted women). Italy is among the last countries in the ranking, more precisely in the penultimate place before Turkey, with a share of 7.5 per cent (in 2023). The distribution is not homogeneous among the armed forces. In the Atlantic Alliance countries, women are more present in the army (35.7%), much less in the air force (28.3%) and the navy (23.6%).

How is it possible that many women today want to enlist? 'For many,' explains Fellin, 'it is a professional opportunity. In peacetime, the soldier does a job that is not too dissimilar from any other occupation. We are witnessing an all-round change in society. Women now do jobs that were unthinkable before. They drive trucks, for example'. For centuries, women had no military vocation. The statue that in Orléans recalls the figure of Joan of Arc, on horseback, sword in rest and breastplate on her chest, celebrates the exception rather than the rule.

One of the tasks of the Special Representative of the Secretary General, former Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, is to facilitate the path of these women. "My aim is not to incentivise enlistment, but to ensure that there are equal opportunities, recognising the diversity of the female gender. Just think: there is not even a uniform for women, with the necessary space for breasts. Ladies use the men's. The same goes for bullet-proof vests'. A programme to produce uniforms for Ukrainian female soldiers has just been started.

Incredibly, even purely military equipment is not intended for use by women: the grip of a machine gun, the positions inside a tank or jeep, even the ejector seats of a fighter jet are not designed for the build of a female soldier. It is not only a question of providing female soldiers with equipment adapted to them, but also of reconciling their work with pregnancy or breastfeeding. 'Bodies get bigger, feet get longer'. Ensuring equal opportunities also serves to prevent frustration and resignation.

In 2022, the war in Europe is once again claiming victims. Against Russia, 5,000 Ukrainian women are fighting on the front lines. Another 55,000 are deployed in the rear. "They want to fight. Theirs is a voluntary presence. It is therefore essential to give them all the tools, on an equal footing with men,' Fellin continues. Moreover, the female gender can also play a crucial role in the military field, as demonstrated by the experience in Afghanistan where NATO used all-female battalions to interact with local women in a country marked by radical Islam.

By now, in many European cities, the police officer as well as the military sentry is a woman. Sometimes these ladies appear sullen and militaristic, almost as if they had stepped into the role, even more so than their male comrade. "I too often find them withered, hardened,' admits Irene Fellin. 'When I talk to them face to face, they tell me about the great difficulties they encounter in a career still dominated by men. Perhaps it also depends on the interpretation they give of the job. They respond to the expectations of a certain model of authority'.

For two years, for the first time, a woman has led Italy. Yet, when she arrived at Palazzo Chigi, Giorgia Meloni asked to be called the Prime Minister. In Germany, Angela Merkel was the Bundeskanzlerin der Bundesrepublik Deutschland. In France, Christine Lagarde is the présidente de la Banque Centrale Européenne. Also in Spain, Teresa Ribera is the ministra para la Transición Ecológica. 'Women who come to power are still few,' notes Fellin, 'and tend to conform to male power. Language, however, is very important'.

Language is important, as is the image projected to the outside world, directly or indirectly. Cases of violence against women are more frequent, or rather their publicity is more frequent. In France, in these weeks, a historic trial is being held against a husband who drugged his wife to allow 50 men to rape her while she was unconscious. One has to wonder about the impact of the increasing presence of women in uniform on society as a whole.

The influence could prove positive. The Special Representative, who founded the Italian branch of WIIS (Women in International Security) in 2016, notes that violence against women often has to do with men's fear of losing the space they have enjoyed for centuries: 'When I began my gender studies I discovered that Sweden was the country with the highest rate of domestic violence, but also the country where women's emancipation was greatest. The change in the status of women had been very rapid and had not been sufficiently internalised'.

It remains to be understood, to return to the question we started with, what the role of women might be in mediating between belligerents, and above all whether their increasing presence in the military field does not jeopardise their innate ability to seek compromises in a world dramatically in need of concord. 'NATO,' our interlocutor replies, diplomatically, 'is also a military organisation dedicated to deterrence, not just combat. So in trying to make our Armed Forces more inclusive it also works for prevention'.