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In 2005, members of Congress proposed two amendments that would remove barriers to basic medical care for victims of sexual assault. Maine Democrat Michael Michaud proposed a measure to provide emergency contraception for female rape victims in military bases. Florida Democrat Debbie Wasserman-Schultz and Connecticut Republican Christopher Shays offered another proposal that would have allowed an exception to the ban on federal fi nancing of abortions in the cases of military victims of rape. Military doctors are authorized to perform abortions in cases of proven rape or when the mother’s life is endangered, but the federal government does not pay for the procedure. In addition, the rape must have been investigated and verifi ed for women to qualify for the abortion, which often does not happen due to the incompetence of military policy or the antagonism of commanders.

Republican leaders of the House Rules Committee blocked both amendments. An editorial in the New York Times accused Republicans of obstructing the bill to avoid voting against providing female soldiers with basic necessary medical care (which they would have had to do in order to retain the support of extreme-right voters). This past May, the Michaud amendment was again brought to the fl oor and again blocked. After it was blocked in 2005, Congress has not voted on the Shays-Wasserman amendment. Currently, a coalition of the ACLU, the Miles Foundation, the American Medical Association, and the American Public Health Association, are urging Congress to support an addition to the 2007 National Defense Authorization Act.

A 2005 report found that the rate of sexual assault in the U.S. military had increased again by forty percent from the preceding year. When compared with a twenty-fi ve percent increase between 1999 and 2004, it is clear that the rate of sexual assault is accelerating. While the rate of claims fi led has gone up, the number of cases brought to military courts has remained constant. Anita Sanchez of the Miles Foundation estimates that of all the sexual assault claims fi led, “only two to three percent go to court, and those who are convicted only get a year in jail.”

These alarming statistics lead some critics to conclude that the military is inherently sexist. Others compare sexual assault cases with the highly publicized tortures at Abu Ghraib and argue that both are symptomatic of the same violent, sadistic military culture. Lieutenant General Sanchez, who ordered the cover-up of female soldiers’ deaths by dehydration, also approved the use of unmuzzled dogs and the practice of inserting prisoners head-fi rst into sleeping bags and tying them with electrical cord at Abu Ghraib. At least one prisoner died from the sleeping bag technique. Says Christine Hansen, “There are serious interconnections about how these two issues are related to violence, control, and subjugation.”

As an institution, the military relies on the use of violence to achieve its ends. Is it doomed to be dominated by sexual violence as well? Can women ever belong in the military without having constantly to defend their membership against those who want to reduce them to sexual objects? Thus far, the U.S. government has refused to acknowledge the seriousness of sexual assault. Offi cial inaction serves tacitly to condone the male exploitation of females, and military culture seems to be shifting slowly if at all. But even if women leave the military entirely, it will remain the face that the United States presents to the global community. Perhaps the real question is not whether it is possible to change military culture, but rather, can we afford not to?