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Opinion

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JULIETTE KAYYEM

War’s glass ceiling

Pentagon moves closer to allowing women to fight

By Juliette Kayyem

 |  Globe Columnist  

  February 02, 2012

OVER 130 women have died in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and yet they were not in combat. This paradox - women fight in wars but are not assigned to fighting in wars due to the Pentagon’s exclusionary policy - is at the center of a long-simmering debate that has avoided much of the Lady Gaga-ness surrounding repeal of the military’s ban on homosexuals. But if 2011 was the year of ending the “don’t ask, don’t tell’’ prohibition, 2012 begins with hints about a significant policy transformation regarding women in combat.

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