Should women be in combat?

Women weren’t allowed to officially serve in direct ground combat jobs when Emelie Vanasse started her ROTC program at George Washington University. Instead, she studied biology — but it still bothered Vanasse to be shut out of something just because she was a woman.

“I always felt like, who really has the audacity to tell me that I can’t be in combat arms? I’m resilient, I am tough, I can make decisions in stressful environments,” Vanasse said.

By 2015, the Obama administration opened all combat jobs to women, despite a plea from senior leaders in the Marine Corps to keep certain frontline units male only. Then-Defense Secretary Ash Carter told reporters that, “We cannot afford to cut ourselves off from half the country’s talents and skills.”

The policy change meant that women could be