>>Having written that I also know that hiking with gear on and climbing rocks and hills for 72 hours straight is one thing. It requires endurance and healthy lungs. Keep in mind that all of this is done during a period of 72 hours with no sleep. NONE. Then you may get a couple of hours sleep and just when you start to feel the ache, you are up and going again. 72 hours feels like 3 weeks. You eat when you can and every meal is packed with calories and carbs which you burn up in the first 30 minutes. If I had to climb a shear 10' wall and pull myself over, I couldn't do it without a boost or a pull from someone else. When you need to do those things you are already running on empty. No matter how many pushups and pullups I did, my upper body strength would never suffice. That feat is often a necessity of infantry soldiers in urban warfare.
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>Thanks for shedding light on this for those who have never encountered it. Women do better at some tasks than men and vice-a-versa. Being a special forces officer is "man" work. Women can fly planes as well as men, work with computers, or many other tasks, but not things that require that upper body strength you speak of. I have worked with female detectives who were as good as any man (except me of course<vbg>).

As I understand it, women have better reactions and would make better fighter pilots than men, if only they could pull the necessary Gs that men can 0- shame really. OTOH I don't see why a woman couldn't operate a tank, or howitzer, etc. any worse than a man.