There is a certain kind of sailor you'll meet in the seagoing services; the saying goes there's one on every ship. His boast is that he can find a way around any rule or regulation in the UCMJ, which he does mostly by twisting key words and phrases back around on themselves till they seem to oppose the moral principles they refer to. We call him the sea lawyer. And from some of the discussion at this site attempting to justify incidents of sexual abuse of female cadets at USAFA, which came to public attention early this year, on the basis of the meaning of the Academy's motto, the Air Force has its share of barracks lawyers, too. The gist of their argument seems to be that since there's a sign on campus that says "Bring Me Men," that must mean that women are not wanted in the corps of cadets, and if they bull their way in where they don't belong, well then they deserve what they get if they come to harm, they asked for it.

Okay, now let's get real. You and I all know that that motto went up on the ramp long before the notion of opening the Academy to women was even a glimmer in a Congressman's eye. And even back then, in the "good old days," that sign never did mean "Bring me only grown male humans." Like all mottoes, the purpose of this one is to convey a profound message in just a few words, but ones that are heavily loaded with meaning. Of the three words that make up this motto, "men" is certainly the one that packs pretty much all of the meaning. Your barracks lawyers are right about that. But what we are really talking about here is someone whose character is capable of accepting, and, what is more, committing him to acting on the core values of the Air Force. That kind of men, as the Colonel I work for points out, "respect human life, and, as officers in training, should aspire to protect those they lead. The so-called men that raped these women failed on both of these accounts, and therefore are not men. They are children playing where they don't belong with what they should never be trusted with, the respect of their peers and the loyalty of their followers. These children posing as men disgraced themselves and all the real men [and women] at the Academy, and have therefore lost their right to call themselves men." Harsh words. But fair judgment on moral weaklings who lack the necessary strength of character to function as cadets.

For those of you who go on to be commissioned out of USAFA, the Academy will someday be your Alma Mater, literally the mother of your grown-up soul, the full-grown version of the character you brought to the Academy, developed there as a cadet, and will consult daily throughout your career as an officer. So what the Academy really means by "Bring Me Men" is "Give me good officer material -- stand-up, do-right young people -- to work with. Creeps, bullies, and moral cowards need not apply, I can't use them. Because my mission is to turn out not just a force for the security of America but bearers of the honor of the Air Force and keepers of the public trust. And for that they're going to have to be morally as well as physically courageous, even in the most stressful situations that combat can throw at them."

That kind of guts isn't determined by a y chromosome.

But let's just for the moment talk about courage in the more ordinary sense of the word. If you're considering applying to the Academy, you've probably heard stories about the hassle and general all around hard time you can expect to be given by upperclassmen and cadre. They seem intent on weeding you out, and you are wondering how you're going to make it through that first year as a lowly Dooley if you're selected. Now double that general 4th class hassle and add nasty personal comments, dirty tricks meant to show you up as incompetent, silencing meant to freeze you out of the daily social life of your peers, and passive aggressive behavior meant to show you up as lacking in leadership skills. This is what some of the female veterans of all our Services I interviewed for the Library of Congress this summer told me they went through in the first mixed classes at the Academies and their early military careers.

What the first female cadets at the Citadel went through only a few years ago was, if anything, even worse. Well, you may say, the new guy always gets ragged, way it goes. It wasn't all that long ago that a certain black cadet by the name of Benjamin O. Davis was left to eat alone, exercise alone, ride alone, and so on, throughout his years at West Point. He not only made it through to commissioning despite his silencing, but rose to become a general officer.

The first lone female cadet at the Citadel left after less than a year, but 2 out 4 in the next class of females toughed it out to be commissioned (that's going from 0 to 50% success in just 5 years). You have to respect that kind of fortitude in the face of adversity.

For women contemplating entering a male dominated career like the military there's an extra level of difficulty they're going to have to factor into the cost of their training and early careers. It means that, realistically, they can expect harsher, more personal and more persistent "rookies' harassment" than their male peers are normally subjected to. Sometimes it doesn't even stop at that point: Gen. Claudia Kennedy was sexually harassed by a fellow Army general shortly before she retired. But are you really trying to tell me that you're OK with sexual abuse being an accepted part of the cost of an Academy education and a career in the Air Force? If you think you might be, would you be OK with it across the board for men as well as women? And if you think that's so far-fetched, think again.

You may have heard that during the first Gulf War the Air Academy was so concerned about what it considered the strong likelihood of sexual assault against any of its graduates who were captured by the Iraqis that it instituted special survival training sessions for cadets specifically meant to steel them to the possibility. The fear was that undisciplined fighters, steeped in a culture in which women of "good" family are for the most part kept veiled and cloistered in the home, would look on unveiled American military women working side by side with their male counterparts in a war zone as fair game for sexual abuse. We've all heard the lurid stories about the late, unlamented Uday Hussein, whose violent ways with women gave the phrase "love hurts" whole new depths of meaning. As it turned out, there were such incidents (see, for example, Capt. Rhonda Cornum's account of her captivity in Iraq). What you may not have heard about the Air Academy's POW rape survival course was that it wasn't just the female cadets the Academy put through that program. The program itself was discontinued after the news broke that cadets of both sexes had made complaints that some training scenarios had become too "realistic," and that's a whole other story. But my point in telling you about it is that the Air Force wasn't kidding itself about what male POWs should fear from an enemy so lacking in honor it would allow women soldiers who fell into its custody to be sexually assaulted, in direct opposition to International Law of War and all that's morally decent

To return to the more recent incidents at the Air Academy, some of you devils' advocates out there have been wondering whether the women involved might not share just the least little bit of responsibility for what happened to them. After all, isn't good judgment a part of any officer's fitness for command. What kind of judgment does it show when a woman goes poking around alone in places where it really isn't safe for her to be? Now, I may be mistaken, but what I hear lurking under the surface of questions like this one is the fear that some female cadet with an ax to grind might try to get even with a male cadet by accusing him of sexual assault. This is for sure a very serious situation to find yourself in. Rape is a felony. It's not only a one-way ticket out of the Academy and the Air Force, but into prison.

I wish I could tell you that women are just too high-minded and fair to ever make such unfounded charges. But I can tell you that because of the deep humiliation involved and the fear that reporting their attacks up the chain of command might reflect badly on themselves or only get them more hassle from their male peers, estimates are that many fewer women actually bring charges than have just cause to do so. They are more likely to try to tough it out in silence for the sake of the Academy and their careers. That's a dark and lonely road to walk, and any woman who takes it is likely to end up processing out, robbed not only of her human dignity but her dreams of becoming a military officer as well.

As for the implication that these women deserved to be raped because they were in the wrong place: no matter what your barracks lawyers are saying you need to know that in a court of law neither where a woman went, nor what she wore there, nor whether you thought she was flirting with you is going to count for much as a defense if she said "no." That's the law of this land, and the law of its military.

Now, I'm not saying I think it's a smart idea for cadets of either sex to go diddy-bopping through the rougher parts of town after midnight on liberty. There are good reasons certain places are off-limits. But the sad fact is that the incidents we are talking about occurred on the grounds of a US military reservation, where Congress (the duly-elected representatives of the people all military personnel -- including cadets -- are ultimately responsible to) says women have every right to be. I don't expect -- or particularly want -- to see anything like the co-ed shower scene in "Starship Troopers" in your barracks anytime soon. But there really shouldn't be any places on those grounds that a female service member or cadet might shouldn't go (including the men's latrines) because she'd be in danger of bodily harm from her male counterparts. Embarrassment, maybe, but not bodily harm. An accident or other emergency may even require her to enter in order to aid a fellow cadet. Or, as on the Coast Guard training ship Eagle, the men's head may simply be where the only laundry facilities in officers' country happen to be located.

Being such a small minority, the simple fact is that female cadets are often going to find themselves studying or on a mission where they are going to have to be alone with fellow cadets or officers who will be male. We don't confine our female officers to command of all-female units these days any more than we limit our black officers to command of all-black units. Even if we still thought such a discriminatory practice was right, the Air Force cannot waste time and talent trying to match the sex and ethnicity of its officers to the troops they will command. The bottom line today is that the Air Force expects you will behave like men ("stand-up, do-right young people" remember?) and give its female officers the same cooperation and respect you'd give any officer of that rank. They have their mission, missions that are constantly expanding into the combat arena. Those female cadets may someday be your wing men on a bombing run over Iraq. They may have good reason to fear sexual assault at the hands of a dishonorable enemy if they are downed and captured.

The question is, should your sisters-in-arms also have anything to fear from you?