Carter: Opening Combat Jobs to Women 'Makes Sense' | Military.com: As questions swirl over whether President-elect Donald Trump will seek to roll back recent social changes in the military, the outgoing defense secretary said the push to open more combat jobs to women "makes sense."
Speaking to reporters traveling with him to military installations around the U.S., Ashton Carter said of the Obama administration's rule change to let more women serve in combat roles, "It makes sense."
The secretary said, "Females are half of our population. We're an all-volunteer force. So we recruit from the population it makes sense for us to recruit people, from as wide a population as possible."
Carter added, "Now they have to be qualified, but it's a benefit to our military to be able to draw from what is a competitive [market] … to have the ability to have access to the best people we can."
Trump is facing calls from some conservatives to undo the women-in-combat provisions, which affects a large portion of the military -- hundreds of thousands of troops -- serving in combat-related military occupational specialties.
