Last week, the U.S. Army announced new fitness standards in line with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s orders to make the standards for women and men in combat roles the same. Like much of Hegseth’s past decision-making, the new standards show a lack of forethought.
In previous interviews and in his most recent book, Hegseth has suggested that women shouldn’t serve in combat roles and that military standards were lowered in order for women to get into these jobs. He walked back some of those comments during his confirmation hearing. “Yes, women will have access to ground combat roles, given the standards remain high. And we will have a review to ensure the standards have not been eroded,” he said in January. Given the underlying assumption that women are in those roles because of lower standards, it’s reasonable to question whether the new Army combat fitness standards are designed to limit women’s participation.
Like much of Hegseth’s past decision-making, the new standards show a lack of forethought.
To understand the potential impacts of the new policy, it’s important to consider the new physical fitness test requirements. The test now consists of five consecutive events: deadlift, hand-release push-ups, sprint-drag-carry, plank and a 2-mile run. Most soldiers pass the physical fitness test. But combat standards are tougher; to pass, soldiers have to get a higher score in each event. Each event is scored up to 100, with 60 being the lowest possible passing score. For example, soldiers will need to run 2 miles in 22 minutes to get a score of 60 on that event. Yet, combat troops need a minimum overall score of 350, which they could hit by doing exceedingly well at one or two events or by scoring 70 points on each test.
Despite early testing of gender-neutral combat fitness standards showing lower pass rates for women than men, more women are likely to pass the test with training. Will Hegseth accept that these women are fit for duty?
The Army has branded the new fitness test as an effort to “strengthen readiness and lethality.” But that denies the success women have achieved since the ground combat exclusion policy was lifted more than a decade ago, which allowed women to serve in ground combat units. Women have already proven themselves in combat roles under the existing standards. Even before they were allowed into direct ground combat roles, women served in combat and earned awards for valor.
Since the ground combat exclusion policy was lifted, more than 150 women have graduated from Army Ranger School. Female officers in the Army and the Marine Corps have completed infantry officer courses and gone on to lead combat platoons. And thousands of women have served or are serving in combat roles that were previously male-only roles.
If the goal is really military readiness, then this new physical fitness test ain’t it. Peer reviewed research has found scant evidence that traditional military physical training — aimed at improving performance on the physical fitness test — improves combat readiness. The current fitness testing is focused on brute strength and misses key elements that could contribute to job performance and lower the risk of injury, such as flexibility and endurance, according to a 2022 study published in Military Medicine. The assumption that the new fitness test will improve readiness is not supported by the research.
The new standards fail to recognize that women would likely perform better than men in events aimed at gauging flexibility and endurance.
The new standards fail to recognize that women would likely perform better than men in events aimed at gauging flexibility and endurance, both identified as ways to contribute to combat readiness. Some studies have found women have more slow-twitch muscles, which use energy more slowly and are more resistant to fatigue. You can see this play out in more endurance-based athletic events. As running distances increase, for example, the gender gap shrinks. In fact, female runners are faster at distances of more than 195 miles. The current Army fitness testing is biased to men, to the detriment of all genders.
If the new standards are truly about accountability and performance, then they should apply evenly. But that’s not what we’re seeing — not in the test and not in the leadership behind it.
While women are being forced to “prove” their place in combat, the man pushing for stricter standards has himself evaded consequences for actions that would land a service member in jail. For example, if a female soldier (or a male soldier for that matter) leaked classified information in a Signal chat, then she’d be court-martialed. But when Hegseth did it, the system looked the other way.
The real double standard isn’t in who can run 2 miles the fastest — it’s in whom the system chooses to hold accountable.
Sara Sneath
Sara Sneath is a climate reporter investigating the fossil fuel industry’s influence on universities, public narratives and policies as a journalist-in-residence with the University of Miami's Climate Accountability Lab. She served in the U.S. Marine Corps and used her post-9/11 GI Bill to pay for college, where she earned a B.S. in journalism and a B.A. in sociology. She writes about communities on the frontlines of climate change, offshore drilling and oil and gas industry disinformation.