WASHINGTON: US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has disbanded a committee that provided recommendations for women serving in the military, including on their well-being and treatment, alleging on Tuesday it had pursued a “divisive feminist agenda.”
The Defense Advisory Committee on Women in the Services was created in 1951 and provided advice on “recruitment, retention, employment, integration, well-being, and treatment of women” in the military, according to the committee’s website.
On Tuesday, a Pentagon spokesperson said Hegseth had decided to terminate the committee because it is “focused on advancing a divisive feminist agenda that hurts combat readiness, while Secretary Hegseth has focused on advancing uniform, sex-neutral standards across the Department.”
The Committee is among the oldest advisory panels within the US military and has submitted over 1,100 recommendations to Pentagon chiefs, with about 94 percent either fully or partially adopted, according to the committee’s website.
“Recommendations have historically been instrumental in effecting changes to laws and policies pertaining to military women,” it says.
