The House Subcommittee on Military Personnel last week passed a resolution that would require the military to house and train male and female recruits separately in basic training.
The language was included in the National Defense Authorization Act of 1999.
The subcommittee ignored the military's request to maintain the current system in which men and women train together and live in the same barracks.
Instead, the subcommittee followed the recommendation last December of a Defense Department panel, appointed by Secretary of Defense William Cohen and headed by former Sen. Nancy Kassebaum Baker, R-Kansas, that men and women be segregated in training.
Another panel, the Defense Advisory Committee on Women in the Services (DACOWITS) released a report in January saying more, not less, gender-integrated military training is needed.
The subcommittee's legislation (H.R. 1559) does provide each service with the authority to waive the separate facility requirement initially in certain cases. If the branch's secretary determines that a particular installation does not have sufficient facilities to implement the separate barracks requirement, that installation may be allowed to house recruits on separate floors until new facilities are available.
The legislation requires that the requirement for separate facilities be fully implemented by October 2001.
In addition, the legislation states that only male officers can command and serve as drill instructors for male units and only women can lead female units.
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