Army: Reports that women were given special treatment at Ranger School are 'pure fiction'

The U.S. Army calls allegations in a recent magazine article that two women were given special treatment to graduate from Ranger School “pure fiction,” according to a news release late Friday from the Pentagon.

A People Magazine article quoted unnamed sources making allegations that women were pushed through the course. Capt. Kristen Griest and 1st Lt. Shaye Haver became the first women to graduate from the Army’s toughest combat leadership program on Aug. 21. A third woman is still in the course and starts the final phase in Florida for a second time this weekend.

According to the People article: “‘A woman will graduate Ranger School,’ a general told shocked subordinates this year while preparing for the first females to attend a ‘gender integrated assessment’ of the grueling combat leadership course starting April 20, sources tell People. ‘At least one will get through.’”

People quotes an unnamed Ranger instructor as saying, “We were under huge pressure to comply. It was very much politicized.” In a release sent late Friday, Brig. Gen. Malcolm B. Frost, Chief of Public Affairs for the U.S. Army, called into question the article and reporter, Susan Keating.

“The latest attack on the integrity of the United States Army by People magazine’s Susan Keating is more than inaccurate, it is pure fiction,” Frost wrote. “Ms. Keating continues to question the tremendous achievement of the first two women to pass the Army’s elite Ranger School. In her latest article, she makes a number of very serious allegations, which are flat out wrong.”

The most serious of the claims in the article is that women were allowed to repeat a Ranger training class until they passed, while men were held to a strict pass/fail standard.

“That is false,” Frost wrote.

The article states that a two-star general made personal appearances to cheer them along during one of the most challenging parts of the school. Maj. Gen. Scott Miller, commander of the Maneuver Center of Excellence at Fort Benning and ultimately over the Airborne and Ranger Training Brigade which operates Ranger School, did visit Camp Merrill in the north Georgia mountains and Camp Rudder in the Florida swamps while the women were in the class.

“Yes, Maj. Gen. Miller did personally observe this Ranger course — as he has every Ranger course since assuming command,” Frost said. “That’s his job; but while he may view or even participate in training events, he has never graded or influenced the grade of a Ranger patrol.”

The People Magazine article comes as an Oklahoma congressman is questioning the process that produced the first two women Ranger School graduates. People was the first to report that Rep. Steve Russell, R-Okla., had sent a letter to McHugh. Russell is on the House Armed Services Committee.

Russell, a Ranger-qualified retired Army lieutenant colonel with combat tours to Iraq and Afghanistan, sent a letter to Secretary of the Army John McHugh on Sept. 15, requesting patrol grade sheets, spot reports, phase evaluation reports and sick call reports, all “with Ranger Instructors’ comments for each and every phase to include every recycled phase and class.”

Russell also requested peer evaluations and “a complete breakdown of each female candidate’s recycle history and dates for each phase.”

“We asked for the records to make sure that all of the people who passed the course deserved to pass it,” Russell’s Communication Director Daniel Susskind said earlier this week.

The secretary has received the request and the Army leadership will respond appropriately, said Army spokesman Wayne Hall.

Throughout the entire process, Army officials — including Miller, commander of the Maneuver Center of Excellence at Fort Benning; Col. David G. Fivecoat, commander of the Airborne and Ranger Training Brigade; and Command Sgt. Maj. Curtis Arnold of the Airborne and Ranger Training Brigade — have maintained the standards were not lowered.

Russell was part of a congressional delegation that visited Ranger School in April shortly after the women began the course. His office has declined to answer questions about that visit.

Congressman Steve Russell's request to Secretary of the Army

This story was originally published September 26, 2015 at 10:38 AM with the headline "Army: Reports that women were given special treatment at Ranger School are 'pure fiction'."