Pete Hegseth Requires Everyone in Combat Units to Meet the Same Physical Fitness Standards

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth ordered the military services to require everyone who serves in a combat specialty to meet the same physical fitness standard. Hegseth announced the policy was on the way by a video posted on X as he returned to the US from Japan.

For far too long, we have allowed standards to slip. We’ve had different standards for men/women serving in combat arms MOS’s and jobs….

That’s not acceptable, and it changes right now! pic.twitter.com/Zn9OyBew6G
— Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth (@SecDef) March 31, 2025

Hi, everybody. Pete Hegseth here, and we're about to land in Washington, DC, on our way back from Japan, where we've been meeting with the troops, talking to allies and partners, and reestablishing deterrence in the Indo-Pacific. This Sunday, of course, we're still working, I want to show you one thing. It's a new memorandum that's coming out today on Combat Arms standards.
You see, for far too long, we have allowed standards to slip. We’ve had different standards for men and women in combat arms MOSs and jobs. That’s not acceptable. We need to have the same standards, male or female, in our combat roles to ensure our men and women who are under our leaders or in those formations have the best possible leaders and the highest possible standards that are not based at all on your sex, if you're a man or a woman.
I'm signing this memorandum today. The services will review and see that we have nothing but the highest and equal standards for men and women in combat.

This announcement was foreshadowed by Hegseth's review of military standards announced on March 13; see STRAC Is Back: SecDef Pete Hegseth Orders Review of Military Appearance, Fitness Standards – RedState.

There is only one reason this is even an issue: in 2013, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta opened ground combat positions to women. In the social Petri dish environment the Obama administration created in the military, by 2015, women were forcibly graduated from Ranger School. As I posted at the time in The Best And Perhaps Only Reason To Vote For Donald Trump – RedState:

Under Obama, the “long march” became a sprint. Senior officers who were outspoken Christians were forced into retirement. Into senior leadership slots were inserted yes-men of the worst sort. The suck-up-kick-down types who do whatever the boss tells them to do and ruthlessly punish subordinates for not falling in line. Under the current Secretary of Defense, Ashton Carter, the collapse of a warrior culture has been complete. Homosexuals were allowed to serve openly with a concomitant increase of sexual assaults on male soldiers. Women were placed aboard submarines with a predictable impact on both morale and discipline. Three women were shepherded through Ranger School for no greater reason than to debase the performance standard there in the name of equality. When the US Marine Corps did an empirical analysis of the performance of all-male versus co-ed infantry units they found the co-ed units performed at about 60% of the standard set by the all-male unit. Ashton Carter’s Pentagon pronounced it biased and disregarded it. Transgendered military persons are not given the psychological discharges they so richly merit but are allowed to serve in whatever fictitious form the wish.
The services are rife with intellectually bankrupt types at all levels who are willing to say or do whatever it takes to get their heads patted by the command structure. In short, under Obama the US military has been transformed from one that demonstrated it could do anything anywhere to a cultural cesspool where megalomaniacs and sexual deviants rule the roost surrounded by battalions of sychophants panting to carry out their orders.

BACKGROUND:

Last women wash out of Ranger School – RedState

Women In Ranger School, The Politicization Of Our Military – RedState

Social Justice Warriors corrupt military training – RedState

Marines: Male units perform better. Sec Navy: What's a few dead Marines – RedState

Women In Combat: Making A Virtue Of Weakness Gets People Killed

Here is why this matters. Every time a gender-neutral physical fitness test is rolled out, it has two results: Most men aren't challenged, and most women can't pass. As a result, tests that were gender-neutral now have gender norms. For instance, when the Army Combat Fitness Test was premiered, it had three bands matched to occupational requirements. The failure rate among women soldiers was so high that Congress got involved to find out why and to insist that the "plank" be substituted for the "leg tuck" that has a 72% failure rate with women.

It was quickly gender-normed. In the two-mile run event, the minimum passing time for a man is 22:00, and A time of 13:22 gets a maximum score. For women, the times are 23:22 and 15:29, respectively. On one of the tests of upper body strength, the "Standing Power Throw," a man's maximum/minimum distances are 12.6 meters and 6 meters. The standard for a woman is 8.4 meters for a maximum score and 3.9 meters to pass.

In his memo, Hegseth makes it clear that whatever test the services come up with cannot be gender-normed, and, more importantly, it cannot grandfather (grandmother?) in people who are already in combat roles. He underlines the latter requirement in his trademark Sharpie to emphasize the point.

All entry-level and sustained physical fitness requirements within combat arms positions must be sex-neutral, based solely on the operational demands of the occupation and the readiness needed to confront any adversary. In establishing those standards, the Secretaries of the Military Departments may not establish standards that would result in any existing Service member being held to a lower standard.

While I applaud what Hegseth is trying to do, I'm deeply ambivalent about how this plays out. The elegant solution would be for Hegseth to rescind Panetta's memo and bar women from direct combat roles. At that point, the problem would fix itself because allowing women into ground combat units causes this entire crisis. It would also create hundreds of new jobs to powerwash the skull fragments and brain matter from the walls of Congress.

I wish him luck, but by the time this is massaged by the services and Congress applies pressure, I predict we will see the physical standards for combat units lowered to ensure a physical fitness test does not keep women out.

READ THE MEMO

Combat Arms Standards by streiff on Scribd

Few things are harder than turning around a failing but complacent and self-satisfied organization. That is the challenge facing Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. The military services have been hollowed out through DEI and dysfunctional leadership. Standards of appearance, performance, and physical fitness have eroded. Follow RedState for some of the most informed coverage on his efforts to recreate a force in crisis. Join RedState VIP and help continue that coverage. Use promo code FIGHT to get 60% off your membership.