In a combat situation, you want the person next to you - the one who has your back - to be in top physical shape. Your safety, your very life, may depend on that person's ability to perform under fire. So we have to wonder why the U.S. Marine Corps has delayed a new female combat physical fitness plan because half of them failed. Part of the plan requires women seeking combat roles to do three pullups - half couldn't. It's not an arbitrary figure established by male officers bent on keeping women out of combat roles. On the contrary, the Marines have a long history of demanding the best from members of its ranks. That has always included strength as well as top physical conditioning, because lives depend on it/Murf Raquet, Moscow-Pullman Daily News. More here.

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