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The “Invisible Battalion”: Women in ATO Military Operations in Ukraine

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The “Invisible Battalion”: Women in ATO Military Operations in Ukraine The “Invisible Battalion”: Women in ATO Military Operations in Ukraine Author(s): Tamara Martsenyuk, Ganna Grytsenko, Anna Kvit Source: Kyiv-Mohyla Law and Politics Journal 2 (2016): 171–187 Published by: National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy http://kmlpj.ukma.edu.ua/ The “Invisible Battalion”: Women in ATO Military Operations in Ukraine 1 Tamara Martsenyuk National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, Department of Sociology Ganna Grytsenko Independent researcher in sociology Anna Kvit Kyiv School of Economics Abstract The study bears a metaphorical title — “The Invisible Battalion” — to reflect the finding that women in the Armed Forces of Ukraine and in volunteer battalions in the ongoing conflict in the Donbas are not given equal treatment to their male colleagues; their contributions are rarely recognized. The theoretical background of this article brings us to the sociology of the military, gender in organizations, and feminist perspectives of women’s participation in the armed forces. Fieldwork to study women’s participation in the ATO (summer-autumn 2015) was conducted using 42 in-depth semi-structured interviews with women (aged 20–47) who are, or were in the ATO. Key Words: Ukraine, Anti-Terrorist Operation (ATO), the Donbas, women, armed forces, female soldiers. 1 The sociological study “Invisible Battalion”: Women’s Participation in Military Operations in the ATO (Martsenyuk, Tamara, Ganna Grytsenko, and Anna Kvit. “Invisible Battalion”: Women’s Participation in ATO Military Operations (Sociological Research). Kyiv: UWF, 2016), inspired and organized by Maria Berlinska, volunteer and Head of the Center for Air Reconnaissance. The research was made possible due to the informational and financial support provided by the ICF “Ukrainian Women’s Fund” and the UN Women’s office in Kyiv. For an earlier and longer version of this material see the report: Tamara Martsenyuk, Ganna Grytsenko, and Anna Kvit, “Invisible Battalion”: Women’s Participation in ATO Military Operations (Sociological Research). Kyiv: UWF, 2016. Project coordinator: Maria Berlinska, Head of Volunteer Organization “Air Reconnaissance Support Center.” 172 Kyiv-Mohyla Law and Politics Journal 2 (2016) 3 Introduction Recent events in Ukraine connected with the Euromaidan protests of 2013–2014 and later armed conflict in the Eastern part of the country brought changes into women’s lives and their roles both in society and their families. On the one hand, the threat of violence makes women more vulnerable towards the socio-economic situation. For example, women are the majority among IDPs (internally displaced persons) from Eastern Ukraine responsible for children, the elderly, and disabled relatives. On the other hand, during these turbulent events Ukrainian women managed to challenge traditional gender roles (as carers of others and victims of conflict) and reclaim visibility, recognition, and respect as revolutionaries and volunteers. The Euromaidan protests in Ukraine started on the night of 21 November 2013 with public protests in Independence Square in Kyiv when President Viktor Yanukovych announced a decision to turn Ukraine away from the European Union, and continued for about three months (even after the Yanukovych regime had fallen). Women actively participated in all form of activities in the protest space of the Maidan. Besides cooking, cleaning, and entertaining, women were fighting on barricades, negotiating, participating in peacekeeping, providing medical support, maintaining information support, participating in legislative work and logistics, and providing education and huge organizational support for protesters.2 When the protests turned violent, women were excluded from much of the protest zone activities.3 As a reply to this exclusion, women organized both military and non-military Women’s sotnias (or hundreds). Women made efforts to make their input into the Euromaidan more visible (especially compared to the Orange Revolution, where in memory politics “ordinary” women are almost absent as active “makers” of revolution). Later, when the so called Anti-Terrorist Operation (ATO) started women joined the front lines of the Donbas war as volunteers, journalists, medical staff, and military personnel.4 But female fighters as well as women in the Ukrainian army in general face gender discrimination, recognition, and visibility problems. “Women at War” is not a new topic in Ukrainian Studies across various disciplines; and yet, the topic is usually dominated by historical analyses of the 20th century (i. e., women’s 2 Tamara Martsenyuk, “Gender and Revolution in Ukraine: Women’s Participation in Euromaidan Protests of 2013–2014,” Perspectives on Europe 44.2 (2014): 19. 3 Olga Onuch and Tamara Martsenyuk, “Mothers and Daughters of the Maidan: Gender, Repertoires of Violence, and the Division of Labour in Ukrainian Protests,” Social, Health, and Communication Studies Journal 1.1 (2014): 95. 4 Anti-Terrorist Operation zone in the Donbas is a term often used by the media and government of Ukraine to identify territory where the war in Donbas takes place. From the beginning of March 2014, protests by pro-Russian and anti-government groups took place in the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts of Ukraine. Later these demonstrations escalated into an armed conflict between the forces of the self-declared so-called Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics (“DPR” and “LPR” respectively), and the Ukrainian government. Tamara Martsenyuk, Ganna Grytsenko, Anna Kvit. The “Invisible Battalion”: 173 Women in ATO Military Operations in Ukraine participation and role in the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, OUN-UPA). There is a gap in the academic research on Ukrainian women in the Armed Forces in post-Soviet Ukraine in general, and the post-Maidan period in particular. That is why the main aim of this article is to find out the specifics of women’s participation in the military operations in the ATO zone, revealing both possible achievements and problems of women’s integration into the military. The “Invisible Battalion” project caused changes in gender politics in the Armed Forces of Ukraine, which are also analyzed in this article. The changes themselves are not analyzed in this text due to the lack of space, though the knowledge-building aim in studying this issue definitely precedes and defines the normative-building one. Women and the Military: Background Information In most societies, the dominant tendency was that, with the exception of war heroines, women took part in combat only in exceptional circumstances.5 But visible changes have happened in the second part of the 20th — beginning of the 21st centuries. Women’s entry into the armed forces widened with the decline of the draft system and the tendency to rely on voluntary-based army forces.6 For example, a change in and expansion of women’s roles in the U. S. Army began with the end of the draft and the introduction of the All- Volunteer Army in 1973.7 The percentage of women in the army increased from approximately 2% to around 15%.8 At the same time, the institutionalization of gender politics in the armed forces occurred. For example, the NATO Committee on Gender Perspectives is one of the oldest in the NATO structure and was formally recognized by NATO’s Military Committee in July 1976.9 In 1961 senior female officers in NATO began to organize conferences on an ad hoc basis to discuss the status, organization, conditions of employment, and career possibilities for women in the armed forces of NATO member nations. In 2000 only six NATO countries had equal enlistment opportunities for women and men, whereas in 2013 all NATO members offered this opportunity, although certain positions in combat, submarine and tank units remain closed for women in several NATO countries. According to Marriët Schuurman — NATO’s Special Representative for Women, Peace and Security in the Office of the Secretary General: “Equal participation and applying a gender 5 Helena Carreiras, Gender and the Military: Women in the Armed Forces of Western Democracies (London: Routledge, 2006), 1. 6 Giuseppe Caforio ed., Handbook of the Sociology of the Military (New York: Springer Science & Business Media, 2006), 284. 7 Beverly C. Harris, Zita M. Simutis, and Melissa M. Gantz, Women in the US Army. An Annotated Bibliography, No. ARI-SR-48 (U. S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Science ALEXANDRIA VA, 2002), 1. 8 Harris et al., Women in the US Army, 1. 9 “NATO News: 40th Anniversary of the NATO Committee on Gender Perspectives,” May 31, 2016, accessed September 25, 2016, http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/news_131710.htm. 174 Kyiv-Mohyla Law and Politics Journal 2 (2016) lens to today’s security challenges” is one of the “founding principles that NATO is meant to safeguard and promote.” 10 In military sociology, discussions on women’s participation in the armed forces are based on the opportunities for women to be professional soldiers. The main dilemma in discussing gender integration is the question of what a modern army should be like. Should it be a professionally closed group, or must it also respond to social changes in society, and, in particular, to the changing role of women in society? American scholar Mady Segal singles out three groups of factors that promote women’s integration into the army: changes in the armed forces, changes in the social structure of society, and changes in culture.11 The researcher understands changes in the armed forces as the changing concept of national security, military technology,
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