"someone else's daughter die than their son"

U.S. military's forgotten women

Lieutenant Emily Perez, 23, a West Point graduate who outran many men, directed a gospel choir and read the Bible every day, was at the head of a weekly convoy as it rolled down roads pocked with bombs and bullets near Najaf, Iraq. As platoon leader, she insisted on leading her troops from the front.

Two weeks ago, one of those bombs tripped her up, detonating near her Humvee in Kifl, south of Baghdad. She died Sept. 12, the 64th woman from the U.S. military to be killed in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Eight died in Vietnam.

"The public doesn't seem concerned they are dying," said Charles Moskos, a military sociologist at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, who has closely studied national service. "They would rather have someone else's daughter die than their son."

Continue..Lizette Alvarez The New York Times