trapdoor:

Saletan places a lot of emphasis on assymetrical conflicts, but the fact remains that an Army unit can move only as fast as its slowest member, and can carry on average, much less combat materiel if it doesn't have a similar strength ability among all its members. No one is saying that women shouldn't be armed -- but can they be as effective on patrol as their male counterparts? Obviously not. They can't carry as much weight or move as fast.

The question is not whether women on average can be as effective on patrol as men on average. Of course they can't, on average, assuming that combat effectiveness is primarily derived from soldiers' physical strength (a big if, I think). The question is whether individual women (not average women) have enough physical strength for the unit to achieve a certain level of combat effectiveness. The combat effectiveness of a unit is not just a linear function of the number of pushups you can do. Let me ask you this: if, by accepting women into combat units I could field two mixed-sex units instead of one all-male unit, and the presence of women in those units made them each 10% less effective than an all-male unit, have I increased or decreased my fighting strength? That leaves aside the question of exactly how much physical strength contributes to combat effectiveness and whether women possess other attributes that enhance combat effectiveness rather than detract from it.