1. History of
Military Sexual Trauma
& Sexualized Warfare
Kristen Zaleski, PhD, LCSW
Clinical Assistant Professor
University of Southern California
School of Social Work
May 29, 2014

2. Military
Sexual
Trauma

3. — “Sexual Misconduct Case Ends With No Jail
Time for General” (NY Times, March 2014)
— “Battle for Benefits: VA Discrimination Against
Survivors of MST”- (ACLU, 2013)
— “Yet Another Military Sex Scandal” - (Time,
July 2012)
— “Daughters and moms now consider rape
before applying to military” (CNN, June 2013)

4. — 750 BC The Roman
Empire “found wives”
by capturing and
raping Sabine women.
— The Greek poem
“The Illiad” details
the Trojan War that
started after Helen was
kidnapped because
of the sexual desire
of Paris, the prince of
Troy
— (Homer, trans.1998)

5. — World War I
— Rape and
Brutalization
of Belgian
women by
German soliders
(Brownmiller, 1975)

6. — World War II
— Rape of Nanking- mass
murder and mass rape
by Japanese soldiers in
a six week period that
took place in the Chinese
capital city of Nanking
— “Comfort Women”- mostly
Korean kidnapping
victims who were forced
to work in brothels
(average 10 men per
day) for the Japanese

7. — 1945- Soviet forces
entered Berlin and
raped between 100,000
(some estimates
1 million) German
women in a few weeks
time(Grossmann, 1995).

8. — Terror and Territory
— Ethnic cleansing
— Fistulas in Democratic Republic of Congo
— Bosnian wars- rape camps.
— Pregnancy and war related rape are interconnected
— Domination of the dominant army
— Murderous rage and libidinal energy are inter-
connected (Freud)
— Not about sex– it’s about power
— Masculinity is valued in war– femininity is equated with
“weakness”. Thus, to be masculine is to dominate the
feminine.

10. — Vietnam War (1968)
— US servicemen massacred hundreds of unarmed
Vietnamese in small town of My Lai, raping and
sexually brutalizing dozens of women and children
(Neill, 2000)
— Tailhook Scandal (US Air Force, 1991)
— 100 US Navy and Marine aviation officers accused of
sexually assaulting at least 83 women and 7 men at
the Las Vegas Hilton during a conference retreat.

11. American men
and women
soldiers sexually
harassed,
sodomized with
objects, and
sexually posed
detainees.

12. — Jane Harman (2008) wrote in an LA Times op-ed that
“women serving in the U.S. military
are more likely to be raped by a
fellow soldier than killed by enemy
fire in Iraq”.

13. — Can we filter out predators?
— Sexual felony vs. misdemeanor for new recruits
— Sexualized age group (rates of college aged victims are the
same as military)
— Military instills power and domination in its training
— “Thingification” vs. empathy
— Social Construction
— Co-ed dormitory (barracks)?
— ‘Booty Duty’
— Sexual education and sexual boundaries taught as curriculum
in military training?
— How can we de-stigmatize being “weak” and reporting a
sexual trauma when they are being trained to be fighers?

15. Civilian Sexual
Assault
(CDC.gov)
1 in 5 women (1
in 71 men) report
rape in life span
73% by a Non-
stranger
37.4% of female
rape victims
assaulted
between age 18-
24
Rape results
in 32,000
pregnancies each
year
Military Sexual
Trauma (MST)
- 1 in 4 female
veterans (1 in 100
male) report MST
to VA provider
(Department of
Veterans Affairs;
2014).
- Estimates are 9.5%-
33% of women
report attempted
or completed rape
while in the military
(Turchick & Johnson,
2010)
97% of victims of MST
knew their assailants.
84% of attacks involve
a service member
perpetrator.
(Street & Stafford,
2002; Farris, Schell &
Tanielian, 2013)
About one half of
the men and women
in the military are
between 17 and 24
years of age. 70% are
under age 30.
(Department of
Defense, 2007)
Military women are
within child bearing
age, therefore
pregnancy rates
are much higher for
unintended pregnancy
in general and rape
specifically.
(No official
documentation of
numbers is kept at this
time).

16. — No access to medical care without permission
— Reporting process lacks confidentiality and
transparency(more on this in the next slide)
— May not have access to prophylaxis
(pregnancy)
— Stranger assault still has a betrayal sense to it
because of the nature of military family
— Cannot miss work
— Cannot move homes
— Cannot visit family/call friends
— Receiving psychological support is limited

17. — According to the DOD only 8 percent of sexual
assailants are referred to the military court,
compared to 40 percent of offenders in civilian
courts.
— New recruits can ask to have their civilian sexual
crimes waved to become a new soldier
— The military does not have a sex offender registry to
alert services members, unit commanders or military
families of these perpetrators.
— Some convicted assailants are allowed to resign
from the military rather than face jail time or other
punishment.

18. — Kristen Zaleski, PhD, LCSW
Clinical Assistant Professor
University of Southern California
School of Social Work
Kristen.Zaleski@usc.edu
***Expected Spring 2015***
“Understanding and Treating Military Sexual Trauma”
published by Springer Publications. Please e-mail if you
would be interested to know when the book is published.