MINMINMINIMIZING Women’s roles in war

I was reading a quote that went something like “Women have been a part of wars since the beginning of time”. This got me thinking. <br><br>When, if ever, did a war happen solely because of a woman? What war broke out that a man went out and died for a woman’s cause? When did a man die for a woman on the battlefield, to protect her or fight for her? <br><br>Usually, it’s the other way around. Women fought for a man’s cause. Women fought and died, suffered, sacrificed for a man’s war. Both men and women are responsible for engaging in wars. But let’s not pretend women have been solely responsible for wars. That just isn’t the truth. <br><br>Look at Cleopatra. She fought for power, yes, but the reason she fought was to protect Egypt’s men and women and culture. She allied herself with men and was willing to marry a man to have Egypt win. When she saw things were lost, she killed herself. But she didn’t wage war over petty squabbles. She fought hard for her land and her people. At any rate, Cleopatra wasn’t a leader of the armed forces, she had generals and strategists do that. She didn’t lead the battles much herself. <br><br>Napoleons second wife, Marie-Louise of Austria, was the cause of the war between France and Prussia. However, that war was also due to France’s disputes and struggles with Prussia, and Spain, and Russia. This war wasn’t solely on some woman that Napoleon married. He wanted her to give him an heir, and the child was illigitimate. (Yet Napoleon still married her?) and he put their child on the throne. <br><br>Marie-Antoinette was blamed for the French Revolution because she cared about Austria. She convinced her husband to go to war with Austria in order to gain more territory for France. She had power to a degree, but again, the French Revolution was many causes. It was her fault in that she helped convince Louis XVI to throw France into war with Austria, and she was Austrian herself, making it look like she was calling for war for Austria, not France. <br><br>I think a good example might be the Iran-Iraq war. Saddam Hussein had the Iraqis fighting for him, and the Ayatollah was leading the Iranians to fight against the Iraqis. In the middle of all this, two women, one Saddam’s half-sister Sajida Talfah, and Ayatollah’s wife, Batoul Asadpour. Both women convinced the men to wage war against each other, and the war went on for eight years killing thousands of people. <br><br>It seems, if we go on a Wiki list of female war criminals, women have committed atrocities during war, and that women were responsible for people being killed. However, these women were not in top command, and held leadership roles, but they weren’t calling the shots, men were, and following commands from above. <br><br>More often, it was men that were the ones that called for the shots, called for the wars to start, and called for men to go out and die for them. Women played roles, but their roles were not that of sovereignty. Women didn’t lead men into battle and die for their causes. When women fought, they were fighting for a man’s cause, a nation’s cause, a family cause, not just their own. Not just to satisfy their desires or fulfill their own egos. <br><br>I think there should be a serious reevaluation of history when it comes to women’s participation in war, and their role in it. Women didn’t lead men into war and call for bloodshed, and it wasn’t for silly reasons. They don’t have the same level of ego as men, they don’t have the same level of idiosyncrasy. <br><br>Men should be more responsible and aware of their own nature, and not so quick to lay blame on women.