Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has directed all U.S. military branches to adopt gender-neutral fitness standards for combat roles, signaling a significant shift in how the Department of Defense (DoD) measures combat readiness and physical capability across the force.
In a memo issued Monday, Hegseth ordered the services to submit formal assessments of their current physical fitness standards within 60 days and to identify which of those standards should apply universally to men and women in combat-designated roles.
“We weaken our military when we turn away patriots who are fully capable of performing the requirements of a military occupational specialty,” Hegseth wrote. “That means our standards must be operational, not political — rooted in the needs of the warfighter, not in the comfort of the committee.”
Key Points of the Directive:
- Date Issued: April 1, 2025
- Compliance Deadline: Services must submit implementation assessments within 60 days, with interim updates due in 30 days.
- Scope: All combat roles across all branches; non-combat positions may retain distinct standards.
- Policy Goal: Establish “operationally relevant, sex-neutral standards” aligned with real-world military requirements.
Background: Longstanding Debate Over Fitness Equality
The new policy seeks to end years of back-and-forth over gender-normed scoring in military physical assessments, particularly following the 2015 decision to open all military combat positions to women.
The Army’s rollout of the Army Combat Fitness Test (ACFT) in 2020 originally applied a gender-neutral scoring system but later adopted sex-based percentile adjustments after early data showed disproportionately high failure rates among female soldiers. Critics, including Hegseth, have argued that these adjustments compromise the combat readiness of mixed-gender units.
“No one wins when we play games with the truth,” Hegseth stated in a recent interview. “The battlefield doesn’t care what gender you are. The standard is the standard.”
The policy is a necessary step toward fairness and operational realism. The directive itself specifies that any standard set must be directly linked to the physical demands of the job, not to general fitness or average population benchmarks.
What Happens Next?
Each service is expected to review its fitness standards and determine which are valid predictors of job performance in combat environments. These standards must be “sex-neutral,” meaning they apply equally to all service members in a given combat role, regardless of gender.
The Department of Defense will review all submissions in the summer, and follow-up policies will be issued thereafter. While the directive doesn’t set a final date for full implementation, officials indicate it will likely go into effect before the end of FY2025.
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