Women in the military
Eventually, she was banished from federal soil and was told she would receive a death sentence if she were caught on federal soil again. Those who fought in the war disguised themselves as males and went by men's aliases. It wasn't difficult for women to conceal their true identities because soldiers showered separately and were fully clothed the majority of the time. In addition, both men and women would join the army with no previous military experience, so their training was very similar and the women would not stand out.
Sophronia Smith Hunt disguised herself as a man and served at the Battle of Jenkins' Ferry. She fought alongside her first husband, who was wounded in the battle and later died.
The most common way for women to be discovered was through injury. For instance, in 1861, Mary Owens claimed to have enlisted in the Union Army disguised as the "brother" of William Evans, with whom she was in a romantic relationship. To avoid combat, Owens claimed she took the job of delivering handwritten messages to commanders on the battlefield. After her lover was killed in battle, Mary said she decided to avenge his death by fighting on the battlefield. She sustained an injury to her forehead and was sent to the hospital for treatment, where her female identity was revealed. She was discharged from the military. Those who were discovered would either be sent home or punished. Mary was supposedly warmly welcomed back into her town.
Other disguised women were uncovered by chance. Sarah Collins was a strong woman who believed she could do the job of a male soldier. Her brother, also a soldier, assisted her in disguising as a man by cutting her hair short and dressing her up in men's apparel. Her true identity was discovered due to her improperly placing her shoes. Sarah was then sent home while her brother remained fighting. 
It is difficult for historians to estimate the true number of women who fought in the war because of their disguises and aliases, as well as their desire for discretion. Women joined the fray of the Civil War for similar reasons as men: the promise of a steady wage, innate sense of patriotism, or the thrill of an adventure. Some women would even follow their loved ones into battle.
In 1917, Loretta Walsh became the first woman to enlist openly as a woman when she join the Navy. A 1948 law made women a permanent part of the military services. In 1976, the first group of women was admitted into a U.S. military academy. Approximately 16% of the 2013 West Point class consisted of women.
In 1990 and 1991, some 40,000 American military women were deployed during the Gulf War operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm; however, no women served in combat. A policy enacted in 1994 prohibited women from assignment to ground combat units below the brigade level.

Policy changes: Until 1993, 67 percent of the positions in the Army were open to women.
In 2013, 15.6 percent of the Army's 1.1 million soldiers, including National Guard And Reserve, were female, serving in 95 percent of occupations. As of 2017, 78 percent of the positions in the Army were open to women. It was only in 2015 that the Department of Defense dropped its ban on women in combat roles, and integration of women into these MOS's has been slow. In the U.S. Air Force, in 2015, 99% of career fields are open to women, with the exceptions of Special Tactics Officer, Combat Control, Special Operations Weather Technician, Combat Rescue Officer, Pararescue and Tactical Air Control Party.
In 2013, female US Army soldiers enrolled in a training course designed by Combined Joint Task Force Paladin, specifically designed for Female Engagement Team members. The course was intended to train female soldiers for tasks such as unexploded ordnance awareness, biometrics, forensics, evidence collection, tactical questioning, vehicle and personnel searches, and homemade explosive devices.
By May 2015, none of the nineteen women vying to become the first female Army Rangers had passed Ranger School. Eleven of the nineteen dropped out in the first four days. Of the remaining eight who failed in the next step, three were given the option to restart from the beginning. Two graduated in August 2015. A third graduated in October 2015.
In April 2015, the Marine Corps' Infantry Officer Course, which had been gender-integrated for two and a half years for research purposes, ended without a single female graduate. The final two participants failed the initial Combat Endurance Test.
In 2016, Secretary of Defense Ash Carter opened all military occupations to women, without exception. This opened up roughly 10% of all military jobs that had previously been closed to women, including positions in infantry, armor, reconnaissance, and some special operations units.
Women have been injured, killed, and awarded high honors. Two women received the Silver Star for their actions in combat: Sergeant Leigh Ann Hester in 2005 and Army Specialist Monica Lin Brown in 2007. Over 10,000 combat action badges were awarded to women who served in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan.
In 2022, the United States Army revised its 40-year-old fitness test – the Army Physical Fitness Test – with the new Army Combat Fitness Test. The test originally included leg tucks and was graded on an even field between age and gender. These factors lead to a low portion of female soldiers meeting adequate fitness scores, with 44% failing. The Army has since updated the exam, replacing leg tucks with a plank and grading based on a matrix that accounts for age and gender. This policy change allowed a majority of female soldiers to meet standards and set a precedent for breaking uniformity in expectations.
In February 2023, a series of new policies were published by the US Defense Department in order to support military members. Anyone who receives an abortion could travel out of state and receive three weeks of administrative leave.

Physical, social, and cultural issues: A 2015 Marine Corps study found that women in a unit created to assess female combat performance were significantly injured twice as often as men, were less accurate with infantry weapons, and were less skilled at removing wounded troops from the battlefield.
The study assessed a nine-month experiment at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, and Twentynine Palms, California. About 400 Marines, including 100 women, volunteered to participate.

Male squads, teams, and crews demonstrated better performance on 93 of 134 tasks evaluated (69 percent) than units with women in them. Male units were faster while completing tactical movements in combat situations, especially in units with large "crew-served" weapons such as heavy machine guns and mortars. Male infantry squads had better accuracy than squads with women in them, with "a notable difference between genders for every individual weapons system" used by infantry rifleman units. The M4 carbine, M27 infantry automatic rifle, and M203 single-shot grenade launcher were assessed.
Male Marines who had not received infantry training were more accurate than women who had received training. In removing wounded troops from the battlefield, "notable differences in execution times were found between all-male and gender-integrated groups".
Unit cohesion was lower in mixed-gender units. Many female soldiers reported that the way they are viewed by male soldiers is often detrimental to their participation. For instance, female soldiers are often labeled as "either standoffish or a slut". In order to avoid such labels, female soldiers have to spend time with fellow soldiers strategically, without spending too much time with any one of them. This approach often has an isolating effect. In several instances, women were considered less skilled than male soldiers, so were not given opportunities to complete tasks for which they were qualified.
According to Lieutenant Colonel Dave Grossman, author of On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society, Israeli soldiers reacted with uncontrollable protectiveness and aggression after seeing a woman wounded. Further, Islamic militants rarely, if ever, surrender to female soldiers, lessening the IDF's ability to take prisoners. Iraqi and Afghan civilians are often not intimidated by female soldiers. However, in socially conservative environments, female combat soldiers can search female civilians, and children and women are more likely to talk to female soldiers than to male soldiers.

Sexual harassment and assault: One 2009 report concluded that military women were three times more likely to be raped than civilians, and that women soldiers in Iraq were more likely to be attacked by another soldier than by an insurgent. In 1988, the first military-wide sexual harassment survey found that 64% of military women had been subjected to some form of sexual harassment. The most affected were Native Americans, followed by Hispanics and African-Americans.
U.S. Senator Martha McSally, an Arizona Republican, said during a Senate meeting on sexual assault in the military that she was raped by a superior officer in the U.S. Air Force. McSally was the first female combat pilot in the U.S. Air Force. She said that she never reported it because so many people did not trust the system, she blamed herself, was ashamed and confused, and thought she was strong but felt powerless.

Sexual assault: What it is and the process: Sexual assault is more likely to occur in the military than in the civilian population. One-in-four active-duty female military personnel will be sexually assaulted. The military has a Code of Justice which defines sexual assault, rape, aggravated assault, abusive sexual assault, nonconsensual sodomy (forced oral or anal sex), or attempts to commit these acts.