US Army sex assaults akin to insider attacks in Afghanistan: US admiral

A US admiral says sexual assaults committed by American soldiers in the country’s Army are similar to insider attacks carried out by Afghan troopers against US-led soldiers in war-torn Afghanistan.
“Any form of unwanted sexual contact or sexual harassment is a different kind of insider attack that is lethal,” said Admiral James Winnefeld, vice chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, during a meeting with a women’s military group on Thursday.

“We will not allow this to go on…We have worked hard on this but not hard enough,” he added.

Washington is facing a crisis resulting from the rising number of sexual assaults in the country’s military.

On May 25, President Barack Obama said the problem would undermine trust in US military.

“Those who commit sexual assault are not only committing a crime, they threaten the trust and discipline that makes our military strong,” Obama said during the US Naval Academy graduation ceremony at the Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium in Annapolis, Maryland.

A newly-released report by the Pentagon on sexual assaults in the military indicates that unwanted sexual contact protests involving military personnel jumped to 26,000 in 2012 from 19,000 a year before. The figure shows a 37-percent increase.

The sharp increase in the number of sexual assault cases comes as the Pentagon is planning to integrate women into front-line combat roles.

According to a survey conducted in 2011, about one out of five military women said they had been the victims of sexual assault by another service member since joining the military.