In 2018, a Marine general who heads the service’s training command wrote about his concern that the “pursuit of ensuring fair and equitable opportunity” had allowed a female Marine candidate demonstrating “dangerously poor performance” to continue a key course.
“This could have resulted in a MISHAP,” Maj. Gen. Kevin Iiams, the commanding general of Marine Corps Training and Education Command, wrote in an email to other Marine Corps officers obtained by Military.com through a government records request.
The candidate was undertaking the Corps’ grueling 15-week Infantry Officer Course.
“Did we let this 2Lt go to [sic] far before ending her training?” Iiams wrote in the email.
Iiams was serving as the commander of the Corps’ training command at Quantico, Virginia, as a two-star general at the time he wrote the email. After a pair of other postings and promotion to lieutenant general, Iiams returned to the same position in 2021, a job he still holds today.
A Training Command spokesperson told Military.com that Iiams’ email was to ensure the Marine was being evaluated at the appropriate level of performance, and that she was not being pushed beyond what is appropriate for safety.
Nearly 90 pages of internal communications from Marine leadership regarding gender integration efforts at IOC obtained by Military.com highlight growing pains as the Corps adapted its infantry officer training following the opening of combat arms to…
