March 11, 2010  Print Email | Sexist Spaniards call for female defence minister to go
A woman can't look after soldiers claim
Posted by Nick Farrell at 09:20 AM GMT on Mar 24, 2009 | A REFORMING woman defence minister in Spain, who turned the military from a joke to a valued institution, is being told to quit because leading Spainish ministers don't think a girl should be in charge.
 Rivals of Spanish Defence minister, Carme Chacón jumped when she made a diplomatic gaff announcing that the country would withdraw from Kosovo without telling the rest of Nato.
While Madrid swiftly back-pedalled yesterday, saying the timetable for withdrawal was flexible but it was dramatic climb down.
The local press smelling blood, claimed she was incompetent. El Mundo said that her appointment had been frivolous and she was putting image before substance. Apparently the press don't like her photo opportunities without allowing questions, and her wearing a trouser suit to a military gala. Spainish Ministers are not supposed to wear trousers apparently.
El Pais found her action "incomprehensible ... deepening the vision of Spain as an unpredictable international ally who responds only to the stimuli of domestic policy".
The gaff seems to indicate that Chacón was doing her job properly, which required one of the toughest people to do.
The Spanish army, once the role model for the world, was at its lowest ebb since the Napoleonic Wars. When Chacón took charge she purged top generals and reformed the whole lot and now it is respectable. She famously inspected troops while pregnant, something that indicated that women were now at last being taken seriously in Spanish politics and society.
However the qualities that led Chacón to sort out the military are exactly those which have been winding up her cabinet colleagues. In the interests of protecting the military by getting them out of a conflict which is over she has upset the Americans. It seems that sexism is the tool which will be used to lever her out.
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