Officials: Panetta opens combat roles to women

The groundbreaking decision overturns a 1994 rule banning women from such roles.

(Photo: H. Darr Beiser, USA TODAY)

WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has lifted the military's ban on women serving in combat, a move that will allow women into hundreds of thousands of front-line positions and potentially elite commando units, a senior Pentagon official said Wednesday.

The move would open hundreds of thousands of military positions to women, said the official who spoke anonymously because Panetta had not yet made the announcement. Panetta and Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of      Staff, are scheduled to announce the policy change Thursday.

Read more at http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/01/23/panetta-women-combat-pentagon/1859221/