Why We Need Women in Special Forces

Summary

Smart Women, Smart Power – "Why We Need Women in Special Forces"

Podcast: CSIS | Center for Strategic and International Studies
Host: Dr. Kathleen McInnis
Guest: Jessica Yahn, Special Operations Veteran & Executive Producer of "Guerrera"
Date: May 14, 2025

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Episode Overview

This episode explores the pivotal role women play in special operations forces (SOF), focusing on Jessica Yahn’s experiences as a veteran and creator of the documentary "Guerrera." The conversation delves into the origins and operational necessity of integrating women into elite military units, the powerful stories from Afghanistan, and how women’s participation addresses critical blind spots in modern conflict. Jessica also reflects on the legacy of her fallen teammates and the lasting strategic value of employing gender as an operational capability.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Jessica’s Military Path and Motivations

• A Military Upbringing: Jessica grew up in a military family; her father was a U2 pilot during the 1990s and early 2000s ([01:30]), instilling an early sense of service.
• Transition from Air Force to Army: Initially attended the Air Force Academy but found the Army a better fit for her leadership style and interests, especially after realizing she didn't meet the vision requirements to be a pilot ([02:04]–[02:58]).
  • Quote: "I was a little too free spirited for an academy... maybe the Army is the place for me. Actually, I really like the woods." — Jessica Yahn ([02:04])

Establishing the Cultural Support Teams (CST)

• Genesis of the CST Program: Emerged from US Army Special Operations recognizing the operational need for female soldiers to engage with Afghan women, especially in culturally sensitive contexts where male soldiers couldn’t interact ([08:12]).
• Operational Blind Spots: Prior to CSTs, US and coalition forces were missing key intelligence and creating vulnerabilities by not engaging with half the population ([09:34]–[10:00]).

"Guerrera": The Documentary

• Origins: Began as a short memorial tribute to fallen teammate Jennifer Moreno, evolving into a larger project when its deeper significance was recognized ([04:44]).
  • Quote: "The first decision, really, was just to try to put something together that would honor the memory of Jennifer Moreno, who was a teammate of mine... Then Will called me after the weekend of interviews and said, this is a much larger story." — Jessica Yahn ([04:44])
• Honoring Sacrifice: The documentary also pays tribute to Ashley White and others who lost their lives as CST members, aiming to inspire and inform future generations ([06:34]–[06:17]).

Lived Experiences & Operational Advantages

• Accessing Critical Information: Jessica recounts how Jennifer Moreno enabled her Ranger task force to uncover weapons caches by engaging women and children whom male soldiers couldn't question ([10:20]).
  • Quote: "That information probably would have never came off target had she not been there engaging with the women and the young children." — Jessica Yahn ([10:20])
• Mitigating Physical & Intelligence Risks: CSTs not only closed intelligence gaps but also neutralized direct threats, e.g., uncovering a female suicide bomber ([11:27]).

Expanding the Human Terrain

• Comprehensive Engagement: Women in SOF provide unique access to the full “human terrain” (female US service members, partner forces, local women, adversarial women), enabling fuller situational awareness ([13:13]).
  • Quote: "It's just, what's your game plan to get after each one of those segments of the population?" — Jessica Yahn ([13:17])

Lessons from Ukraine & Modern Conflict

• Questioning Combat Distinctions: Dr. McInnis highlights the blurred lines between combat and non-combat in current wars, as seen in Ukraine where thousands of women serve on the front lines ([14:54]).
  • Quote: "What's the distinction between combat and non combat anymore?... The landscape is so complicated, it's so porous." — Dr. Kathleen McInnis ([15:46])

Influence Beyond the Battlefield

• Education as Strategic Leverage: Jessica reflects on her experiences in Afghanistan, linking women’s education to generational change and conflict resolution ([17:00]–[17:53]).
  • Quote: "If you want to change a community, educate a woman, and let that have a ripple effect that will have a generational impact." — Jessica Yahn, paraphrasing Pashtana Durrani ([17:53])

The Ripple Effect & Strategic Advantages

• Empowerment and Hope: The documentary aims to inspire by turning the legacy of loss into hope and action for others. There is frustration at the failure to consistently recognize the strategic edge that serious engagement with women offers ([18:28]–[19:18]).
  • Quote: "It strikes a chord. And for each person that may be a little different, what they pulled out of it." — Jessica Yahn ([19:45])

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Purposeful Inclusion
  "The cultural support team program was the purposeful employment of gender as a capability... I provided value on target because I was a woman." — Jessica Yahn ([20:52])

• On Power
  "Power to me is influence, particularly on things outside of our direct control to achieve a desired outcome." — Jessica Yahn ([21:15])

• Episode Highlight:

  • The story of conversing with an Afghan cleric about religion and being told, “You’re an infidel and this war will never end,” which foregrounds the challenges of changing mindsets and the importance of shaping young generations ([16:46]–[17:00]).

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Important Timestamps

| Time | Segment / Topic | |-----------|-------------------------------------------------------------------| | 01:30 | Jessica’s military family & early influences | | 02:04 | From Air Force Academy to Army ROTC | | 04:44 | Origins of "Guerrera" & honoring Jennifer Moreno | | 06:34 | Remembering and honoring Jenny as a teammate | | 08:12 | The operational need for women in special operations | | 10:20 | Operational advantages: CST stories (weapons cache & suicide bomber) | | 13:13 | Human terrain: engaging the full population | | 14:54 | Lessons from Ukraine and modern warfare’s blurred boundaries | | 17:53 | Impact of educating women – generational change | | 18:28 | Frustrations around under-leveraged strategic advantages | | 20:52 | Gender as capability in operations | | 21:15 | Jessica’s definition of power |

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Summary & Takeaways

• Women add operational necessity and strategic advantage to modern special operations, especially in environments where gender norms restrict engagement for male soldiers.
• The inclusion of women on SOF teams sheds light on otherwise inaccessible intelligence and threat vectors ("blind spots").
• Jessica Yahn’s documentary, "Guerrera," amplifies the voices and sacrifices of women in SOF, aiming to educate and inspire future generations.
• The ripple effect of engaging and empowering women not only improves military effectiveness but also fosters longer-term societal stability.
• Gender is best viewed not merely as representation, but as a capability that can be purposefully leveraged for influence and mission success.

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This episode is a powerful testament to the necessity of integrating women at all levels of military operations, showing their irreplaceable impact and the broader implications for national and global security.

Transcript

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

This is Smart Women, Smart Power, a podcast that features conversations with some of the world's most powerful women. We feature thought leaders at all career levels where we explore, among other things, the many contributions that women make to the fields of international business, national security, foreign policy, and international development. Does having women in positions of power influence the outcomes of decisions in these fields? Why or why not? Join me, Dr. Kathleen McInnes, Director of the Smart Women's Smart Power Initiative at the center for Strategic and International Studies. For these incredible conversations.

Today, I'm joined by Jessica Yahn, a special operations veteran and executive producer of a powerful new documentary, Guerrera, that tells the stories of trailblazing women who served in special operations in Afghanistan. The series highlights the human experience surrounding conflict, including the stories of sacrifice, unity, and hope. I'm Dr. Kathleen McInnis, and this is Smart Women. Smart Power. Welcome to the podcast, Jess.

[Jessica Yahn]

Thank you.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

There's so much to discuss today in this moment that we find ourselves in. But as we do with all of our guests, I'd love to start our conversation with your origin story. What got you interested in joining the military and why did you choose to serve?

[Jessica Yahn]

I grew up in a military family. My father was a U2 pilot, so reconnaissance plane, Air Force wild. Yes.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

So what years is he a U2 pilot?

[Jessica Yahn]

90S into the early 2000s. So grew up always on a military base watching movies like Patton and Civil.

War documentaries and Band of Brothers.

And so I always had a desire to serve. And then of course, 9, 11 happened, and that was an impact in my decision as well.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

How were you called to the particular service and branch that you chose to serve in?

[Jessica Yahn]

Well, to be honest, I actually went to the Air Force Academy my freshman year of college. I was a little too free spirited for a academy and had a great first year, but also found out I didn't have the eyesight to be a pilot at the time. They had just started doing the lasik surgery and my favorite day of basic training at the Air Force Academy was tromping around the woods with a rock on my back, flanking the OP4, which is the opposition forces, the cadets that are playing enemy that day and safety, killing one of them by successfully maneuvering around the battle space. You know, at the end of that.

First year on all kinds of probations, you know, I said, maybe the army is the place for me. Actually, I really like the woods and, you know, I think everything happens for a reason. I ended up switching over to UC Santa Barbara.

Commissioned through Army Reserves Officer Training Corps out of Santa Barbara.

My dad did tell me I wasn't.

His favorite daughter anymore, but we got past that.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Well, you can't win them all, really, Right? Was there a moment when you were in ROTC that really solidified for you that you made the right, that you knew you were on the right path?

[Jessica Yahn]

I think I knew I was on the right path pretty quickly, just again, because I found myself drawn to being a leader in small tactical units. And that's really all ROTC is. It's back to the, you know, you do basic maneuvering Battle Drill 1 Alpha.

I'm sure that doesn't mean much to many people on the podcast, but, you.

Know, react to contact. You have this tight knit group of teammates.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

How big was your rotc?

[Jessica Yahn]

Small. Santa Barbara has a very small program, so I was one of the only females, and I had six or seven males that were in my same class. Altogether, the program was probably only 25.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Wow. Okay, cadets at the time, no big deal. But you just produced a powerful new documentary which highlights a series of events that occurred during the war on terror when Joint Force commanders realized that there's an actual operational need for women on combat missions with all male special operations teams, like. So, to start us in this conversation, could you set the scene for us? How did you decide to do a documentary on this?

[Jessica Yahn]

The first decision, really, was just to try to put something together that would honor the memory of Jennifer Moreno, who was a teammate of mine that I was deployed with as a. You know, she was part of the Cultural Support Team program. That decision looked like my cousin was dating a filmmaker, and I had a.

Little extra cash in my pockets. And, you know, I said, hey, Will Agee is a filmmaker, the director for.

Guerrera, and he's phenomenal. And I said, hey, I'd like to do a small memorial tribute film for Jenny and really also to recognize just her sacrifice as well as Ashley White's sacrifice. Ashley White was killed in 2011 during her participation in the Cultural Support Team program. And then Jenny Moreno was killed in 2013, which was during the deployment that we had together. So, you know, it started as a very. It was meant to be just a short 15 minute. Will flew out to San Diego. San Diego is where Jenny is buried. She's buried at Rosecrans National Cemetery right there overlooking the ocean. And we flew in a couple of core teammates, interpreters. And so it was, you know, five characters initially. And Will called me after the weekend of interviews and said, this is a much larger story, and I want to take this on as my next you know, full length project. And so that's am always grateful to Will for recognizing the potential of the story and that it needed to be told in a much bigger way. And so that's how it ended up.

Becoming what it is now. Fifteen terabytes later, I think he went in the Ken Burns approach, you know, do a lot of interviewing and then distilled it down.

Originally it was like a two hour documentary and then we ended up breaking it up into the three part series.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Tell us about Jenny.

[Jessica Yahn]

She is just a bright light of a human and was fantastic at her job, was a fantastic teammate. You know, I spoke with Manaz Akbari, who is the female tactical platoon leader commander. That is the Afghan equivalent of the cultural support team. So Minaz and I were having a conversation about Jenny and the female tactical platoon also lost one of their closest teammates, Majimi and Hakimi. And Minaz told me sometimes it takes.

The best of us away.

And she said she thinks it's always for a reason because it creates such a lasting impact on the rest of us to take that loss and turn it into fuel, to turn it into action and solidify what that legacy was to give hope and empower others. And I think Guerrera is a part of that journey, turning that sacrifice into hope for others.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Could we go back to the actual lived experience of the establishment of the cultural support teams and this recognition by tactical commanders that these cultural support teams were required? Was there from your perspective, was there a moment, was there something that a commander said or like, how did you perceive our militaries and the coalition? I think as well, when was the moment that they started to get that there was a problem that this needed to solve?

[Jessica Yahn]

I think over multiple iterations of because it grew out of the special operations community. U.S. army Special Operations Command were the ones that instituted the program to purposely recruit, assess, select, train and then deploy this cohort of women. But it's not that it didn't exist outside of Afghanistan. In Iraq, you had Marines, female engagement teams, you had women experiencing combat because there's no clear where's the line in a counterinsurgency, Right. So it was only a matter of time before commanders had the courage to do something that may have pushed back, that was truly innovative and different. And I think that risk ready mindset, and I'm quoting Margy Worll here, who just wrote the courage Gap and it's a great read on how to implement courage in our everyday lives and not just from an individual's perspective, but how that changes organizational Courage and an institution such as the Army. So we had the right leaders in place that said, you know, is an operational imperative in Afghanistan. Let's do this pilot specific for Afghanistan, largely also due to the nature of the culture, obviously a very conservative society.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Yep.

[Jessica Yahn]

We were losing a war in the narrative space, if you will, because men were searching and questioning women, which was seen as completely against.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Completely taboo.

[Jessica Yahn]

Right. Yeah. And so between that and then understanding that there were probably some layers of intelligence or even just protection for the force that we weren't breaking into, drove that.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Let's dig into that a little bit deeper, if you don't mind, because I think this is one of the central questions that the community's grappling with right now. What were the operational advantages that we saw? What did the introduction of these cultural support teams, female engagement teams, do for the force that we couldn't have done otherwise?

[Jessica Yahn]

I'll answer this in a story, and I'll answer it with a story of Jennifer Moreno. So she was on target with her Ranger task force, and through questioning and conversating with the women and children on target, was able to lead the task force to a weapons cache that was part of the adversary's equipment. That information probably would have never came off target had she not been been there engaging with the women and the young children. And there's different examples. It could be an adult woman, it could be a young boy or young girl. But there's so much information that we were not tapping into that informs the task force's operations and then helps them be more lethal, more able to even protect the task force members. And the other example that I like to give, women aren't always. They can be an adversary as well.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Yes.

[Jessica Yahn]

So on the target objective Ares that Gurira captures in episode two, there was a female suicide bomber on that target. One of the roles of the cultural support team, once the women and children were cordoned off from the males in a particular compound, is to very rapidly search to ensure that there aren't weapons that would be yielded against the task force. In the case of objective Aries, again, this particular adversary was able to. There were multiple suicide models and Daisy chained IEDs around the compound that caused so much chaos. One of those was a female. So then you just think in terms of if we aren't addressing all aspects of the adversary's population, men and women, we have a blind spot.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

That's what I noticed through my own research and my own interviews with other service members. One of the primary advantages is the reduction of These blind spots, by engaging with the other 50% of the population and being able to do so, as you point out, like it was not appropriate for male commanders to do so or male troops to do so. Intelligence is so important. Understanding the terrain is so important. And if you're not fully understanding the human terrain, you've created deep vulnerabilities that might not be able to be surmounted in future conflicts.

[Jessica Yahn]

Absolutely. And I know that right now you could call it women, peace and security, call it mission analysis, intelligence preparation on the battlefield. At the end of the day, humans will be a part of warfare. And 50% of the world is 51%.

I think you probably are women. And so the way I look at.

It is first, there's who. Who's the who? There's female US Service members, there's partner force service members. We talk about sharing the burden. We can't be everywhere in the world. General Fenton from Special Operations Command just did his posture statement recently. Really emphasized the power of partnerships and the need for our all NATO, our Indo, PACOM allies or otherwise anywhere around the world to help again, shoulder that burden with us. And so there's women in partner force nations, then you have local women, and then you have adversarial women. Same on the male side. But that is your complete picture of human terrain in an operating environment. And so it's just, what's your game plan to get after each one of those segments of the population?

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

And do you have the capabilities resident within the force to be able to do so?

[Jessica Yahn]

You said it. So it's that deep understanding of our terrain, of our operating environment, so that we can better or more effectively influence. Because that's what it's about at the end of the day, influence for freedom of action to achieve our desired outcomes. And then again, I also look at it as just a targetable vector.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Yeah.

[Jessica Yahn]

Whether that's, again, bring in information off target that is relevant, whether it's being able to collect a lot of other different capacities. When we think reconnaissance, when we think about all the other innate activities that the military performs, there's definitely capacity at rest if we're not tapping into female populations.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Right. And I look at the Ukraine war, for example, and the lessons that that is beginning to suggest, lessons that we might encounter, probably not learn any of. That's a military adaptation joke for all three listeners who get it. But when you look at Ukraine, there's upwards of 60,000 women that have joined the armed forces and I think 20,000 on the front lines. And given that they're being pummeled by Russian missiles all the time. This point that you made earlier, which I think is a pretty profound one, what's the distinction between combat and non combat anymore? When we're talking about these wars and the wars of the future, I find myself as an analyst a bit puzzled by those kinds of distinctions because the landscape is so complicated, it's so porous. Right. And so, yeah, that's another thing that I keep reflecting on.

[Jessica Yahn]

So my last mission as a cultural.

Support team member, we went to a compound that ended up being a madrasa. So, oh yeah, no women on that target. While there weren't any women, there were, you know, a dozen or so young boys.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

For listeners, target in this context just means a place to engage. It wasn't like, you know, putting a bomb on a place.

[Jessica Yahn]

At this point, I have a dozen or so young boys that I'm now responsible for comforting, controlling, also searching and then questioning. As part of this mission, one of the other things that the task force had me do was engage the senior leader or kind of the eldest person on a target at the end of the mission to ensure that if anything was damaged, they had the right paperwork to make a claim for compensation. So I'm now engaging with the lead, the imam of this madrasa. And through the interpreter, you know, he asks me if I believe in Jesus. He's asking me about my religious beliefs.

And, you know, it's funny, as I'm sitting there in the middle of a, you know, desert in Afghanistan, like, talking about theological conversation with this jeopardy, and I'm like, yes, I do, and in America, we have freedom of religion. And, you know, as I walked away.

His last words to me were, you're an infidel and this war will never end. And so I'm walking back to the helicopter and this is 2013. So again, decade plus into this war, and all I can think about is all those young minds that are standing up against that mud wall. As I was working with them, thinking, if we don't address the education aspect, if we don't address this cycle of violence, we will not have the Enduring Freedom name of the campaign, and we won't have the enduring impacts that we're trying to achieve here in this country. And so at that time, I started looking for who's educating women in rural areas of Afghanistan, because women, even in conservative societies have influence in their homes.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Yes.

[Jessica Yahn]

And if you want to change and I'll butcher this quote is Pashtana Durrani, who is the founder of Learn Afghanistan Would always tell me, you want to change a community, educate a woman, and let that have a ripple effect that will have a generational impact. Pashana is also a character in Carrera, and we were actually filming in Kandahar at her schools when Kandahar fell to the Taliban.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Oh, my God.

[Jessica Yahn]

She's now here in the States. She still goes back and takes care of her foundation, is still very involved, but she's about to graduate from Harvard this summer.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

This notion of the ripple effect and how powerful it can be to tap into this aspect of society for our overall strategic goals. That's the piece that I found, again, as an analyst, as a researcher, as a national security scholar, all the things I found deeply frustrating. That the failure in some quarters to acknowledge the strategic advantages that engagement with women and thinking about that can give the United States. We're in this strategic competition with some really nasty actors, and it seems to me that we should be leveraging every possible tool in the toolkit to give us advantages. But anyway, back to the documentary. What's the reception been?

[Jessica Yahn]

Those that have watched the reception's been phenomenal. It's a very grassroots campaign. So we're slowly just trying to get the word out there and again, just get the story out there, because it's an important story that needs to be told. So far, again, the folks that have watched it have given really, really fantastic feedback. It wasn't necessarily what they thought it would be. It is very complex, but it strikes a chord. And for each person that may be a little different, what they pulled out of it.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Sure.

[Jessica Yahn]

Part of our goal was to highlight as many different characters to perhaps resonate with as many different members of the audience as possible and just share that sacrifice of, again, Jenny, of Ashley, of those killed alongside Jenny on Objective Ares, and let that be a source of inspiration for the next generation.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

So to start wrapping up this incredible conversation, I'd love to ask two questions that our listeners are very familiar with. Do you think your gender as a woman has had an impact on the decision you've taken to produce this documentary and put these stories in the world. If so, why?

[Jessica Yahn]

If not, why not to produce a documentary?

No.

However, to participate in the cultural Support Team program, which was the impetus for the documentary. Absolutely, 100%. The cultural support team program was, you know, the purposeful employment of gender as a capability. And so I'm a woman.

I provided value on target because I was a woman. So absolutely, that impacted that decision, which.

In turn was the reason for Gurira.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

That is such a wonderful way to phrase it, too purposeful employment of the capability, because that's what we're talking about.

[Jessica Yahn]

Gender as a capability, gender as a capability.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

And the final question, Smart women, Smart power. How do you think about? How do you define power?

[Jessica Yahn]

Power to me is influence, particularly on things outside of our direct control to achieve a desired outcome. And I say direct control because, you know, in the military, when we talk about mission command, command and control, we assess how well we know ourselves, how well we know our enemy, and how well we know the environment. It's still powerful to be able to know yourself very well. But truly exerting that influence on things that are outside of our control, whether that's the terrain, whether that's an adversary, I think that's how I would define it.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Jessica, thank you so much for joining us today. And thank you for bringing these important stories into our conversations and honoring their memories. Really appreciate everything you've done.

[Jessica Yahn]

Thank you for having me.

[Dr. Kathleen McInnis]

Subscribe to the Smart Women Smart Power podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to great content. Be sure to follow us on Twitter martwomen or you can follow me on Twitter jmcinnis1. Thanks for listening and join us next time.