Mandukhai Khatun

Mandukhai Khatun was empress of the Northern Yuan Dynasty (also known as Post-Imperial Mongolia) during the late 15th century. Khatun is the female honorific equivalent to Khan, meaning ‘military ruler’.

Sole daughter of an aristocratic Ongud family, Mandukhai was married at the age of 18 to Manduul Khan, ruler of the Mongol Empire. She bore one daughter to Manduul, increasing her seniority over his other childless wife. However when Manduul was assassinated in 1479 the empire was left with no recognised heir. Mandukhai then adopted the 7-year-old orphan Batmunkh, the last living descendant of the legendary Genghis Khan. Mandukhai named Batmunkh as “Dayan Khan” and through him became effective ruler of the Mongolian empire. 

Under Mandhukai’s leadership the empire went to war with the the Oirats in Western Mongolia and defeated them to great acclaim. In doing so she united the warring Mongolian tribes and instituted a number of codes to enforce the Oirat’s loyalty.

Mandukhai refused the marriage offer of one of her generals and instead married Dayan Khan when he reached the age of 19. Together the two led raids against Ming China in response to Chinese attempts to strangle the Mongols by closing trade. To contain her, the Chinese expanded the Great Wall and deployed gunpowder artillery, but this did not deter the raiding. The pair also had to contend with an Oirat rebellion, during which Mandukhai fought in the battles personally, even though she was pregnant with twins. 

Mandukhai died in 1510 of natural causes according to most sources, although some legends claim she was murdered by Ming agents. In her life she bore seven sons and three daughters, and it was from her line that successive khans and nobles of Mongolia were descended.

Peshmerga Militia Unit

A 700-strong all-female unit of Peshmerga Kurdish militia is currently involved in fighting the Islamic State in Northern Iraq and have been instrumental in securing the Kurdistan region.

The unit was created in 1996 in order to help combat Saddam Hussein loyalists. Since that time they have predominantly existed in a supporting combat role but have recently been used on the front lines at Kirkuk and securing oil fields in Bai Hassan.

The majority of the women are volunteers and have been trained alongside SWAT teams and special forces units. They are led by Colonel Nahida Ahmed Rashid, who began her military career fighting for the Kurdish separatist movement as a teenager and is now the highest-ranking female officer in the Kurdish army.

Some Western media outlets have framed the use of female soldiers as terrifying to the forces of the Islamic State and that they find it dishonourable to be killed by women. However others have pointed out that the IS and al-Qaeda field their own all-female battalions.

A BBC correspondent followed the Peshmerga women was impressed by their motivation to protect other women who have been victims of the IS forces. She also described the support they received from their families and community. “People know that they’re fighting a very, very tough fight,” she said. “But also, in a way, they know that these are pioneers, not just in Kurdistan, but in the region.”

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News Sources:

http://www.pri.org/stories/2014-07-16/kurdish-iraq-fight-against-isis-isnt-just-men

http://www.pri.org/stories/2014-08-07/meet-female-colonel-leading-kurdish-forces-battle-against-isis

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-28308632

Runak Bapir Gherib

“14 year old Yazidi girl returns home with AK

12/08/2014 — Sinjar mountains, Iraq — Runak Bapir Gherib, 14 y.o. from Shengar makes her way down the mountain after 7 days. She is with her mother and sister (in the back) waiting for a car to drive them away. She took the gun from Shengar to protect her family. YPG also gave weapons to the people who wanted to fight, but it has been impossible to verify whether this weapon was given to her by YPG or family members.”

Source: diannefeinstein-vevo

Milunka Savić

Milunka Savić was a Serbian soldier who fought in the Balkan Wars and in World War I. She was wounded no less than nine times during her service and is the most decorated female combatant in the history of warfare.

In 1912, when she was aged 24, Savić’s brother was called up to serve in the Balkan Wars against Bulgaria. Accounts vary as to whether she impersonated her brother or simply accompanied him, but it is certain that she joined the Serbian army having disguised herself as a man. She saw combat within weeks and was awarded with a medal and a promotion for taking part in repeated assaults during the nine-day Battle of Bregalnica.

During the tenth assault she was wounded by a Bulgarian grenade and while being treated in hospital her gender was revealed. Unwilling to punish her given her valour on the battlefield, Savić's commanding officer offered her a transfer to a nursing division. Standing at attention Savić insisted she would only serve her country as a combatant. When the officer told her he would give her his answer the next day Savić simply responded “I will wait” and remained standing at attention in front of him. He relented after just an hour and allowed her to return to the infantry.

Just a year after the end of the Balkan Wars Europe was torn apart by World War I and Savić continued to serve her country. Following the Battle of Kolubara in the early days of the war, she was awarded the Karađorđe Star with Swords medal, the highest award available. She received the medal a second time in 1916 after she single-handedly captured 23 Bulgarian soldiers at the Battle of Crna Bend. The war progressed poorly for Serbia, and Savić found herself fighting for the French as the retreating Serbian army was reformed under their control at Corfu. By the end of the war she had received medals from France, Russia and Britain for her bravery.

After the war Savić turned down a military pension in France to return to Serbia where she raised her daughter and a number of foster children on her own. Largely forgotten by the public, she made a living by working as a cleaning lady. During the German occupation of Serbia in World War II she was imprisoned in the Banjica concentration camp. Accounts vary as to whether this was because she refused to attend a banquet with German officers or because she was operating a hospital to treat wounded partisans. She was ultimately spared execution and released by a German officer who recognised her as a war hero.

Savić died of a stroke in 1973, aged 84. She was buried with full military honours and a street in Belgrade is named after her.

Tamara Bunke

Tamara Bunke, also commonly known as Tania the Guerrillera, was an Argentine-born German communist revolutionary who played a key role in the post-revolutionary Cuban government and in other Latin American revolutionary movements during the 1960s.

Raised in Buenos Aires by a family of expatriate German communists, Bunke grew up surrounded by the Argentine Communist Party as well as being a keen athlete and intelligent student. In 1952 the family returned to East Berlin where she studied political science and acted as a translator for the Socialist Unity Party of Germany. In this capacity she met the hero of the Cuban Revolution, Che Guevara, when she was assigned to be his interpreter.

Inspired by the revolution, Bunke moved to Cuba in 1961, quickly graduating from voluntary work to a range of high-profile tasks in the militia, the Cuban Literacy Campaign and a number of government departments. She was later selected to take part in “Operation Fantasma”, Guevara’s guerrilla expedition to Bolivia aimed at sparking revolutionary uprising across Latin America.

The only woman in the operation, Bunke was trained in the use of knives, pistols and submachine guns, as well as the transmission of coded radio messages. Styling herself as ‘Tania’, she quickly impressed her superiors with her intelligence, stamina and skill for espionage. In 1964 she served as secret agent, infiltrating Bolivian high society so successfully that she became a personal friend of the Bolivian President. In this role she became an invaluable source of information for Guevara for two years.

However late in 1966 Bunke’s cover was blown due to a failure of the spy network, forcing her to join Guevara’s armed guerrilla campaign in the mountains. It is rumoured but unconfirmed that during this time she and Guevara became lovers. She became responsible for monitoring radio communications but without access to her previous information sources the operation became increasingly isolated and desperate.

Injured in the leg and suffering a high fever, Bunke was included in a group of 17 ailing combatants that Guevara tried to send safely out of the mountains. The group was ambushed by the Bolivian army while crossing the Río Grande river and Bunke was shot while wading through high water with her rifle above her head. On hearing the news of her death Guevara initially refused to believe that such a thing was possible. She was later declared a hero of the Cuban Revolution.

Milka Kufrin

Milka Kufrin was a Yugoslav partisan who fought against German occupation during the Second World War.

The daughter of Croatian peasants, Milka attended school as a child and as a young woman studied agriculture at the University of Zagreb. During her time as a student she also became a member of the Communist Youth Organisation.

In 1941 Yugoslavia was invaded simultaneously by the Axis powers of Germany, Italy and Hungary, and in response the Partisan Resistance was formed. Kufrin, then in her early 20s, immediately volunteered to join the resistance but was refused. After continuous persistence she was accepted in October 1941 and assigned to a unit stationed in Kordun.

In 1942 Kufrin was given the task of sabotaging the Zagreb-Rijeka railway line. Every night for a period of eight months she approached the railway to plant explosives, no simple feat due to how heavily guarded the rail-line was. For her efforts she was proclaimed a national hero by the Yugoslavian government.

Yamakawa Futaba

Yamakawa Futaba (1844-1909) was an educator in the Japanese region of Aizu. While little is recorded of her life, it is known that she was trained as a fighter and took part in the defense of Tsuruga Castle when it was besieged during the Boshin War. While the castle’s defenses were eventually breached, Futaba survived the siege and following the war went on to lead the movement demanding improved education for women and girls in Japan.

Bà Triệu

Bà Triệu, or Triệu Thị Trinh, was a Vietnamese warrior and military commander in the 3rd century who fought against the occupying forces of the Chinese Wu Kingdom.

An orphan of noble birth, Triệu grew up among her brother’s family as a slave. At the age of 19 she declared her intention to become a warrior to fight against the Wu, who controlled Vietnam at that time and had purged more than 10,000 people. When her brother tried to prevent her leaving she is famously quoted as rebuking him with the words: “I want to ride the storm, tread the dangerous waves, win back the fatherland and destroy the yoke of slavery. I don’t want to bow down my head, working as a simple housewife.”

Triệu was successful in raising an army of around 1000 men and women, which she led north from the Cu-phong District to engage the Chinese in open rebellion. Despite the relatively small size of her army she was successful in defeating the Wu in over 30 separate battles within a period of 2 years. 

While Triệu’s war effort allowed her to carve out her own portion of Vietnam for a time, her success was a humiliation for the Wu, especially as their Confucian beliefs emphasised the natural inferiority of women. In response the Taizu Emperor of Wu sent huge numbers of troops to the Vietnamese frontier. While Triệu’s army held out for several months in the face of this new onslaught, she was ultimately killed in battle in the year 248.

Following her death and the consolidation of Chinese rule, Triệu was immortalised in Vietnamese folklore as a supernatural hero, often depicted riding into battle astride an elephant wielding dual golden swords.

Nancy Wake

Nancy Wake was a journalist turned resistance fighter during the Second World War.

Raised by a poor family in Sydney, Australia, Wake used a small inheritance from an aunt to travel to America and then Europe. By the mid-1930’s she had found work as a journalist and married Henri Fiocca, a wealthy industrialist.

When Germany invaded France in May 1940 she and Fiocca became heavily involved in the French Resistance. The pair were responsible for smuggling thousands of Jewish refugees and Allied servicemen into Spain. Wake often used her looks to get past Nazi checkpoints, later describing herself as “a flirtatious little bastard”.

Wake’s activities caused the Gestapo to declare her their most wanted person, dubbing her ‘the White Mouse’ for her ability to evade capture and placing a 5 million franc reward on her head. However by 1943 Nazi control over Vichy France made her work increasingly dangerous and with the collapse of her network she fled to Spain. Fiocca, who she left behind, was tortured to death for refusing to inform on her.

Wake convinced British special agents to train her as a guerilla operative. In April 1944, she parachuted in southern France to link up with Maquis resistance fighters in preparation for the D-Day invasions. She took command of a 7000-strong unit, winning the men’s respect by repeatedly beating them in drinking competitions. Over the next several months her unit fought 22,000 enemy soldiers, causing 1400 casualties in exchange for only 100 of their own. Wake herself was ruthless. She executed a girl who had been spying on the unit, killed an SS sentry with a karate chop to the neck, and on one occasion biked for 70 hours through enemy checkpoints to deliver radio codes to the Allies.

After the war Wake was heavily decorated by Britain, France and the US. During the 1950’s she worked for the British Air Ministry’s intelligence department, where she married again to a former pilot. She died in 2011, aged 98.

French Resistance Member

“A girl of the resistance movement is a member of a patrol to rout out the Germans snipers still left in areas in Paris, France, on August 29, 1944. The girl had killed two Germans in the Paris Fighting two days previously.”

Source: Histoire Fanatique

US Recruitment Poster

US Armed Forces recruitment poster from World War II.

Source: demons

Apranik

Apranik was a Military Commander and Resistance Leader of the Persian Sasanian Empire in the 7th century.

The daughter of Piran, a renowned Persian general, Apranik was raised in a time when the Sasanian Empire was coming to the end of it’s 400-year existence, having been weakened by war with the Byzantine Empire. Motivated by national pride, Apranik followed in her father’s footsteps and joined the army after finishing her schooling. She rose through the ranks from a petty officer to becoming a fully-fledged Commander.

When the Sasanian Empire fell to a full-scale invasion by the Islamic Rashidun Caliphate, Apranik took command of major battalion of the surviving Persian Army and mounted an ongoing war of resistance against their conquerors. She found that conventional warfare did not work against the guerilla tactics employed by the Caliphate soldiers, who often melted away into the desert. In response she led the Persians in hit-and-run attacks designed to inflict maximum damage in a short time.

While the Empire was never restored, Apranik’s determination and refusal to surrender inspired a wider movement of resistance. She is said to have died fighting in combat as it was preferable to capture. The white horse she rode became a symbol of freedom still recognised today and she inspired a number of other Persian female resistance fighters who were nicknamed ‘Apraniks’.

Marguerite Delaye

Marguerite Delaye was a woman who fought during the siege of the French town Montelimar in 1569 during the French Wars of Religion.

While details of her involvement are scarce, it is recorded that she lost an arm in the fighting. A statue was erected in her honour after the battle.

Bethany Gilford

Bethany Gilford, British Army Medic in Afghanistan.

Source: Military Armament

Tarantula Unit

The Tarantula Unit, An All-Female unit of the Capital Defence Command’s 35th Special Assault Team of the Republic of Korea Army trains in building clearance. 2013/4.

Source: Military Armament

Filipina Warrior

“While women in precolonial Philippines were often designated to the venerable position of the babaylan, it was not an uncommon occurrence for them to pick up arms and become warriors.”

— Perry Gil S. Mallari, The Filipina as Ritualistic and Warrior

Christian ‘Kit’ Cavanagh

Christian ‘Kit’ Cavanagh was an Irishwoman who fought in the British army as a dragoon during the 17th and early 18th centuries.

Born in 1667 in Dublin, 'Kit’ was a wild teenager who eventually settled down to run a pub with her husband Richard Welsh. When Welsh disappeared in 1691, Cavanagh received a letter indicating he had, possibly not by choice, ended up in the British Army and been sent to Holland. Unwilling to lose her husband she left her children with her mother, disguised herself as a man and joined the British Army on a mission to find him.

As an infantryman she fought at the Battle of Landen, where she was wounded and captured by the French. She was eventually returned to the British, but was discharged from the army for killing a sergeant in a duel over a woman. She immediately re-enlisted and joined the Royal Scots Greys Dragoons, with whom she served until the end of the Nine Years’ War. During this time she grew to enjoy the life of a soldier, with a penchant for the looting that followed battle. 

Cavanagh re-enlisted with the Scots Greys when the War of the Spanish Succession began in 1701. She was shot in the thigh during the Battle of Schellenberg, but refused to be sidelined and fought in the Battle of Blenheim a month later. After this battle she was assigned to guard French prisoners, where after 13 years of searching she found her husband. Unfortunately when she found Richard he was courting a Dutch woman. Having rebuked him fiercely she left and returned to her life with the Scots Greys.

Cavanagh’s identity as a man had never been challenged, despite being known as the 'Pretty Dragoon’. However when her skull was fractured at the Battle of Ramillies the surgeon treating her discovered she was a woman. She was discharged but carried on with the army as a sutleress, and some accounts claim she continued to fight on the front lines.

On return to Britain Cavanagh was presented to Queen Anne, who granted her a bounty of £50 and a pension for her services. Following her death in 1739 she was buried with full military honours. 

Æthelflæd

Æthelflæd was an Anglo-Saxon queen and warrior in 9th and 10th century England, who fought to protect her land from Viking invasion.

The eldest child of King Alfred of Wessex (better known as Alfred the Great), Æthelflæd was raised in a time when the kingdoms of England were being conquered by Danish Vikings to create the new territory of the Danelaw. As a teenager she was married to Æthelred, lord of the neighbouring kingdom of Mercia, to form an alliance against the Vikings. On the way to her wedding she personally fought off a Viking attack, which may have been sent to assassinate her and prevent the marriage.

The alliance proved effective in bullying the Vikings into making a temporary peace, and the couple took advantage by building a series of forts to help defend their lands. When in 902 Æthelred began to suffer a wasting illness, Æthelflæd became the ruler of Mercia in all but name.

As ‘Lady of the Mercians’ she undertook a military and political campaign to reclaim what had been lost to the Danelaw. In 905 she led her forces in repelling a Viking attack on the port of Chester, and in 907 she took an army deep into Danish East Anglia to retrieve the bones of a Christian saint.

In 917 she again went to war, not just against Vikings at Derby, but also against Welsh kings who had been opening their borders to Viking forces. This was more of a tactical than bloodthirsty move, leading to alliances with some Welsh rulers. A cunning politician, she also cultivated ties with the king of Alba (Scotland) and even with disaffected Viking lords.

She died in 918, just days before the Vikings at York surrendered to her and accepted her as their overlord. Her life’s work led to a combined kingdom of Mercia and Wessex that lay the foundation for a united nation of England.

Catalina de Erauso

Catalina de Erauso, also known as the ‘Nun Lieutenant’, was a legendary Basque soldier and duellist in the 17th century. 

Raised in a convent, De Erauso ran away at age 15 shortly before taking her vows as a nun. As Spanish society allowed little freedom for women, she took to disguising herself as a young man. After a few years roaming Spain as a page, she signed up on a ship to Peru as a cabin boy.

She worked in the Peruvian town of Trujillo in a store, but had to leave after injuring a relative of her employer in a duel. She moved to Lima but again had to leave in shame following a scandal involving a young woman. This led to her enlisting in the Spanish army and fighting in Chile during the Arauco War. At one point she was under the command of her own brother, Miguel, who never recognized her.

On the front lines in Chile, De Erauso reached the rank of lieutenant and became famed for her sword-fighting skills, however she fell into disfavour for killing an enemy leader who her superiors wanted captured alive. Disgraced, she fell into the habits of drinking and gambling, which in turn led to her fighting in a number of duels. This led to tragedy when she inadvertently killed her own brother in a duel gone wrong.

Grief-stricken she became an outlaw and con-artist, on one occasion absconding with a dowry paid to her to marry a young woman. She eventually entered into a convent in Lima after confessing her sex to a bishop. On return to Europe in 1624 De Erauso’s story had become public knowledge and she toured Italy as a celebrity. She was so famous that she was reportedly granted special dispensation by Pope Urban VIII to wear men’s clothing.

She returned to New Spain in 1645, using the name Antonio de Erauso, where she worked as a mule driver on the road from Veracruz. She died in Cuetlaxtla in 1650. Her autobiography, Memoir of a Basque Transvestite in the New World, is still widely read today.

The Rani of Jhansi Regiment

The Rani of Jhansi Regiment was the Women’s Regiment of the Indian National Army (INA) during the Second World War. It was named after Lakshmi Bai, Rani of Jhansi, a revolutionary heroine.

The regiment was formed in 1942, along with other Indian nationalist forces aiming to overthrow the British Raj in colonial India, with assistance from Imperial Japan. Most of the 1500 women were not from India at all, but teenage volunteers of Indian descent from rubber plantations in Malaya.

The regiment was raised in Singapore and were organised into officers or sepoys (privates) based on their education. It was led by Captain Lakshmi Sahgal, who was upper-class and highly educated. The cadets were trained in the use of rifles, hand grenades and bayonet charges. Some received additional training in field medicine and jungle warfare in preparation for operations in Burma. 

In 1944 the Rani were deployed in Burma alongside other INA forces and the Japanese army. 100 Rani troops are are noted as forming a vanguard unit as part of the ongoing Battle of Imphal, while other Rani gave support to the Nursing Corps there.

By March 1945 the INA had failed at Imphal and were forced into a disastrous retreat. The Rani suffered losses from Allied air attacks during the retreat and were disbanded not long after. While Lakshmi Sahgal went on to become the Minister of Women’s Affairs in the Azad Hind government, the fate of most members of the Rani of Jhansi regiment is unknown.