"I Want to be in the Fight": An MP Officer Reflects on Leadership, Gender Issues in the Military, and Overcoming Adversity

Having overcome Hodgkin's lymphoma as a cadet, Mary Elizabeth "Guvvi" McGovney branched Military Police upon graduation from USMA in 2004. She participated in the 82nd Airborne's emergency response and relief efforts in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina in 2005, and later deployed to Afghanistan as a platoon leader (2005-6), to Iraq as a staff officer (2007-8), and again to Iraq as a company commander (2011). In this interview, she discusses her time at West Point, her operational experiences, and the complicated sociological dynamics that shape gender roles and relations in the U.S. armed forces.