WASHINGTON – A new Pentagon survey shows women in the military endured the highest level of unwanted sexual contact since the Defense Department began tracking the data sixteen years ago, a startling finding that shows sexual crimes rising steadily despite hundreds of millions spent to curb the problem and vows by senior leaders to tackle itt.
The Pentagon estimates that sexual assaults among women service members surged an estimated 35% from 2018 to 2021. The survey shows that 8.4% of women and 1.5% of men in the active-duty military said they had been the victim of a sex crime, ranging from from groping to rape, according to results of the survey obtained by USA TODAY. In 2018, an estimated 6.2% of women in the armed services were victims of unwanted sexual contact.
