Even though they are prohibited from being in combat roles such as infantry, women increasingly are serving on the battlefield in Iraq and Afghanistan in a variety of jobs that routinely take them "outside the wire" — meaning off base.

Those roles include military police, medical positions, personal security for commanders, pilots and truck drivers. Hawai'i's 2nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team had a female Stryker vehicle driver in Iraq.

But for the Hawai'i National Guard's 29th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, it's been a man's world when it comes to missions into Iraq.

About 1,700 National Guard and Army Reserve soldiers are in their ninth month in Kuwait, with a return expected in August. More than 1,000 of those soldiers regularly travel into Iraq and back to Kuwait on convoy security escort missions.

Only a few female soldiers have been on those missions. Maj. Pam Ellison and Staff Sgt. Crystal Carpenito have crossed into Iraq as public affairs officers who write about the brigade in its newsletter, the Lava Flow.

Spc. Cherry Roldan-Gador, meanwhile, made the rare trip in January as part of a re-enlistment request.

Roldan-Gador, who lives in Kapolei, handles records and paperwork. But she wanted to see what it was like to be part of a Convoy Escort Team. She ended up rolling out with CET 4-6 "Monsta 808" to Baghdad. She re-enlisted at Al Faw palace at Camp Victory.

"It was scary and exciting," Roldan-Gador said of the trip, in an account in the Lava Flow. "It gave me more confidence that a female soldier can get out there and do all the things that the guys can do."

Ellison said there is no brigade policy excluding women from the convoy escort missions. "There just so happens to be no females whose duty positions place them on CETs on a routine basis," Ellison said.

Most of the escort duty is performed by the 100th Battalion, 442nd Infantry; and the 1st Squadron, 299th Cavalry Regiment.

The 100th-442nd, being an infantry unit, has no women. Four female soldiers are attached to the cavalry squadron, Ellison said. The Convoy Escort Teams are very busy, and the 100th Battalion, which drives to and from Camp Cedar in southern Iraq, recently logged 1 million vehicle-miles on the road.

Ellison said there are about 100 female soldiers throughout the 29th Brigade who have a variety of important roles including command sergeant major. A female company commander provides security forces at one Kuwait location where the Hawai'i soldiers operate, the Sea Port of Debarkation, Ellison said.