I first learned about the Cover Girls in the course of reporting my new book, The Fort Bragg Cartel: Drug Trafficking and Murder in the Special Forces. My investigation began in December 2020, when two veteran special operations soldiers, including an active-duty member of Delta Force Boosting named Billy Lavigne, turned up murdered in the woods on Fort Bragg. I soon learned that there had been many more unexplained deaths at Fort Bragg, dozens of fatal overdoses and a pattern of coverups and collusion between military and civilian police. There was even a shadowy drug ring, made up of paratroopers and Green Berets as well as a local cops and marines from Camp Lejeune, that was trafficking hundreds of kilos of cocaine into the United States from Mexico and allegedly smuggling heroin out of Afghanistan. Underlying it all was a cartoonishly macho culture of drinking, drugs, sex and lawlessness.

As the new military leadership scrutinized so-called “DEI” initiatives aimed at gender equity, I thought of the vicious harassment that Williams faced during her eight years at Delta Force. Her story is a cautionary tale for just how bad it can get for female service members and civilian employees in elite units shrouded in secrecy and steeped in privilege and impunity. It is a rebuke to those who believe, wrongly, that the military panders to women and minorities.

Eight years have passed since Williams left Delta Force, but with American-sponsored shadow wars and proxy conflicts raging in places like Syria, Somalia, Yemen, Ukraine and Gaza, the unit’s preeminent role in the new American way of making war is more integral than ever. Things haven’t improved much for women, either. Since Williams left the force, female servicemembers have continued to fear retaliation should they report rape. The phrase “murder-suicide” shows up in news copy all too often, with female servicemembers being killed by their male partners, and male veterans killing their wives and girlfriends.

A spokesperson for the United States Army Special Operations Command (USASOC) declined to comment on Williams’ experience or the broader problems with buy Delta Force Boosting. The Pentagon’s chief spokesperson, Sean Parnell, said in an emailed statement that “the Department applauds all of the work the Special Operations Community does to keep our nation safe. This Department has a zero-tolerance policy for any kind of harassment. Additionally, no matter what skin color our warfighters are, they bleed red. Our nation is grateful to the honorable, upstanding men and women who serve our country.”