The 2009 Scrooge Lump of Coal Award goes to ... Major General Anthony Cucolo for announcing there is no room in his barracks for pregnant soldiers this Christmas.

Pregnant soldier? The very phrase makes one pause, even shudder slightly, in ways we both can and cannot fully understand.

Gen. Cucolo's response was more practical: He simply ordered the women under his command not to get pregnant, and the men not to impregnate, well, a soldier, anyway. That's about as gender neutral as the good general could make it.

Let's admit that Gen. Cucolo has reasons on his side: He has 22,000 soldiers under his command in Northern Iraq. Just 1,700 of them -- or less than 8 percent -- are women. But pregnancies among this small minority of women are posing enough of a problem for his troops' combat-readiness that the general issued his order: getting pregnant and impregnating (well, a soldier, anyway) will both subject a soldier to military punishments up to and including court martial: Conceive life, and go to jail.

"General declares war on pregnancy," as Australia's Sydney Morning Herald blared.

Stars and Stripes reports that since the Gen. Cucolo took over in November and his new order went into effect four women and three men have already been punished (with letters of reprimand). Whether and how an abortion affects these cases has not been publicly discussed.

Under the onslaught, the general retreated slightly. ABC News reported that he is ruling out jail time for infractions, saying that lower levels of punishments are all that is necessary. But the basic rule he has enacted remains -- and for a reason: Pregnant and soldier just don't go together.

But women are people who sometimes get pregnant.

The National Organization for Women, God bless them, issued a sweeping denunciation: "How dare any government say we're going to impose any kind of punishment on women for getting pregnant," NOW president Terry O'Neill told ABC News.

Thank you, NOW. But NOW's brand of feminism is unable to acknowledge the problems that gave rise to Gen. Cucolo's wretched order: Female soldiers create problems. These problems may be "manageable" in the sense that this relatively small proportion of women soldiers do not substantively interfere with America's massive military might. Women also expand the potential pool of expertise available, albeit at a cost. But between pregnancy and reports of sexual abuse, women soldiers are uniquely vulnerable and raise substantial problems for the military in ways that men do not.

NOW is right: It is wrong to punish women for pregnancy, even when pregnancy substantively interferes with equal work for equal pay. But why? The military context raises the stakes about our core values here. Which do we as a society value more: women's capacity to help kill or to create new life?

For the general the answer is clear: "I can't tell you how valuable my female soldiers are," he said. "They fly helicopters. They run satellites. They're mechanics. They're medics. Some of the best intelligence analysts I have happen to be female. You start losing them when you're facing a drawdown, and you really hurt the unit."

What he failed to recognize is that this is an issue that goes beyond cost-benefit analysis and utilitarian reasoning to the heart of our shared values.

I am not a fan of encouraging women to join the male franchise of killing for one's country. But if we do so, I know something else: I do not want to be defended by even one woman who has been punished for her (our) capacity to give life, in order to make her more fit for assisting in the kill.