12-year-old inferno: British 'Barbie fighting' exposes sexual abuse in the army

Miss England, Katrina Hodge, had a path of thorns in the British army, suffering sexual abuse at the age of 18.

Now, at 30 and having children, the woman decided to share her story with the Daily Mail.

Nicknamed "fox", she received letters of hate and was even attacked in the canteen. When the superiors learned of the abuses and intimidation that Hodge was suffering from his colleagues, they did nothing.

"These 12 years have been a hell of a thing for me and I do not intend to put up with that any longer," he told the Daily Mail in 2018. "It's not permissible for a woman to be degraded like that.

Upon entering the Pirbright regiment in Surrey in 2004, she ended up receiving the nickname "Barbie of combat" when presenting in high heels, false eyelashes and a pink suitcase. But the following year she showed that she was capable: she saved the lives of her five comrades in Iraq when her group's car with an alleged rebel crashed. The prisoner grabbed two rifles, but Katrina punched him in the face, causing him to lose his guns. It was then she was decorated and things got worse.

"Every time I passed by, they called me in a low voice to all those infamous names like 'slut', 'whore' and 'liar' ... Once I got on my ass and tossed me a can of soda. hold back the tears so as not to cry in front of everyone, but when I returned to my room, I began to cry, "commented the woman.

Hodge recalls that he was only 18 at the time. The executioners wrote a letter about her with false accusations, making copies for all the barracks. The episode reached the sergeant-major. Katrina thought that the army could find the person responsible for the letter but was eventually transferred to another

In 2009, Hodge was elected to Miss England. She says she used advertising to encourage more young people to join the military and give the Armed Forces a good image. But the situation got worse and some soldiers began to judge her without even knowing her.

By 2015, when she was already a corporal, the woman decided to have suffered too much, abandoning the army. Despite this, he says, he continues to receive letters from his former colleagues over the Internet.



She currently lives in Brighton (UK) and has two daughters - one in three and one in six. Just recently, a Facebook post appeared on the page of the British Military Club, highlighting what she did for the women of the Armed Forces. But it was not long before the comments appeared, denigrating her, more than 500, even though it had been three years since she had left the army.

"I know I'm not the only victim ... I met seven other soldiers who also suffered abuse of this kind."

Katrina made an official complaint to the Ombudsman for the Armed Forces. He hopes his complaints will be heard and taken seriously this time.

Hodge is sure that if the abuses he suffered in 2005 had occurred in 2018 things would have developed differently. The army has changed, but there is still a long way to go.