From a young age Ali knew she wanted to join the army, and was part of the new 1984 revolution of women that went straight to training at Sandhurst Royal Military Academy. Ali describes the developments in training, such as compulsory weapon exercises and more intensive physical fitness. She was posted to 10 Company Aldershot where she took on administrative roles in welfare and career management. Ali was then taken to the Royal Green Jackets, then the Light Division Depot at Winchester. She describes this as the point in which her ambition for a military career took over and she began to dedicate herself entirely to the army. From here she was posted to the NATO camp in Sennelager, the Grenadier Guards, and Hohne for gunnery training where she began to understand Soviet tactics in the Cold War. When the Gulf war broke out in 1990 Ali knew that the WRAC was coming to an end. She was initially told that as a member of the WRAC she could not go to the Gulf, but she was grateful that the orders changed. In her interview she gives an incredible description of her experiences on ground operation. Ali continued to serve with the Adjutant General Corps and left as a full Colonel responsible for training across the whole of the army.

Ishbel had experience with the University Officers Training Corps (OTC) and the Territorial Army (TA) before she joined the WRAC in 1985. She had trained as a pharmacist at university and it was only after graduating she considered joining the army. She recalls Crusade Eight as the first major operation she worked on alongside the local infantry unit. Ishbel describes how in this role, aside from escorting VIPS, most of the women would take on administrative work. She was then posted to C Company in Grangemouth as a Platoon Commander and comments on the changing atmosphere surrounding women's treatment in the early 1980s. Ishbel also describes how in the OTC and the TA women were afforded more opportunities, such as weapons and armed combat training, whereas the WRAC were only just introducing weapons training. From this point Ishbel underwent a series of role changes within the army; she traveled to Sandhurst, Catterick, Cyprus, Northern Ireland, and London where she completed her Masters in Administration. At Porton Down, she revisited her pharmacist experience and worked with scientists to develop pharmaceutical and technological military defences. Ishbel went on to become an Adjutant General in Bosnia, the Balkans, then a Lieutenant Colonel in Cyprus and a medic in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Reflecting on the WRAC, Ishbel feels that it gave her the grounding to begin her wider military career. An inspiring interview, we thank Ishbel for her incredible stories and for being a trailblazing woman.