OTTAWA — When Sheila A. Hellstrom first joined the Royal Canadian Air Force in 1954, she was limited to one of three roles: nurse, dietitian or administrator. As the decades passed, she would become the first Canadian woman to reach the rank of general and the Canadian military would integrate women into combat roles.

On Thursday, Brigadier General Hellstrom, who retired a year after a human rights tribunal ordered the full integration of women in the Canadian military in 1989, said that the debate following the Pentagon’s decision to allow women into combat was both familiar and frustrating.

“People are bringing up the issues we had to deal with then,” said General Hellstrom, who is 77. “We have shown here that we can do it.”

Opening the Canadian military to women followed a protracted debate, but the questions over the suitability of women as combat troops have now all but faded from the nation’s collective memory.