Posted on 10/1/2004, 3:39:03 AM by neverdem
WASHINGTON, Sept. 30 - To help meet its recruiting goals at a time when its forces are strained by operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army has lowered some requirements for recruits.
The changes are among the clearest signs yet of the military's growing problems in recruiting and retaining soldiers. They mean that many hundreds of recruits who would have been rejected in the past could be enlisted this year.
Army officials characterize the changes as modest and well within quality standards mandated by the Pentagon and Congress. But they amount to the first relaxation in Army recruiting standards since 1998, when a strong economy was hurting military recruiting.
Army officials said Thursday that for the recruiting year that started this week, at least 90 percent of new recruits must be high school graduates, compared with 92 percent last year. And up to 2 percent of recruits will be enlisted even if they scored in the lowest acceptable range on a service aptitude test, compared with 1.5 percent last year.
Given the total of 101,200 incoming soldiers whom the Army and the Army Reserve say they need to send to basic training this year, the changes mean that as many as 2,000 or so recruits who would have previously been rejected could be enlisted.
"In difficult recruiting environments, it is inevitable that either quality standards or recruiting resources be subject to adjustment," said Richard I. Stark Jr., a retired Army colonel who is a military personnel specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies here. "The Army has been forced to adjust to both."
The Army's decision to loosen standards comes amid calls for the House Armed Services Committee to investigate accusations by Iraq war veterans at Fort Carson, Colo., and other Army bases that, nearing the end of their enlistments, they are being pressured to choose between re-enlisting and being sent back to Iraq with another unit. Army officials have denied using any such approach to encourage re-enlistment.
In another sign of strains within the Army, more than 35 percent of nearly 3,900 former soldiers mobilized for yearlong assignments in a little-used wartime program have resisted their call-up, seeking delays or exemptions. Some of the former soldiers, members of the Individual Ready Reserve, may face criminal charges for failing to report, Army officials said.
Taken together, these issues have energized a bipartisan effort in Congress to increase the size of the Army by 20,000 to 30,000 soldiers, have helped to spur calls by Senator John Kerry to enlarge the Army by 40,000 troops and have prompted many lawmakers to warn of a tough challenge for recruiters.
"Recruiting for the United States Army is going to be a major challenge in the days ahead," Representative Ike Skelton of Missouri, the senior Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, said this week. "You are wearing them out."
Officials said Thursday that the Army met most of its goals for the 2004 recruiting year, which ended on Monday. The active-duty Army exceeded its recruiting target of 77,000 soldiers by 587, and the Army Reserve exceeded its goal of 21,200 by 78, according to Douglas Smith, spokesman for the Army Recruiting Command, at Fort Knox, Ky. But the Army National Guard missed its recruiting target of 56,000 soldiers by 5,000, the first shortfall by the Guard since 1994.
One main reason the Army has changed its quality standards is that it is entering the new 12-month recruiting cycle from one of its worst starting points in a decade.
Typically, the Army wants to enter each recruiting cycle with a cushion of incoming volunteers whose entry has been deferred from the previous year - about 35 percent of its overall goal for the year. But several weeks ago the Army projected that it would reach only 25 percent, and officials said Thursday that the cushion was actually only 18 percent.
The Army is adopting a range of incentives including bonuses, educational benefits and choice base assignments to help meet its recruiting and retention goals, as it typically has during years when it starts with so few recruits already identified. In addition, it is bringing on 1,000 new recruiters.
But aides to two Colorado lawmakers, Representatives Diana DeGette, a Democrat, and Joel Hefley, a Republican, said their offices had received calls from several soldiers at Fort Carson, as well as Fort Riley, Kan., and Fort Lewis, Wash., complaining of pressure to re-enlist with the alternative being deployment to Iraq.
One sergeant at Fort Carson, who served nearly a year in Iraq with the Fourth Infantry Division's Third Brigade and whose enlistment is to end in February 2006, said Thursday that he would take his chances on being reassigned rather than re-enlist.
"I can understand we're in a war, and extraordinary things happen in war, but the Army is moving the goal posts on me," the sergeant said in a telephone interview, speaking on condition of anonymity.
A spokesman for Fort Carson, Lt. Col. Dave Johnson, said a new Army program to create more stable units whose members will stay together for three years required troops whose enlistments end before December 2007 to re-enlist, extend their current enlistments a bit or take no action and possibly be assigned to another unit.
But Colonel Johnson said the Army was looking closely at each soldier's record and was not using the threat of Iraq deployment to increase re-enlistments. "We're not strong-arming anyone," he said.
After all, it's Kerry that says he'll find (somewhere) another 40,000 troops. How low will the standards have to be lowered to meet that goal?
Unfortuantely, it's Bush who has to somehow spin this, because it's the mess in Iraq that is to blame for this problem. That's why we're stretched thin - and a lot of people are declining to sign up because they don't want to get shot at or blown up in Iraq, where there are no WMDs and Saddam's gone and it's still a mess. It's a mess that has happened on Bush's watch, so it's hard to "spin" this in a way that hurts Kerry more than Bush. As a conservative Republican, one of the reasons I've opposed the Iraq invasion from the beginning is because I saw a mess in the making - and feared it would bring the Democrats back to the White House.
"But they amount to the first relaxation in Army recruiting standards since 1998, when a strong economy was hurting military recruiting. "
Sounds like a string economy is hurting military recruiting.
Ping
Looks like the beginnings of another "Project 100,000."
The country needs to pull it's head out of the rectal defalade position. The Draft was not a dirty word in WWII and it should not be one now.
Sorry, but I think you're way off on why we're stretched thin. I was senior enlisted back in 98' and worked hard against the tide of eroding pay, high peacetime optempo, lack of material support and PC policies which caused good Sailors to leave the Navy in droves. It was so bad that the Navy instituted a mandatory Recruiting Duty policy for every Sailor leaving Sea Duty which exacerbated the problem (Recruiting Duty is brutal).
Clinton supposedly left the country a military that was able to fight a war in two theatres simultaneously. After eight years of cuts do you think we can handle Iraq and North Korea at the same time?! Did he mislead american people about the readiness of our military?
After the demise of the Soviets Bush senior left a plan to cut Army Divisions from 27 to 16 with an absolute minimum of 14. Clinton the great legacy builder cut Army Divisions back to 12 with the understanding that the reserves would augment regular forces during the time of war. Currently, 40,000 personnel billets are being transfered from the Air Force and Navy to the Army and Marine Corps to mitigate the Clinton end strength shortfall. It will take years to integrate and build the infrastructure to support them.
I'm truly surprised that retention and recruiting is a high as it is. Having to endure back to back to back deployments while the Democrats actively undermine morale and encourage the enemy must be taking it's toll.
I'll say this while the current President has tasked the force heavily, he has provided landmark pay and benefit increases to the active and retired force. Active pay is up 30 percent, Tricare for life and concurrent receipt have finally been delivered for retirees. Even little things like reduced SGLI premiums with free coverage for family members and free full coverage replacement insurance for household goods damage during PCS moves help retention. Trust me after 13 moves the previous treatment of losses and damages was scandalous.
Another thing to remember, during the 90's we flew over 400,000 flights over the skies of Iraq. That's 80 flights a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year while Osama flew around the gulf on the Afghani national airliner like Mick Jagger on tour and and trained 18,000 terrorists. Our aircraft were being shot at on a daily basis and in my opinion that situation was allowed to fester too long. At the time of the Iraqi invasion 13 tons of Saddams WMD were still unaccounted for.
The Bush Doctrine while painful is changing the world. Libya and Pakistan have capitulated it's WMD program's.
The terrorist can't train more terrorist on an annual basis than the FBI turns out new agents. The Syrians are turning around and were no longer funding the North Koreans $800 million in patsy money to not build nukes. We'll starve them out.
That does not imply "courage" to me. One of the first things President Bush should have done after 9-11, instead of telling the country that we are at War - go shopping, is called for the Congress to pass a Draft Bill. Whether or not we needed it at the time is irrelevant. That would have shown "courage" to me.
The Times article is sounding an alarm because the waiting list has shrunk from 35 percent to 18 percent of next year's requirements.
The Times article also tries to blur the distinction between full time Army and Reserve soldiers to make the problem seem worse.
Finally, our enemy is more international than John Kerry and Democrats are willing to admit. (I've lost the FR link to a page of Hussein's terrorist connections. Perhaps someone else can provide that. The 911 report outlies any number of Hussein-terrorist links.) But we didn't start this war and it's not like Bush attacked Norway. Iraq violated the Gulf War truce agreement in any number of ways besides giving sanctuary to a variety of terrorists and hosting terrorist training camps. Considering his hatred for the Bush family and America in general and considering his sadistic nature, isn't it logical that he would attack us directly or pass weapons and money onto those who would?
Kind of hard to win an election and run a country when you only have one supporter.
You have to be just plain silly to think the first thing that the president should have done after 9/11 is call for a draft.
Sometimes the hyperbole on FR can become a serious distraction.
I am puzzled by the persistence of some people in their advocacy of a draft. Tommy Franks has said a draft would be ineffective. Many other military officers and experts have stated a draft would be counter productive.
The reason is because 1) We have enough volunteers. 2) This is not WWII or the Civil War or the War for Independence. This is not a tank battle with a large foreign power either. This is a war with a nearly invisible enemy that requires large numbers of special ops and intelligence personnel. 3) It takes several years to properly train these professionals and draftees would be civilians again before they could be trained and form effective units. 4) Draftees lower the moral of the military. 5) A draft would give aid to our enemies. I don't mean terrorists, I mean liberal and socialist politicians. That's why every bill in Congress calling for a draft is sponsored by Democrats.
Those calling for a draft are either Democrats who want to recreate the Viet Nam anti-war scenario as closely as possible or people who lack faith in a volunteer military or lack faith in Americans to defend themselves or just want to spread suffering or something. I really don't get the infatuation with a draft considering the idea defies all logic and experience.
This article doesn't match what was in the Washington Times:
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20040930-122138-5753r.htm
I thought they said recruitment goals were being met.
Bad news does not get better with age. No matter who gets elected, the issue will be on the front burner next year. The deployment tempo is starting to drive good people out of the military - if they can get by the stop/loss orders.
The President should have struck when the iron was hot. In the days and weeks following 9-11, Americans, and in turn, Congress would have supported him in giving the administration authority to conscript as a contingency. It would be behind us, but because that did not happen - it is all politics now.
Of course this is not WWII (or any other conflict), it is this conflict - the WOT - a war like no other. This is the 'greatest generation' and with the proper leadership, Americans rise to the occasion, whether they are drafted or they enlist.
Still schilling for the DNC I see.
It's a hard job, but somebody has to do it!! I wonder if they pay for his ISP.
LOL!
Maybe, would explain alot.
Especially the continuous push for a draft and the whining that Dubya's children should be in uniform and serve in Iraq besides the constant doom and gloom predictions of Iraq spinning into gory gloom and defeat.
They apparently forgot the Prime Minister Allawi lives there, knows the situation over there, and said that free elections could be 'held today in 15 of 18 provinces.'
On the retention front, both the Guard and Army reserves will miss targets slightly — by 1 percent and 3 percent, respectively, the Army projects.
Thanks for the link, but the Washington Times article doesn't paint a prettier picture either, IMHO.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.