Posted on 04/12/2007 8:59:57 PM PDT by PAUL REVERE TODAY
WASHINGTON, April 11 (UPI) -- The U.S. Army is struggling to convince recent West Point graduates to make the military their career. Recent graduates of the U.S. Military Academy are exiting active duty at the highest rate in more than three decades, the Boston Globe reported Wednesday. Many military specialists say repeated tours in Iraq are driving out some of the Army's best and brightest young officers.
Of the 903 officers who graduated from West Point in 2001, nearly 46 percent left the service in 2006. More than 54 percent of the 935 graduates in the class of 2000 had left active duty by this January, Army statistics showed.
In most years during the last three decades, between 10 percent and 30 percent of West Point graduates opted out after their mandatory five years of service, the newspaper reported.
Who cares. they served their obligation. Let them go. If the administration wants to wage war, then they need more troops to do it, and that costs money. don’t do it on the cheap and burn out the existing guys with repeated tours. These West Pointers see the writing on the wall. It will get worse unless we either ramp up the number of army (100,000 or so), or tell Iraq and Afghanistan its time to start ponying up. And those that stay, will make general.
Keep in mind that the classes of 2000 and 2001 started in 1996 and 1997 respectively, and those candidates who were actually honorable and interested in serving their country were possibly less likely to apply due to the CIC at the time. Thus, the candidate pool was tilted toward the "free education, five-and-out" contingent.
If my conjecture is correct, the situation will persist for the next few years, until the class of 2005 (started in the summer of 2001) hits the five-year point, and then the retention rate will start to come back up.
What does the military know that we don’t know? Why are anti-American illegal immigrants allowed to swarm over our borders? Why are West Point cadets refusing to make a career out of the Military? Do these three questions have any connection?
truth bump
The Army has been screwing certain of their Officers big time over the last few (likely many) years.
I am of the mind that Point men (and women) do not feel themselves to be the elite as they once did. Many West Pointers are by the way, political appointees, of a sort.
When those butter bars get into the units, they have to contend with some serious attitudes from Officers who are agenda driven.
The Army needs to do some serious house cleaning, on levels that most folks do not ordinarily think about.
I could write a lot about what the Junior Officer Corps is dealing with, and I have never even been one of them.
I just know a few who have been.
Most of the West Point cadets, could get into any school that they want. They want to be West Pointers.
It has little to do with the cost of the education that motivates them to go there, generally speaking.
yeah,
it’s called
decline of the roman empire, the sequel.
What about the Navy? What do the numbers at Annapolis say? Are the Marine officers leaving at the same rate? Where are they going? How many of those WP Grads are going into the civilian side of defense?
I think this is just the left finding another number they can twist to bash Bush and the war.
Great point. These were all Clinton appointees. The Army is better off without them. No doubt the ones who came in under our President will reverse the trend.
Well after being spit on, condemned, made fun of and defunded by Democrats, who can blame them?
As far as getting out when the commitment time is up.......I don’t know. I would think so if they don’t get paid a comparable salary. That’s the military. AND there is no point in making the military your career when they’re slowly taking away healthcare for when they retire.
Sounds like a typical BS article from the MSM
There is some real truth to that. I was a 4-year scholarship ROTC guy--same criteria as academy selection, but without the kiss-the-ass senatorial appointment. (There was no way I could get an appointment from Nuevo Mexico 'cuz my name doesn't end in -on, -es, or a vowel...)
I left in '95 as a Captain after my service obligation because the Army of the 90's sucked!
Along with my cohort, I was boarded to assess to active duty, then I was boarded to be retained on active duty after a year, I was boarded to 1LT! I was boarded again at 3 years to remain on active duty, then I was boarded to Captain and they only took the top 1/2!
The only time this happened before was after WWI. In the nineties, the Army was cut in half.
Of course as a junior officer working for a MAJ or CPT with a 'Russian Studies' or History Degree in 1995 was a nightmare, they would throw you under a bus to stay on active duty because there were no jobs for them 'on the outside'.
There is a huge gap in the army now at the senior major/LTC level. Nearly my entire year group left and the West Point grads of 2000 were left working for the guys who sucked more Clinton **** than Monica Lewinsky
Red hot economy...no surprise that these go-getters seek other opportunities.
Ping.
Thought you’d find this thread interesting.
Does anyone know what sex these people are?
Maybe war scared the ladies.
Meaning....?????
“Does anyone know what sex these people are?”
I don’t know the current numbers but by 1986 the attrition rate for the class of 1980 was 40% female to 25% male for West Point graduates, 23% to 11% for the Air Force Academy, 32% to 24% for Naval Academy graduates that went into the Navy, and 57% to 27% for the Annapolis grads that went into the Marine Corp.
I would like to see the updated numbers.
We do know that after combat started following 9/11, the enlistment rates for women and blacks plummeted for the military in general.
I wonder how many are actually Clinton era students who fought to get in for the education, prestige and couldn’t wait to get out to move on to something better?
I’d like to see some actual statistics too. Coming from the usual lamestream media, I can’t take their word for anyting.
I can vouch for that bit about the cost of education... I turned down a four year full ride (everything) scholarship plus a National Merit scholarship to go to West Point, and it’s going to cost me more money to go there than my other schools would. I do it because I want to, not because it’s free.
And I get a little tired of people dragging gender into subjects that aren't really relative.
And the questioning as to whether war is "scaring" the "ladies" is way off base IMO.
Look around and tell me how many American women you see serving in some capacity in Iraq.
Y'all can look around and verify that for me, can't you? ;-)
To demand that an obvious question not be asked, is to display deep rooted sexism.
“I don’t know the current numbers but by 1986 the attrition rate for the class of 1980 was 40% female to 25% male for West Point graduates, 23% to 11% for the Air Force Academy, 32% to 24% for Naval Academy graduates that went into the Navy, and 57% to 27% for the Annapolis grads that went into the Marine Corps.”
A couple of KEY points driving the numbers...
1. This report involves ONLY the graduating Classes of 2000 and 2001.
2. These classes started in 1996 and 1997 -— CLINTON ERA.
3. We were still sleeping, and the Academies were free education with little risk. For the most part — the Academies were NOT attracting the “warrior classes”..
4. The “warrior classes” are those men and women who went into the Acadamies AFTER 9/11/2001, KNOWING they were preparing for war.
5. I would EXPECT a high attrition rate from the classes of 2000/2001 for several reasons:
a. They did not expect to be serving in a war time military.
b. They were willing to serve under a draft dodging bastard like Clinton.
c. The utilization of our forces as “nation builders” instead of enemy destroyers — has had a negative effect.
d. The ROEs have also had a negative effect and led to unnecessary casualties.
e. The PC practice of bringing warriors to trial for actions taken in a war zone with only seconds to make decisions — is having a negative effect..
Semper Fi
I could have saved some time, if I had read your post before adding mine....
Good points!
Semper Fi
That West Point Ring counts for something in the Job Market. They did their minimum bit and cashed in.
Though not necessarily ideal in terms of being considered a control group - I believe the Army bears the brunt of the war in Iraq and Afganistan with boots on the ground - I wonder if similar trends might be found in the other service academies?
My brother graduated from Annapolis and went on to have a 20 year career in the Navy and the Reserve before retiring 5 years ago. With exception to extensive campaigns abroad while his family grew he loved it. However, he confided in me that the the Navy made it about as difficult as it could for him to stay. He said that their attitude toward him was that they knew he was going to leave so they treated him badly - this went on for 10 years.
Like many in the service my brother didn’t like to talk about this for 2 reasons; a) he didn’t like to criticize the service b) he told me that he was actually lucky compared to how others in his graduating class had been treated.
One shouldn’t look at this scenario in cold, hard technical terms, but if you remove all the sentiment of honor, patriotism and service to country, you could look at this situation in simple business terms with our personnel simply being “commodities” and “resources” driven by “market forces”.
Under such a scenario could any other enterprise survive in the market if it didn’t make good use of it’s resources? I should hope that some of the idiots serving our country through elected office would have a closer look at this problem, rather than being entangled in pork and non-binding resolutions!
God bless our troops for protecting our families!
The economy is the driving factor and they are getting out because there are jobs for them !
>>>West Point grads leaving U.S. Army
T’is true. Take for example the class of 1928. Not a single one of those slackers is still on the payroll.
The military is too stretched. We are going to see guys getting out of the military like flies at some point. There will be a breaking point.
We and the Administration expected way too much from a very small military...American is not at war but the soldiers,marines,sailors, and airmen are.
This is an Army-wide problem. Captains are leaving in droves - especially after a couple of tours in Iraq and/or A-Stan. The selection rate to Major, ideally, should be around the 70% mark. In the last two to three years the rate has been in the high nineties. If a Captain sticks around to make Major, he generally will stay for at least 20 years.
Re your post #25.
I think you’re right on, Brother!.....Semper Fi.
“Given the nature of the military and its mission, sex is absolutely relevant. To deny that is to live in a fantasy world.”
Hear, hear.
Maybe you should see what happened to the West Point Class of 1966....
Coming from a background almost identical to these young officers (my academy was a few hundred miles to the south of West Point), it's easy to rebel at the situation in which Rumsfeld, GWB and the current crop of political generals have put these captains and within the zone for promotion to major. They've been tasked to command troops in a futile, no-win battle in which they are ordered to allow mission accomplishment to become secondary, or even tertiary, to casualty phobia and sparsity of force application driven by venile political concerns.
Read the comments of the recently retired and dissenting generals in the February or March issue of Vanity Fair and the entire rationale' and explanation of the facts extant in the post come clear.
Indeed, my oldest son (USMA '94), acknowledged these realities on his last visit home in Januaary after returning from his second visit to Iraq (and one to Afghanistan). Even he, with a male family tradition of career military service reaching back to the Civil War, was disheartened enough to confess his frustration and the transient thoughts going back for a graduate degree as a civilian. He is scheduled for yet another deployment in June and is now back at the National Training Center in the California desert; a battalion commander of infantry.
We have become victims of the most inept and corrupt administration in modern U.S. history. That is a sentence I never thought I'd utter about a president for whom I worked diligently in Florida, assisted as part of the 2000 legal team of volunteers, raised money and considering the immediate preceeding eight years of Bill Clinton.
It pains me to say these thing, not because I, as so many others have been fooled, but because they're true.
It seems to me that those leaving because of repeated tours in Iraq are NOT the Army's best.
I suspect that the leadership’s leanings toward a politically correct armed forces have a lot to do with it. Being an army officer is a thankless job in the best of times. When you’ve got to accommodate pointless bull$#!* in the name of PC as well, and your career hangs in the balance, then it could very easily become no longer worth it.
How many times does one have to put one's life on the line for it to be enough?
If anything, it will get worse!
It is, for some, a poor career choice. For a professional soldier there is nothing more compelling than a war.
I sadly agree.
As long as votes can be bought by mega, multi-national corporations, it's only going to get worse - regardless of what "letter" our leaders wear.
Yeah, right.
These guys (and gals) are fighting a war they won't be allowed to win, while leaving behind spouses and children for repeated extended tours. And they might get killed for that?
Top priorities include family and staying alive. This war is NOT WORTH IT. The administration is inept and corrupt.
A stat that might be meaningless. Tell me the 5-year ‘drop rate’ during Vietnam (’72 -75). Then we’ll talk. Academy grads are human beings & they have other options. It shouldn’t be surprising that the rate increases during wartime.
What are they opting out for? 4x annual pay with a civilian contractor supporting the WOT?
The Islamic Republic of Iraq.
Anything less than total war is immoral, and these young officers instinctively know this. That's why they're leaving.
I wouldn’t go so far as to call the administration corrupt, but inept is right on the money.
My family and my husband’s family both have a long tradition of military service. The pattern is to serve for several years and then come home to the family business. However, I have quietly been encouraging my children to skip military service.
When we have less than total war, when warfighters on the battlefield have to call back to CENTCOM and play “mother may I” with a JAG before they can kill a terrorist, when we prosecute Marines for killing the enemy on the battlefield, I don’t want my kids involved in that. Our military is designed and structured to win wars, not nation-build. We are asking these young men and women to do something they are not trained to do, then complaining when it doesn’t go well.
The officers who survived the Clinton purges are now running the military, and many, if not most of them are simply not fit. With few exceptions, they are politicians, not warfighters, and they make decisions accordingly. They’re the type to tell the administration what they think it wants to hear, not want it NEEDS to hear.
Love your tagline!
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