Army running out of dupable dolts

Volunteer force may be 'severely degraded' soon, retired general says

By Leo Shane III, Stars and Stripes
Pacific edition, Saturday, November 18, 2006

WASHINGTON - The all-volunteer force could be "severely degraded"
within two years unless major recruiting and retention reforms are made
soon, according to a retired Army four-star.

"We're in trouble," said retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey, former
commander of U.S. Southern Command. "We're making some very short-term
decisions. This is a problem of resources and political will."

McCaffrey, speaking on a panel at the Military Officers Association of
America symposium, military base pay isn't high enough to entice the top
high schoolers to enlist, and politicians haven't done a good enough job
appealing to Americans' sense of duty to help with recruiting.

"I don't believe we've ever fielded a more effective fighting force
than we have today," he said.

"But we've had some problems in the last year with the number and
quality of people coming into the armed forces. Generally speaking we've
quadrupled the number of the lowest mental categories. We've quadrupled the
number of high school graduates. We're putting 6,000, 7,000, 8,000 moral
waivers into the armed forces."

The panel on Thursday said recent recruiting difficulties are a
combination of a lack of emphasis on military service in society and the
heavy deployment of both active duty and reserve forces. And the experts
said if those issues aren't addressed, the recruiting difficulties will only
grow, jeopardizing the readiness of the military.

Lt. Gen. Michael Rochelle, the Army's deputy chief of staff, said the
current recruiting environment may be the most challenging the service has
faced since the draft ended 33 years ago.

He pointed to high schools and colleges who block military
recruiters - and noted the San Francisco Board of Education's recent
decision to end JROTC programs there - and indications that the general
public has not put enough emphasis on the importance of serving the country.

William Chatfield, director of the selective service program, said
that military recruiting has evolved into "what the Army can do for young
people, not what they can do for their country."

Stephen Duncan, director of the National Defense University's
Institute for Homeland Security, said one of the side effects of moving to a
voluntary military from the previously drafted forces was a lack of
connection between combat overseas and U.S. society as a whole.

"Now we're in a situation where the folks who step forward to
volunteer are paying a disproportionate share for the freedoms of everyone
else," he said.

Other panelists noted that private contractors in Iraq can make
baseline salaries over $100,000, while young privates often make only a
small fraction of that amount.

McCaffrey said more bonuses and better base pay for young
servicemembers will help solve some of those financial problems.

But he said in order to make sure the military has enough people to
respond to future threats, Congress needs to increase the size of the entire
force: not just active-duty troops but also the reserves, Coast Guard and
border patrol units.

More people will mean more time between deployments and less reliance
on the reserves, he said.

"Are we undermanned? Of course we are, for god's sake," he said.
"We've
got to get our resources to match our rhetoric and our strategy."

But getting that larger pool will require action and more defense
funding from Congress, and more promotion of the military by politicians.

"I have not heard the commander in chief, any governor, any mayor, any
member of Congress ever stand in front of a TV camera and ask the country to
send their boys and girls to fight with us," he said.

"I've pushed the president to get that in one of his speeches. What I
heard was, in a speech at Fort Bragg, 'If you're considering a career in the
military there could be no more honorable way to serve.' That's not the
same. We need people to fight."

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