"So we’re not in much of a mood for retention lectures by people who downplayed those risks in the past."

The Military Officers Association of America weighs in on the GI Bill and the bullshit argument that Mc$ame and aWol are pushing that it would hurt retention, and as I can't say it any better than Col. Strobridge did, here is his editorial in full:

As I See It — Lecture Us Not on Retention

2008/05/19 00:00:00

By Col. Steve Strobridge, USAF-Ret. — May 19, 2008

The ongoing debate regarding potential retention impact of Montgomery GI Bill (MGIB) improvements has caused us to ponder what we do and don’t know about retention dynamics in the military.

No. 1: You have to provide a level of military pay that’s comparable with private-sector pay.

No. 2: You have to provide a system of special pays, bonuses, and other incentives that let the services compete for specific skills that are in high-demand in the civilian world or that undergo particularly high stress.

No. 3: You have to provide a system of institutional benefits that offset the unique, adverse conditions of service inherent in a two- or three-decade military career.

All of these components play key roles in the fundamental building of a common bond between the individual and the military institution — a commitment of servicemembers to their country and service matched by a reciprocal commitment of their country and service to protect their interests and those of their families and, in the worst case, their survivors.

In the late 1970s and again in the late 1990s, retention suffered when the country wasn’t keeping its end of the bargain. Since the turn of the century, Congress has acted in a number of ways to address a multitude of compensation and benefit shortfalls.

The current wartime atmosphere also has sparked a special warrior commitment among those in uniform. They’re employing all of their training on an important mission; they’re experiencing the psychic rewards of sacrificing for the common welfare; and they’re imbued with spirit, patriotism, and concern for their country, their mission, and their comrades in arms.

Recently, defense leaders have argued that rewarding this new “greatest generation” with a World War II-style MGIB (which would pay the full cost of a four-year college education at any state school) would undermine retention by encouraging troops to leave service.

We can’t buy either the principle of this argument or the retention projection behind it.

If any service manpower planner had been told in 2001 that combat troops would face a combat tour virtually every other year through 2008 — with no end in sight — they’d have uniformly predicted retention would be completely in the toilet by now.

The services are employing unprecedented retention bonuses, but even that doesn’t explain the current experience in the face of these extraordinary levels of sacrifice.

Further, for decades the Army has provided education “kickers” extending significantly larger MGIB benefits for soldiers in particularly critical skills. If the Army didn’t think that hurt retention in the most critical skills before, it’s hard to understand why it would now.

From the start of what Pentagon leaders acknowledged would be a “long war,” MOAA pushed for significant increases in ground forces to ease retention risks associated with excessive combat rotations. Until the past couple of years, the Pentagon adamantly denied any significant risk or any need for force increases. Now they can’t grow fast enough. So we’re not in much of a mood for retention lectures by people who downplayed those risks in the past.

MOAA strongly believes the current environment poses very real retention risks, but they stem from continuing oppressive deployment schedules, not from any proposed MGIB increase.

It’s now impossible to grow the force fast enough to quickly ease the terrible and repeated family separations and combat tours that are unprecedented since World War II, so we must demonstrate our reciprocal commitment in another way. And one good way is providing an MGIB benefit that’s more consistent with that offered the previous greatest generation.

Well said, Colonel. And with a lot-less profanity than I can manage when discussing this topic.

Gates Speaks About Taking Care of Troops, MRAPs

Defense Secretary Robert Gates recently gave a speech, emphasizing the need to take care of the troops over the need to prepare for future conflicts:

The Defense Department must focus on current war demands, even if it means straining the U.S. armed forces and devoting less time and money to future threats, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Tuesday.

Meeting the war-fighting needs of the troops now and taking care of them properly when they get home must be the priority, Gates said in a speech to journalists at a seminar here sponsored by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank.

"I have noticed too much of a tendency towards what might be called Next-War-itis — the propensity of much of the defense establishment to be in favor of what might be needed in a future conflict," Gates said.

But in a world of limited resources, he said, the Pentagon must concentrate on building a military that can defeat the current enemies: smaller, terrorist groups and militias waging irregular warfare.

If it means putting off more expensive weapons for the future or adding to the stress on the Army — that is a risk worth taking, he said.

Gates has announced his opposition to one reform that would ease the stress on recruiting and retain soldiers who wish to pursue an education:

Gates’ letter [to Congress] complicates Webb’s effort by opposing S 22 while favoring other bills that include a Pentagon and White House initiative allowing service members to transfer GI bill benefits to family members.

“It is essential to permit transferability of unused education benefits from service members to family,” Gates said in the letter to Sen. John McCain, ranking Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee and a co-sponsor of a Republican alternative bill, which was to be formally introduced on Tuesday. Transferability, Gates said, “is the highest priority set by the service chiefs and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, reflecting the strong interest from the field and the fleet,” Gates said.

Transferring benefits is good for the family but also good for the services by helping to keep people in the military while family members are using the benefits, Gates said.

Gates also restated long-standing Pentagon opposition to GI Bill educational benefits that are too generous, making it more likely for service members to leave the military to attend college. “Serious” retention issues are expected if benefits exceed the average monthly cost for a four-year public college, including tuition, room, board and fees, Gates said.

Webb’s proposal would pay full tuition and fees for a public college plus provide a monthly living allowance equal to the basic allowance for housing of an E-5, which would exceed the level Gates says is acceptable.

The Enhancement of Recruiting, Retention and Readjustment Through Education Act, cosponsored by McCain and other Republicans, provides $1,500 in basic monthly benefits plus $500 a year for books. It also includes transferability of benefits, with the right to transfer all benefits to family members after completing 12 years of service and to transfer half of earned benefits after six years.

The Republican bill might have attracted support from military and veterans groups if the more generous Webb proposal was not on the front burner. But the promises of full tuition plus stipend benefits, similar to what was provided after World War II, are very attractive to major veterans groups and to new organizations representing Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans.

A senior Pentagon official, speaking on condition of not being identified, said the McCain bill, co-sponsored by Republican Sens. Saxby Chambliss of Georgia, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Richard Burr of North Carolina, “is retention friendly. It gives education benefits a big boost, but not more than average national costs. We can manage retention at those levels, but S 22 is a retention killer.”

Webb, in an interview, described such arguments as "absurd."

The Department of Defense, he said, "is doing a very good job managing its career force, given the strains that are on it. But it's doing a very poor job of taking care of the people who don't come in for a career."

Raising GI bill benefits nearer to those offered to veterans returning from World War II, Webb said, will give every volunteer, particularly those with no intention of making the military a career, "a proper reward for their service" and a great tool for transitioning to civilian life.

Defense officials have to understand, Webb said, that a volunteer military is "only a career system to a certain point." The current system isn't properly rewarding those who enter "because of love of country, or family tradition, or the fact that they just want to serve for a while," he said.

The services, he said, "have got this one demographic group they keep pounding on and throwing money at. Yet there's a whole different demographic group that would be attracted to coming in and serving a term."

GATES on MRAPs



During the same question and answer period, Gates also spoke about the Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicle:

Gates pointed to the mine-resistant vehicles as an example of spending money now on critical lifesaving equipment, rather than pouring all resources into war-fighting systems of the future.

Roadside bombs and suicide attacks "have become the weapons of choice for America's most dangerous and likely adversaries — and the need to have a vehicle of this kind won't go away," he said.

Gates also issued a warning to the military services, which have long set their sights on pricey, sophisticated weapons systems that take decades to develop and get onto the battlefield.

The Army has its $200 billion Future Combat System, the Air Force has its F-22 jet fighter. Both programs have been plagued by delays and escalating costs, as well as criticism from Congress.

However, the MRAP vehicle has been cited as having already been compromised by an insurgent-deployed weapon that finds a vulnerability in the design:

The deaths of two U.S. soldiers in western Baghdad last week have sparked concerns that Iraqi insurgents have developed a new weapon capable of striking what the U.S. military considers its most explosive-resistant vehicle.

The soldiers were riding in a Mine Resistant Ambush Protective vehicle, known as an MRAP, when an explosion sent a blast of super-heated metal through the MRAP's armor and into the vehicle, killing them both.

Their deaths brought to eight the number of American troops killed while riding in an MRAP, which was developed and deployed to Iraq last year after years of acrimony over light armor on the Army's workhorse vehicle, the Humvee.

The military has praised the vehicles for saving hundreds of lives, saying they could withstand the IEDs, or improvised explosive devices, which have been the biggest killers of Americans in Iraq. The Pentagon has set aside $5.4 billion to acquire 4,000 MRAPs at more than $1 million each, making the MRAP the Defense Department's third largest acquisition program, behind missile defense and the Joint Strike Fighter.

The military has resisted efforts to find out what might be wrong with the MRAP:

The Marine Corps has ordered a civilian scientist to stop work on a report critical of its efforts to obtain new armored vehicles, saying he exceeded his authority, a Marine official said Tuesday.

Franz Gayl, a retired Marine officer and civilian science adviser, alleged in a Jan. 22 report that "gross mismanagement" of the program to quickly field Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicles had resulted in the unnecessary deaths of hundreds of Marines in Iraq. Gayl had planned to continue his investigation.

Retention problems come to the Air Force

We have been quite diligent at this blog where recruiting and retention issues are concerned, but for the most part, those posts have focused on the Army.

Now the issue is affecting the highly-technical Air Force. All across enlisted career fields, re-enlistment rates are falling precipitously. Especially among young Airmen on whom the service is depending to attend NCO leadership school and become the next generation of senior NCOs. A chasm is emerging in the E-5 through E-7 ranks that will impact the service for decades to come.

Let's look at the numbers: In 2004 the Air Force retained 70% of her enlisted personnel who were eligible for a third hitch. By 2007, that number had fallen to 53%. The percentage of Airmen opting for an initial re-enlistment declined from 63% to 55%.

Warning bells started ringing last spring when the Air Staff realized that retention rates for Airmen with between one and fourteen years in service had fallen for nine consecutive months. The steepest decline was for those with between six and ten years in uniform. The percentage of those personnel opting to remain in service fell from 75% to 65% in less than a year.

Declining retention creates a downward spiral for career fields. While the demands on airmen remain steady or increase, there are fewer experienced NCOs to lead and mentor younger airmen. That, in turn, accelerates airmen into leadership positions for which they lack adequate training and experience and requires veteran NCOs to fill multiple roles. Those pressures, in turn, lead to more NCOs leaving, renewing the cycle.

The Air Force considers 11 Air Force Specialty Codes to be labeled “stressed” because of a combination of retention problems, positions left vacant and operational demands. Altogether, the career fields represent nearly 44,000 airmen, about 17 percent of the enlisted force.

The AFSCs include jobs that have historically been hard to fill because of tough fitness standards and a willingness to be on the front line or sometimes behind it — combat control, tactical air command and control, pararescue and explosive ordnance disposal.

But the other stressed career fields could come as a surprise — contracting, pavement and structural construction, vehicle operations, security forces, and computer and network technicians.

When re-enlistment rates among stressed career fields are examined, the declines are steep.

Among security forces, a career field in which airmen are often deployed for half the year, re-enlistment rates for third terms dropped from 59 percent in 2004 to 40 percent in 2007. During the same years, the re-enlistment rate for airmen agreeing to a second term dropped from 56 percent to 39 percent.

Among contracting specialists, third-term re-enlistments dove from 60 percent in 2004 to 19 percent in 2007.

But concerns aren’t limited to these stressed AFSCs.

Re-enlistment numbers for midcareer NCOs are also significantly down for career fields that aren’t officially considered stressed — such as boom operator, avionics technician, air battle manager, safety, aerial gunner, maintenance management analyst and surgical service.

The Air Staff looks at the problems with retention and tries to cast them as a possible consequence of the Air Force draw down of forces under Rumsfeld, but while there is blame aplenty to heap on Rummy, the drawdown is a very small part of the problem.

The Air Force has been used to plug holes that should be filled by Soldiers and Marines. Air Force personnel have been dying in Iraq - a conflict that never enjoyed support among the enlisted personnel and junior and mid-grade officers. In other words, the people whose shoulders it would fall upon were smart enough to see what was coming.

Now, they are leaving.

The next president needs to appoint a Secretary of Defense who understands the issues facing all of our branches of service, and who is smart enough to listen and develop strategies to stop the bleeding.

Recruiting year off to a slow start

The Army started off the recruiting year with the lowest number of recruits signed up for Basic Training since the United States military became an all-volunteer force in 1973. Gen. William S. Wallace, commander of Army Training and Doctrine Command, told Pentagon reporters on Wednesday that the diminished number of delayed enlistment recruits in the pike will make it extremely difficult to reach the goals for 2008.

For the last two years, the goal of 80,000 new recruits has barely been met. To meet the numbers, qualified OCS candidates were not informed of the option (even though the Army is experiencing a paucity of Lieutenants and Captains). Additionally, the Army has been forced to admit a staggering percentage of recruits on waivers. In FY 2006, fully 17% of all recruits were admitted under waivers for psychological, criminal and health problems. Nearly one in five who were actively recruited, would not have gotten five minutes of a recruiters time five years ago.

In a perfect world, the recruiting year starts with 20,000 recruits, or 25% of the yearly goal, in the pike and scheduled for Basic. The remaining 60,000/75% are to be recruited over the course of the fiscal year. Last summer, the Army toted the board and realized they were not going to meet their 2007 numbers unless drastic measures were taken. Over 1000 former recruiters who had fulfilled their recruiting duties were sent back to the sales floor. Additionally, the Army instituted recruitment bonuses. Recruits willing to leave for basic training by the end of September (to bolster 2007 numbers) were offered healthy $20,000 bonuses - a years salary in many cases.

As a result of rushing recruits into uniform to meet the 2007 goals, the Army started this recruiting year with less than 7400 recruits, or a mere 9% of the 2008 goal, in the queue. “It’s going to be another tough recruiting year,” said General Wallace.

From Army Times:

The bonus program, which began July 25, was part of a last-minute push by the Army to meet its year-end recruiting goal, after having fallen short on recruiting numbers in May and June. It had the effect of getting many of the recruits who signed up after July 25 into basic training sooner than they would have otherwise, thus reducing the number with entry dates after Oct. 1.

“That is of concern for us because the delayed entry program gives us guaranteed enlistees to meter out across the year,” Wallace said. Without that cushion to begin the recruiting year, recruiters are going to have to sign up enough people to meet the existing goal as well as replenish the pool for next year.

Coupled with the recruiting problems are retention problems. The backbone of any military is the mid-level NCO's, and they are not reupping. Instead, worn out by repeated deployments and feeling a sense of futility about the misadventure in Iraq that has cost nearly 4000 American lives, they are opting to leave the service. These losses in leadership will undoubtedly haunt the military for the next two decades.

Without top-notch NCO’s the force suffers. They fill a unique role, because they manage both up and down the chain of command. They transmit orders to the troops they supervise, and they have great influence over the decisions made by the officers they serve.

NCO’s simultaneously prepare their units to complete their mission and know the personal pertinents of their personnel. They know whose kids are struggling to adjust, whose marriage is rocky, who is expecting a baby, whose mother is ill, who has an in-law “vacationing” on their couch and clueless about why they can’t come play. They have the standing to pull a green Lieutenant aside and tell him or her the real score.

These middle managers are especially important in wartime. Not the least of all among reasons: seasoned NCO’s keep Leiutenants alive long enough to become seasoned officers. There are more Sergeants leading Soldiers and Marines down dangerous alleys and on patrol than there are Lieutenants and Captains.

These are the enlisted personnel that an Army facing a three-decade rebuilding process after the folly of destabilizing and occupying Iraq needs to retain most, but they are not staying. Instead they are leaving in droves. And Sergeants who leave after 8, 12, 15 years in service are not G.I.'s who can be replaced at the local recruiting station.

Army recruiting and retention lagging for FY 2007

As if more proof was needed that the Army is broken and George Bush is the vandal that broke it; the Army is lagging both on new recruits and reenlistments. The situation with recruiting shortfalls is so dire – the Army fell 16% short of recruiting goals in June alone – that 1,106 former recruiters have been reassigned and ordered back to recruiting stations throughout the land. The sudden TDY reassignments will run from this coming Friday to 15 October. (FY 2007 ends on 30 September.)

From Army Times:

This surprise program comes at a time that Army recruiting has fallen on hard times.

The service missed its active-duty recruiting goal by 16 percent in June, the worst showing in two years. The shortfall was particularly worrisome to Army leaders because the summer, after students have graduated high school, typically is the best recruiting season.

While recruiters are running at 101 percent of their year-to-date mission of 51,150, Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey recently cautioned that the recruiting environment is “very difficult.”

The fiscal 2007 mission, which ends Sept. 30, requires Recruiting Command to generate at least 30,000 enlistments during the remainder of the summer. Included in that fourth quarter mission are enlistments for July, which have not yet been tallied.

Casey, who spoke during a recent town hall meeting at Fort Bliss, Texas, said more advertising and new programs are being developed to boost the recruiting effort.

Reenlistments are not faring much better, and in an effort to ameliorate that situation, the Army has restructured the reenlistment bonuses for many career fields, ranging from infantry, field artillery and special forces to medical personnel and quartermasters.

The retention goal for FY 2007 is 62,200 but by mid-July less than 50,000 soldiers with a termination date (ETS) before 01 October had reenlisted.

More significant, and not reported in the Army Times article is who is not reenlisting. The tragedy unfolding is due to the mid-level Sergeants who are bailing, burned out after repeated and extended deployments and strains on family life.

Non-Coms are the backbone of any military command structure, and this depletion in the numbers of seasoned NCO’s will have a deleterious effect on the ranks for the next quarter century. These are the soldiers that the Army most needs to retain, and they are leaving in droves.

[Cross-posted from Watching Those We Chose]

A Coming Crisis

I have long been beating the drum about the dearth of officers in our Army. But I overlooked the enlisted ranks. The Christian Science Monitor (one of the best examples of on-the-ground-reporting anywhere) reports that key enlisted personnel are exiting in alarming numbers, and if the trend continues, the Army faces a coming crisis. (I had an 'Oh, Fuck' moment when I read the article)

In 2005, the Army retained 96% of the mid-grade NCO’s whose enlistments were up. The first-quarter numbers for 2007 are in, and that retention number is down to 84%.

The reason for this decline is simple. I can give that answer in one word: Iraq.

Extended tours, repeated deployments, inadequate dwell time with family and friends between those deployments. It is wearing on the Army – which has born the brunt of fighting Bush’s vanity war.

Let’s just cut the crap – if you don’t have an adequate corps of seasoned Sergeants transmitting Officer’s orders and providing leadership – You don’t have a functioning Army. Lest anyone think otherwise, Sergeants run the Army.

So let’s put the state of the military in perspective:

First of all, readiness is suffering. Remember that during Hurricane Katrina, the Louisiana National Guard was unable to mount and adequate response, in part because most of their deep-water vehicles were in Iraq. Desert warfare has taken over – Mountain and amphibious training is not being done. Should the United States have to respond to an imminent threat, the engagement would take more time, cost more lives and money and have a lower chance of success because response / readiness has been undermined by the drain of Iraq.

Secondly, we are suffering a dearth of leadership. The Army is losing command level officers and mid-level Sergeants at a rate that is being felt now and represents a potentially catastrophic crisis of leadership in the future.

In the wake of Vietnam, the military had to be rebuilt, and the Honor Code had to be stitched back together bit by tattered bit. The challenge met by my husband and all of the rest who went in between 1976 and 1985 (the decade after the fall of Saigon) was a cakewalk in comparison to the rebuilding that will by necessity have to take place in the wake of Bush and his Iraq adventure.

In order to make recruitment goals, more and more concessions are being made. People who would not have made it in the door of a recruiting station five years ago are being pursued passionately. They keep loosening the rules so more people can meet the minimum standards for acceptance into service. If you still can’t get in, and you really want to serve, well by golly – we probably have a waiver right here with your name on it! Moral, criminal, physical, we got waivers! (Waivers here! Get your waivers!)

Gotta tell ya – I’m not getting a case of the warm fuzzies over here when I stop to consider all those hinky troops – being led by weak officers and NCO’s…The very thought unleashes horrors in my mind.

They are in the kitchen whipping up a recipe for disaster.

Someone turn off the gas.