Because a year in theater is almost like a vacation.
Army May Extend Tours Of Duty In Iraq
- Thread starter jimmydean
- Start date
And to think we used to bitch about being out to sea without beer for more than a month.
You may remove the word MAY now.
I think the next step is to put a limitation on early outs.
"I don't care if you're in a wheelchair, If you can hold a riffle, then you can return to duty..."
When I joined the guard back in 2003, it was an 8 year rotation. The Pentagon lifted that last year with the idea of "at least 12 months home" until last week when some guard units got notice they "might" be deployed in August. I think that cuts some of the soldiers time at home down to 8 months.
Good times, I'm sure. Most of the guys I was in the guard with get back from Afghanistan in 2 months with a majority of them slated to head to Iraq soon after.
huh, the current policy for Guard and Reserves is no more than a year mobilized at a time, than five years at home station before the next mobilization. Of course there are always exceptions to the rules. But there should not be any Guard/Reserve units heading back out after only 8 months at home. Active duty, yes. But not Guard/Reserve.
you sure it wasn't an 8 year contract when you joined?
you sure it wasn't an 8 year contract when you joined?
oh absolutely, but those were completely different. The soldiers were different, the fighting, equipment, everything about it.
Korean prostitutes helped him get through it...can you imagine trying to pick out a hooker that looks good to you when they are all dressed in burqas?
It was a 3 year contract (now finished thank God) and I never checked what the actual is, but 8 years is what the commander was tossing around when he was trying to get me to extend so I could volunteer for ANA.
As for the 5 years at home between mobilizations, that was pulled last year. I can't find the article now, but I know a lot of people who went to ANA to avoid going to Iraq. That is no longer the case.
<edit> Found an article.
Guardsmen to return to war sooner. New policy ends 5-year lag before second tour of duty.
Ok, now I'm tracking. You're right the 5 years at home policy is no longer a guarantee, but from what I understand that is still the goal. They dropped that policy so that they may be able to snatch up units sooner as needed, however the goal is still for one year over and five years at home.
I'm about 99% sure I heard 'ol Gatesy mention that during the Q&A after his press conference two hours ago. I'm looking for a transcript of it now but it probably still too soon to find one. DoD will probably have one on their site tomorrow.
*edit*
Transcript is up in DoD site. excerpt to follow.
The "goal" is great, but the reality is it aint going that way now and I doubt anything will change. To maintain the troop levels they have now, they will have all guard and reserve forces in rotation within 2 years at least.
At the rate the guard is losing troops (injury/death/ETS), they CAN'T be home for 5 years unless they stop deploying now. So the "goal" is pointless and that sucks for Bubba.
the military started implementing shorter tours in the vietnam era after finding that mental illness skyrocketed after a certain amount in the field.
we are setting ourselves up for disaster with iraq and afghanistan, not just abroad but when these vets return home.
Asian freedom hater....
Hawkeye, BJ and Hotlips were there for like 11 years......
I dunno about that. I'm reserve and have been back for over two years now. And I'm a stinkin MP in a combat support unit. We are a bit of a hot commodity. I thought for sure I'd be doing my second tour by now, but no word yet.
I don't really think that injuries and deaths are hurting troop levels too much. Maybe through retention, but thats about it. I mean, Army National Guard and Army Reserve have only suffered about 500 fatalities in this war. Sure, that sucks and is a lot of troops to be lost, but not enough to hurt the overall force levels.
The "goal" of five years at home is more to rebuild the individual units. When a unit first gets back they take their terminal leave for a few months before they return to drill. Then its all about personnel. They need time to replace some troops lost to ETS and unit transfers, and time to bring in the new trainees to the ranks (a year or so). Then they need some time to replace all the weapons and equipment they left in theater (another year or so). And then they need time to train up (another year or two) and then time to validate at JRTC or something similar, and then prepare for deployment (remaining time).
At least, thats the "goal." There will always be exceptions.
One of our kids (Mizn8's daughter) just signed up for the Army National Guard. She goes to boot in Jun after she graduates high school and will be in Iraq sometime in Jan. I tried to tell her that the Air Force was the way to go since it's almost like being in the real military... but she's all motivated to be a soldier.
We are very proud of her... although i know for a fact she has no idea what she's getting into... but she'll learn and I'm sure she will do well.
I can only speak from experience. My old unit (Infantry no less) had a retention rate of less than 20%. The number of troops that returned from Iraq who could return to Infantry duty was only about 70%. We lost 1 guy in Iraq and only 1 so far in Afghanistan.
My unit was so depleted due to retention and injury, it no longer exists. It was absorbed into the brigade to become part of the new restructuring plan prior to being sent to Afghanistan.
The main issue I see with extended deployments is the toll it takes on the soldiers. I worked as a retention officer for about 6 months working with the guys who came back. Every one of them told me if the Army used 6 month deployments like the Navy, they would have no issue going back. 12+ months gone is hard enough, but to be in theater for 12+ months is even worse. Nearly all of them had trouble with wife/employer/school when they got back. The length of time out of the loop is too great.
Rather than extending deployments, shorten them. Revamp drill weekends to be more meaningful so that the unit is ready to deploy NOW, not in 6 months. Deploy for 6 months with 2 years at home. 6 months is long enough to get the job done, but not so long that you lose touch with your job and your home life.
But that's only from what I've seen. What the hell would I know.
I can see both arguments on the deployment length issue. For one you are absolutely right that these longer tours are going to absolutely kill retention for both the active duty and reserve forces. But on the other hand the 6 month rotations may be too short for some units to be effective. Maybe not for Infantry and MP's. I mean we just break sh*t all day, but what about Civil Affairs guys and MI? I would think that it takes quite a while for a unit like that to get situated, comfortable in their surroundings, accepted by the locals, etc. I would think that they would just be gaining some trust and making some progress when they'd get replaced and the new unit would have to start all over. Maybe it depends on MOS?
Of course I'm just making assumptions here. I could be completely wrong. On my deployment the only locals I interacted with were usually in flexicuffs.
And I hear you on the retention. I'd guess that our unit is below 20% as well. The youngins don't know any better and the older vets are going for the long haul for retirement. The senior E4's through E6's really have no desire to remain in and are not reenlisting. And they are the backbone of the working force.
For me it was a question of $$$. They offered me a "bonus" to fast track through OBC and I would get $4k. But OBC is 6 months and during that time I would lose an estimated $30k (difference between my day job and O1-E pay for 6 months).
So for some people, it's a good thing. A Major friend of mine works for Nike. He was paid 100% of his salary for up to 18 months for military deployments. He makes $180k/year there and combine that with his danger pay and you have a very large bank account when he was done. He made Major during the deployment and reenlisted as soon as he got back.
Flip side:
An E5 friend of mine owned his own auto shop. He didn't make nearly enough to cover his shop without work and had to close up while he was deployed. He had to file bankruptcy protection shortly after he got back because of it. He has been back nearly 2 years and still hasn't fully recovered from the financial strain the deployment caused him. He did not reenlist when his ETS came up.
Both are Ranger qualified. Both are valued assets to the unit. But only one stuck around.
I was regular army, so I never got to see the effects of not working your regular job on soldiers. But, I was stationed at one of the most deployed posts in the military (Ft. Drum), and spent ~6 months out of 4 years stateside, most of that in the field training for the next deployment. And this was in "peacetime", and yes, I was in a combat unit.
The thing that pretty much made me not re-up wasn't the deployments, I actually would have volunteered if I wasn't already going, it was that I had to send one of my soldiers to prison because he had to go AWOL to see his child being born. The units, and the Army in general, have an unspoken policy of "The man only has to be there to make the kid, the rest is optional". And that wans't going to fly.
I can only imagine now what these 18 month deployments are going to do. Families that were already shaky from the start are going to be destroyed, fathers wont know their own kids.
people going awol?
You'd think that, but it takes awhile in country to actually get "your gamesense", as I called it. You learn to look for subtle tells of danger the longer you are in country.
A unit in a combat zone is at it's most vulnerable when it first gets in country, and as it is on its transition out.
Best make sure that Boy Wonder doesn't hear that anywhere, or no one is ever coming home...
gentlemen, i think i know how we can get our numbers back up:
Civilian Marksmanship Program
Civilian Marksmanship Program
anyone think they'll wait till the fall to harvest this crop?
i have an pristine M1 that came from that program... $500 (circa mid 80's)