Army Stretched to Breaking Point

[Secretariat]

Interesting AP article.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060125/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/army_breaking_point

Study: Army Stretched to Breaking Point
By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer

WASHINGTON - Stretched by frequent troop rotations to Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army has become a "thin green line" that could snap unless relief comes soon, according to a study for the Pentagon.

Andrew Krepinevich, a retired Army officer who wrote the report under a Pentagon contract, concluded that the Army cannot sustain the pace of troop deployments to Iraq long enough to break the back of the insurgency. He also suggested that the Pentagon's decision, announced in December, to begin reducing the force in Iraq this year was driven in part by a realization that the Army was overextended.

[lsbets]

I wouldn't totally disagree. In another thread last week I posted that we need more divisions. I think almost everyone in the Army since the 90s has known that we cut back too far. The realignment of the divisions from three brigades to four helps, but I still think we need about four more divisions in the active force. I am not inclined to say "breaking point" - there is still no doubt that we have the best trained, best equipped Army in the history of the world, but even with the pace of commitments in the late 90s the force wasn't large enough.

[JustRalph]

That is what you do with your armies..........you deploy them and use them to their fullest extent. Haven't you ever played risk?

[Tom]

I heard this on the radio yesterday - ls, can you verify?

"Everyone in uniform today either enlisted or re-enlisted since 9-11-2001. Everyone in uniform today knew full well what was at stake when they signed on."

[lsbets]

Tom - enlistment contracts run anywhere from 2 to 8 years. For officers, we have a similar 8 year commitment, however, we don't get an end date - our status is "indefinate". In order for an officer to get out, he would have to resign his commission. Using myself as an axample, I had a 3 year active duty commitment, with no reserve obligation, so I only needed to be in the IRR (Individual Ready Reserve) when I left active duty. I served 3 and a half years on active duty, and then went in the IRR. On Sep 12, 2001 I found a reserve unit and started drilling again. If I got tired of drilling, I could transfer back to the IRR and no one could stop me - I have no obligation to drill. I have also served beyong the original 8 years, so I could resign my commission if I were so inclined.

Back to the enlisted side, and CJ might also have some insights on this, but most folks do not reenlist for the full 8 years. Also, back around 99 or so, senior NCOs had their reenlistment status changed to indefinate. I am not sure at what point they have to reenlist indefinate, but I think it is either at E-7 or around 12 years. So, there are people who reenlisted before Sep 11, 2001, but those people would be the career folks. In the junior ranks - enlisted and junior NCOs, I would say that well over 90% have either enlisted or reenlisted since Sep 11, 2001.

Ralph - I do not agree with the article's assesment, and I stated that. What I am saying, and have said since 1996, is our Army is too small. Bush I cut it back too far, and the trend continued under Clinton. While we were cutting our forces back, we hadn't restructured our military, so we had an Army designed to fight the Soviet Union in the Cold War. We have made signifigant progress over the last couple of years restructuring the force to make it lighter and quicker to deploy, and one of the keys to that was the "Brigades of Action." Unfortunately, there were folks in the senior ranks whose vision of how to prepare the Army for the future was by issuing everyone berets. Fortunately, those folks are gone now. I just believe that we need more divisions in the active force.

[JustRalph]

LS, I was being a little flip with Sec and his usual posting of something that he thinks bolsters his misquided opinions.

I agree with your assessment that the military is too small. I am for all young men and women serving for 2 years minimum. Let's get it going..............

Write your Congressmen..............get on it Sec!

**edit*** These google ads are pretty smart...........I found something to buy!

http://militarysearch.usptgear.com/Share/utils/view.asp?ProdID=VET-AIRF_NVY

Now if they just had a hat that said.............

"Served in the Boring ass eighties.............."

[46zilzal]

I agree with your assessment that the military is too small. I am for all young men and women serving for 2 years minimum.

Why? A lot of people want NOTHING to do with ANYTHING military

[JustRalph]

Why? A lot of people want NOTHING to do with ANYTHING military

Ok, Mr. Clinton..............I understand you loathe the military. Get over it.
It instills lots of good things in a young person........that is about as generic as I can put it.............without getting into a thread fight with you. I know how you feel already. And so does everybody else. consider the bait "not taken"

[46zilzal]

nothing to do with bait. If they GUB'MENT offered an alternative of something akin to the old Civilian Conservation Corps and offered younsters money for school, they would have more takers about giving up two years

[JustRalph]

nothing to do with bait. If they GUB'MENT offered an alternative of something akin to the old Civilian Conservation Corps and offered younsters money for school, they would have more takers about giving up two years

Business as usual. Offer another government handout.........we're done here.........

[46zilzal]

handout? Akin to the Peace Corps, that institution allowed individuals the chance to help DOMESTICALLY. They worked for their money

[46zilzal]

The program had great public support. Young men flocked to enroll. A poll of Republicans supported it by 67 percent, and another 95 percent of Californians were for it. Colonel McCormick, publisher of the Chicago Tribune, and an implacable hater of Roosevelt, gave the CCC his support. The Soviet Union praised the program…perhaps it saw a touch of socialism. A Chicago judge thought the CCC was largely responsible for a 55 percent reduction in crime by the young men of that day.
By April 1934, the Corps, now on a firm foundation, faced the beginning of its second year with near universal approval and praised of the country. This young, inexperienced $30-a-month labor battalion had met and exceeded all expectations. The impact of mandatory, monthly $25.00 allotment checks to families was felt in the economy of the cities and towns all across the nation. More than $72,000,000 in allotments was making life a little easier for the people at home. In communities close to the camps, local purchases averaging about $5,000 monthly staved off failure of many small businesses. The man on the radio could, for a change, say, "There's good news tonight."

News from the camps was welcome and good. The enrollees were working hard, eating hearty and gaining weight, while they improved millions of acres of federal and state lands, and parks. New roads were built, telephone lines strung and the first of millions of trees that would be planted had gone into the soil. Glowing reports of the accomplishments of the Corps were printed in major newspapers, even in some that bitterly opposed other phases of the New Deal. President Roosevelt, well pleased with his "baby," announced his intention to extend the Corps for at least another year.

[Tom]

yadda yadda yadda......and offerd not one shred of protection to our country. 1934....the alternative was the soup kitchen.

The Peace Corp would be useless against Al Qeda.

[Snag]

If the Military was not stretched, the Bush bashers would be calling for his head for not doing enough. We sat on our thumbs for 8 years of Clinton and that didn't get us anything but 9-11.


Come on. You can't have it both ways.

[46zilzal]

protection was not the idea: service was

[ljb]

46,
You are wasting your time trying to talk common sense to these few. They just try to make light of anything that does not fit into their prescribed agenda.

[Bobby]

Pay trillions for a war that's accomplished nothing. Just more terrorists than ever now. Hamas terrorists had a strong showing in the elections today in Palestine.

join the military first, then get an education . . . yea you be sure and tell your son or daughter to do that first.

[Tom]

protection was not the idea: service was

We were talking about the army and protection.

[rrpic6]

46,
You are wasting your time trying to talk common sense to these few. They just try to make light of anything that does not fit into their prescribed agenda.

I'm going to cut that quote out and hand it to every Rush Limbaugh DittoHeadCase that I know.

[JustRalph]

I'm going to cut that quote out and hand it to every Rush Limbaugh DittoHeadCase that I know.

:sleeping:

[ljb]

:sleeping:
Here's the first one. :D :D :D

[Bobby]

Here's the first one. :D :D :D
:lol: :lol:

[Secretariat]

LS, I was being a little flip with Sec and his usual posting of something that he thinks bolsters his misquided opinions.

I agree with your assessment that the military is too small. I am for all young men and women serving for 2 years minimum. Let's get it going..............

Write your Congressmen..............get on it Sec!

"

I can't beleive it. You and I are in full agreement on something. I have always been in favor of a draft for exactly your reason. As you said:

"I am for all young men and women serving for 2 years minimum."

This is a big problem. Without everyone having to be involved, only those who feel a strong personal need, OR those who join for financial reasons serve. This leaves out a lot of people.

Additionally, an entire country forced to serve heightens the reasons for going to war. I want GW's kids and Congressmens kids and grandkids to serve in the front lines so they realize what they've got so many familes involved in. But will it happen? Not a chance as Michael Moore displayed in F911. You may quible with his methods, but the point is made. THe people who send people off to war generally don't have their sons and daughters actually going off to fight in those wars.

Not always so. In the Revolutionary War. Even in the old Athenian democracy all citizens were required to serve.

So JR, we actually do have a common itnerest. And I have written my congressman, but nothing back. btw...their kids are not serving.

[46zilzal]

Rumsfeld Says Military Not Overextended

By Lolia C. Baldor / Associated Press

WASHINGTON - Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld on Wednesday disputed reports suggesting that the U.S. military is stretched thin and close to a snapping point from operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, asserting "the force is not broken."

"This armed force is enormously capable," Rumsfeld told reporters at a Pentagon briefing. "In addition, it's battle hardened. It's not a peacetime force that has been in barracks or garrisons."

Rumsfeld spoke a day after The Associated Press reported that an unreleased study conducted for the Pentagon said the Army is being overextended, thanks to the two wars, and may not be able to retain and recruit enough troops to defeat the insurgency in Iraq.

[PaceAdvantage]

46,
You are wasting your time trying to talk common sense to these few. They just try to make light of anything that does not fit into their prescribed agenda.

Wow, and I was just going to say the same thing....but to someone else....funny how that works out....

[PaceAdvantage]

Pay trillions for a war that's accomplished nothing. Just more terrorists than ever now.

Really? Where? Did the "Terrorist Census Takers" release their report yet?

[Secretariat]

Rumsfeld Says Military Not Overextended

By Lolia C. Baldor / Associated Press

WASHINGTON - Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld on Wednesday disputed reports suggesting that the U.S. military is stretched thin and close to a snapping point from operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, asserting "the force is not broken."

"This armed force is enormously capable," Rumsfeld told reporters at a Pentagon briefing. "In addition, it's battle hardened. It's not a peacetime force that has been in barracks or garrisons."

Rumsfeld spoke a day after The Associated Press reported that an unreleased study conducted for the Pentagon said the Army is being overextended, thanks to the two wars, and may not be able to retain and recruit enough troops to defeat the insurgency in Iraq.

Gen. Casey confirmed the study and agreed that while the army was stretched thin, said we still have the men to do the job if necessary.

[lsbets]

Gen. Casey confirmed the study and agreed that while the army was stretched thin, said we still have the men to do the job if necessary.

And he is 100% correct when he says that.