The Command T.O.C.

Stop Loss (And Therefore IRR Recalls) Will Continue Through 2009

The military has now stated that the "back door draft" policy of stop loss will continue through 2009. I also am very certain, given this policy, that the IRR recalls will continue through at least this time as well. LTG Thurman, in an AP article stated that the need will continue through 2009 as "Demand is greater than Supply".

Of course, this absolutely flies in the face of the fact the military continues to say they are meeting recruiting goals. How can both of these exist unless the recruiting goals are set so low that they know, in advance, even by hitting the goals they will not have enough soldiers? The IRR recall and stop loss are great money savers for the military. They get soldiers without the long term costs of retirement as they know most will get out before retirement age (since they did not want to be there in the first place). So, it is my contention that the military is trying to get soldiers on the cheap and this practice will continue for far longer than 2009.

Another activity which will require the next President to have to make the tough decision. This current yahoo in office has basically decided to abdicate any decision and let the next guy/gal "clean it up".

The Army is Far More Broken Than Even I Imagined

I have been writing for a long time about the bad effects of the Iraq war on our Military (mostly Army) and therefore our national security. While sounding counterintuitive,  I believe the strain we have put the Army under has made us far LESS SECURE than we were before we invaded Iraq. Our Army is at it's breaking point and no one can deny that anymore.

I am on many bulletin board sites interacting with soldiers to collect first hand what it is like to be in the Army today. I was recently shocked by the description of the career of an officer, who screwed up it is, and why they are all getting out. Here, I re-post this entirely and hope you read it. It should tell show you that even if this officer is 1/2 right, the Army is a disaster and not just stretched but actually broken. Here goes:

"For the benefit of those who haven't been in active service for a while, here is a look at lifecycle management's effect on officers.

Most BCTs fall under what is called lifecycle management. This was created to provide stability and predictability and intended to be a 3-year cycle from stand-up thru deployment, however in practice its more like 2 to 2.5-years (much to the chagrin of HRC). Lifecycles are stop loss/stop move environments. Once you're in, it is difficult to get out (possible, but not likely. Its ultimately up to the BDE CDR). Lifecycles culminate upon redeployment. To help you understand the lifecycle, I'll use an example of a new BCT."

Army Captains Leaving in Droves; Military Needs to Bribe Them

All I ever hear from the military clan is that those who serve do so out of "love for Country" and patriotism. Well, apparently that is not enough to keep them in the Army during a time of war. Like normal people working at normal companies, it seems it all comes down to cash.

The Army, facing a huge drain on Army Captains (the future leaders of the Army) has decided to try to bribe them to stay. They are offering bonuses of up to $35K. Kind of like a signing bonus for people who already are in the Army. Even with that the Army does not think it will be enough to retain these "patriots". The Army says:

"The cap on the dollars is purely pragmatic, according to Dan Goure, an Army expert and vice president of the Lexington Institute, a defense think tank in Virginia: “There’s a limit on what the Army can spend.”

With the current wars and their related costs, there just isn’t enough money for higher bonuses, Goure told Stripes in a Thursday telephone interview.

“What we have is five pounds of need and a three-pound sack of money,” he said."

I just find it funny that the Military has us all convinced that somehow they serve a higher calling and are somehow "better" than the rest of us. Well, it appears they are JUST LIKE the rest of us. Give them enough money and they will do anything. Hold back the money and they quit.

What If The Soldiers Come Home to.. A Dead Economy?

First, I apologize for not writing for a while. I took a much needed vacation and when I came back, as usual, there was a lot of "catching up" to do. I am back however and have a lot of thoughts I want to share. The biggest one is on the economy.

Many years ago, back when this blog was actually hosted at a completely different site, I wrote a piece called "What if the Soldiers Came Home and There was No Country?". The basic theme of this was while the soldiers were fighting for "freedom" (I cannot remember which excuse it was back then.. started with WMD, then went to Get Saddam and then to freedom for Iraqis .. let's just call it freedom) our Country's economy was in a shambles. Our debt was out of control (both trade deficit and public debt), the personal debt was out of control, companies were moving production overseas at a rapid pace and the leeches on Wall Street were extracting more and more of the wealth from the people who were really doing the work. My fear at that moment was the soldiers would eventually come home and find the Country they were defending was in tatters as the swarm of grasshoppers who consumed the land had moved on to other pastures.

This was, of course, a prediction and like any prediction it was tough to prove. The warning signs were all there but you could not prove it. The expected right wing lunies came on the site to say "No, everything is fine.. don't worry...". In fact, I remember one statistic they used to tout was to "look at home ownership" and how rich people are with their homes.

Well, I think the announcement by GE yesterday was kind of the solidifying force which told the Country that yes, we are in a recession and yes, things are really really bad. Yes, the soldier is coming home to a Country in tatters. Of course, the White House is quick to bail out Wall Street with a "Bear Stearns" bail out but thinks the "market" should handle the fact that many are losing their homes. A very predictable response from this administration.

At the end of the day, the Bush administration will be the one known as the administration which brought the United States on the brink of collapse. We are caught up in wars we have no business in, our economy is beyond a recession (can anyone spell depression), our military is busted and we are far less safe and far less comfortable than we were just a few short years ago.

This is the legacy of the Bush administration. It would not be so amazing if it were not so predictable. Many on the left predicted this and because it took a while to develop the right wingers continued to say we were "nay sayers". Well, here we are.

Osama Bin Laden could not have dreamed of a better outcome than what he has been handed by the Bush Administration. He must be celebrating wildly that he suckered Bush into this disaster.

UPDATE: Here is what the G-7 Has to say about the World Economy and the slide in the dollar.

The Strain of The United States Army is Becoming Unbearable

I have written a lot about the strain the US Army is under due to the ill-fated Iraq war decision. This was foreseen and predicted by many experts and even a few non experts like myself. Reuters has written a great article on this and discusses some of the strain the Army is under as it conducts nation building. A few quotes:

"Some U.S. soldiers are now on their third or fourth tours. Deployments have been extended from a year to 15 months, with only a year at home between tours."

The outcome on families and relationships has been devastating (Link is to an incredible story) with wives, girlfriends, fiancees leaving as they cannot take the strain of the deployments either. The story goes on:

"it [war in Iraq] exposed a medical system that was ill-equipped to provide long-term care for a large number of wounded warriors.    

It has eroded the U.S. military's ability to fight another major war. Commanders have said the Air Force and Navy would likely have to take the lead if a new conflict arose, because ground forces are so stretched."

It is incredible that Bush has allowed this to happen to the organization that he is supposed to hold in high esteem. I think the "1-2" that George Bush has pulled on the military is astounding. They love him because they think he is a "tough guy" yet he continues to abuse them beyond all recognition. The abused wife syndrome I guess.

Just for fun... Here is the video where George Bush chastises Bill Clinton for using the American Military in expansionist and "Nation Building" missions. I think George owes Bill one big apology:

 

Official Reports The Army is Essentially Running Out of Money

Under Secretary of the Army Nelson Ford reported to the AUSA that the Army is essentially running out of money. Many years ago, a General said, "Beware of the 10 division Army with an 18 Division mission" or words to that effect and he was chastised for it. Now, it has become a truism which is another example of Bush/Cheney incompetence.

The "Dirty little secret" of the Bush budgets is that they do not include a lot of needs of the Army and military as they wage war on the world. What they do is purposefully put too small a budget together then ask for "supplementals" throughout the year.

Why do they do that? Simple. It allows them to say the budget they submitted is shrinking the deficit knowing that they will come back in a few months and ask for a lot more money. The supplemental process is in place to deal with unforeseen emergencies. What Bush has become an expert at is making it part of the normal budget cycle and now his own people are calling him out on it.

Veterans Have Difficulty Coping with College Life

This is an interesting concept and it is not what you think. The data talks about how veterans are having difficulty fitting in because they have differing viewpoints than other college students on a whole host of topics. This is something I have discussed before.

I discussed, very early on in my blogging, how the Country's armed forces are becoming more and more separate from the mainstream of America. This was written about in the incredible book, "The New American Militarism". All you have to do is read the military blogs on the Internet and you will find the military has a general disdain for American Society. This leads us to an interesting dilemma as the military will say they are fighting for America but more and more they seem to hate everything about America.

There used to be a time when it was unheard of to have the military, especially military officers, speak out and be very vocal about politics while they were in uniform. Heck, MacArthur, one of the greatest generals, was fired over it. But in the day and age of "blogging", we have Cols, LTCs and a whole host of CPTs (not sure who is fighting all these wars with all the time they have for blogging) basically saying the Congress is stupid and the average American is a lazy bum. Some of this, we all know, is a psychological thing where you just want to believe what you are doing (especially when your job is to kill people) is somewhat above everyone else and somehow you have a higher calling. But, a lot of it has started to become true hatred of everything that is true about America. A few interesting items:

• They want to defend our freedoms but say anyone against the "Patriot Act" (Basically the right to spy on US Citizens) is a traitor.
• They hate any Country that is not free and want to free them at the end of a gun but have absolutely no problem with COMMUNIST CHINA FINANCING their war in Iraq.
• They claim to have "freedom of religion" as a core belief as long as your religion somehow equates to a judeo-Christian view. (The Judeo is only in there because they believe someday you will convert or God will kill you when the world ends).

Obviously, not the entire military thinks this way and generalizing is a tough thing. However, as a group, the move has been clear and profound towards this view point.

Which always brings me back to the question, "Just what are they defending anyway"?

Feed The Pig - The Pentagon's Budget

Jeff Huber at Pen and Sword has a great discussion on the bloating of the defense budget. I will not repeat it here but you need to go and read this entry. It is fantastic.

The one item I will relay is he points out the irony in the fact that we are proposing the largest military since WWII and yet the 9/11 attacks were done by a few men with boxcutters.

With all the high tech wizardry that we have today, Osama is still at large, Madrid occurred and the only way we could stop the killing in Iraq was to put "boots on the ground".

Republicans say they want to get rid of "pork barrel spending"? 90% of the Pentagon's budget is pork barrel!

Hindsight is 20/20 But To A Lot of Us, It Is Not Hindsight

My favorite argument of the right wing wackos who want war with just about every Country they can name is they claim with "hindsight" we would have done things differently in Iraq. They go on, "But, Hindsight is always 20/20, who could have known".

Well, a lot of people knew and what has occurred in Iraq was predicted by many prominent people and many not so prominent (such as your friendly blogger here). We all knew it was a fiasco and we all knew we would not be out in "six months" as Rumsfeld claimed. We knew we were entering into a quagmire. So, yes, hindsight is 20/20 but if you had just listened to us instead of covering your face in Red White and Blue you may have learned something.

Now, Greyhawk gives no credit to Barack Obama who specifically identified the problem in Iraq and who specifically called for us not to go.

A Sign of The Times - Infantry Brigade has 1/4 of Soldiers Unfit for Duty

We all know by now that the Army is stretched beyond its capacity. This has made our Country less safe, not more as Bush claims, because we literally could not defend ourselves right now if attacked by a country with real weapons (unlike the 3d rate Country we decided to invade).

Here is a story about the 39th Infantry Brigade in Arkansas. They were notified in October of last year they were to be deployed to Iraq. Since then, they literally have combed the state to find enough soldiers to make the Brigade "full" so it can go off to war. They are still 200 soldiers shy of what they need.

"We’ve got to grab the bull by the horns here,” said Brig. Gen. Richard Swan, Arkansas National Guard chief of staff. “What’s necessitating this is we need strength in the 39th. Whose teeth can we fix, how much time do they need to recuperate from an injury, how soon can we move them back into the force?” The 39th was mobilized in October to prepare for a second deployment to Iraq this March. Since then, every unit in the state has contributed soldiers to the brigade to help it reach the 3,200 troops it needs.

After more than a quarter of the soldiers pulled into the brigade were rejected because of medical or legal problems, the brigade is about 200 soldiers shy of that goal."

But of course the Army nuts continue to say that there is no problem here and the Army is just fine. Yeah, that is why they are forcibly recalling 45 year old men with no training!