Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
Miami Herald
November 9, 2007 Army recruiters face obstacles, including potential recruits' fears, different priorities and a lost sense of duty to country, analysts said.
By Frank Greve, McClatchy News Service
THURMONT, Md. -- The Army is struggling to find volunteers for an unpopular war, despite recruiting bonuses of up to $20,000 and pay increases for enlistees that have beaten inflation by 21 percent since 2000.
The Army met its numeric goal of 80,000 recruits last year, but it paid a price in terms of declining numbers of high school graduates and lower scores on skills and physical tests. The percentage of minimally qualified Army recruits, known as Category IVs, has quadrupled since 2002, and the percentage that required special health or moral waivers has risen sharply as well.
And many recruiting problems preceded the Iraq War.
So what's really making good Army volunteers so hard to come by and, in a larger sense, sapping America's ability to fight a ground war or occupy foreign soil?
Pentagon and outside experts cite these factors, in order of importance:
*While risks to U.S. troops are far lower than they were in most previous wars, young adults and their parents find them unacceptably high.
*Parents who went to college want their kids to go to college. So do parents who didn't. As the college-bound percentage of high school students has risen to two-thirds, the percentage that intends to enlist in any branch of the military has fallen by nearly two-thirds.
*Draft-era veterans, who for generations provided role models for military service, are dying off. A Pentagon study projects a 14 percent decline in high-quality recruits from a 10 percent drop in the veteran population.
*Most parents, grandparents, ministers and others whose approval potential recruits seek don't endorse enlistment these days.
*Blacks, who joined the all-volunteer force in disproportional numbers for years, have cooled on military service recently. So have Hispanics.
*Except among those who sign up, duty to country isn't an important value, according to Defense Department polls.
Army Staff Sgt. Brandon Van Dusen, 26, a low-key Iraq infantry veteran who recruits in Thurmont, Md., a leafy, friendly farm town 50 miles northwest of Washington, sees all these factors. But the most powerful one, said Van Dusen, who describes his own combat stint as ''mostly boring,'' is fear among recruits and their parents.
''They all figure they're going to get sent to Iraq, be in a firefight in the first 10 seconds and die,'' he said.
While it may seem that way, it's not. Deaths among U.S. troops deployed in Iraq -- currently about 169,000 -- average 2.3 a day. By comparison, the daily U.S. toll in World War II was 307.
Put another way, U.S. troops in Iraq die at about three times the rate of stateside civilians of the same age and sex distribution, according to a study published in September in Population and Development Review. Per year deployed, the Iraq death risk for U.S. troops is about a fifth of that for the Vietnam War, according to University of Pennsylvania demographer Samuel Preston and coauthor Emily Buzzell.
''People do seem extremely surprised'' by the numbers, Preston said, because they ``severely overestimate the death rate in Iraq.''
Preston attributes the exaggerated fear mainly to news media exposure.
''It's you [journalists],'' he said. ``You're always after the dramatic violence.''
Indeed, Pentagon surveys show that the more attention high school students pay to news, the less likely they are to enlist.
Whatever the reason, senior classes of about 220 at Catoctin High School in Thurmont turn out just two or three military recruits a year now, according to counselor Curtis Howser. They're of three rare types, he said: children of families with traditions of military service, children keen for the military's discipline, and those who enlist on the spur of the moment.
Nick Jensen Jr., 16, is more typical of the rest of the student body, however.
'My dad didn't go to college, and he says, `That's what you're going to do,' '' said Nick, a junior at Catoctin.
Even when parents do mention the military, Howser said, ``it's only as a means to an end, which is money for college.''
McClatchy researcher Tish Wells contributed to this report.
November 9, 2007 Army recruiters face obstacles, including potential recruits' fears, different priorities and a lost sense of duty to country, analysts said.
By Frank Greve, McClatchy News Service
THURMONT, Md. -- The Army is struggling to find volunteers for an unpopular war, despite recruiting bonuses of up to $20,000 and pay increases for enlistees that have beaten inflation by 21 percent since 2000.
The Army met its numeric goal of 80,000 recruits last year, but it paid a price in terms of declining numbers of high school graduates and lower scores on skills and physical tests. The percentage of minimally qualified Army recruits, known as Category IVs, has quadrupled since 2002, and the percentage that required special health or moral waivers has risen sharply as well.
And many recruiting problems preceded the Iraq War.
So what's really making good Army volunteers so hard to come by and, in a larger sense, sapping America's ability to fight a ground war or occupy foreign soil?
Pentagon and outside experts cite these factors, in order of importance:
*While risks to U.S. troops are far lower than they were in most previous wars, young adults and their parents find them unacceptably high.
*Parents who went to college want their kids to go to college. So do parents who didn't. As the college-bound percentage of high school students has risen to two-thirds, the percentage that intends to enlist in any branch of the military has fallen by nearly two-thirds.
*Draft-era veterans, who for generations provided role models for military service, are dying off. A Pentagon study projects a 14 percent decline in high-quality recruits from a 10 percent drop in the veteran population.
*Most parents, grandparents, ministers and others whose approval potential recruits seek don't endorse enlistment these days.
*Blacks, who joined the all-volunteer force in disproportional numbers for years, have cooled on military service recently. So have Hispanics.
*Except among those who sign up, duty to country isn't an important value, according to Defense Department polls.
Army Staff Sgt. Brandon Van Dusen, 26, a low-key Iraq infantry veteran who recruits in Thurmont, Md., a leafy, friendly farm town 50 miles northwest of Washington, sees all these factors. But the most powerful one, said Van Dusen, who describes his own combat stint as ''mostly boring,'' is fear among recruits and their parents.
''They all figure they're going to get sent to Iraq, be in a firefight in the first 10 seconds and die,'' he said.
While it may seem that way, it's not. Deaths among U.S. troops deployed in Iraq -- currently about 169,000 -- average 2.3 a day. By comparison, the daily U.S. toll in World War II was 307.
Put another way, U.S. troops in Iraq die at about three times the rate of stateside civilians of the same age and sex distribution, according to a study published in September in Population and Development Review. Per year deployed, the Iraq death risk for U.S. troops is about a fifth of that for the Vietnam War, according to University of Pennsylvania demographer Samuel Preston and coauthor Emily Buzzell.
''People do seem extremely surprised'' by the numbers, Preston said, because they ``severely overestimate the death rate in Iraq.''
Preston attributes the exaggerated fear mainly to news media exposure.
''It's you [journalists],'' he said. ``You're always after the dramatic violence.''
Indeed, Pentagon surveys show that the more attention high school students pay to news, the less likely they are to enlist.
Whatever the reason, senior classes of about 220 at Catoctin High School in Thurmont turn out just two or three military recruits a year now, according to counselor Curtis Howser. They're of three rare types, he said: children of families with traditions of military service, children keen for the military's discipline, and those who enlist on the spur of the moment.
Nick Jensen Jr., 16, is more typical of the rest of the student body, however.
'My dad didn't go to college, and he says, `That's what you're going to do,' '' said Nick, a junior at Catoctin.
Even when parents do mention the military, Howser said, ``it's only as a means to an end, which is money for college.''
McClatchy researcher Tish Wells contributed to this report.