The Army's hard sell

Why is joining the military always equated with dying? We teach people how to survive, not die. We also understand the inherent risks associated with certain career fields. The truth is that the total combat related deaths for the whole war is less than 1% of our operational strength. That hardly means:

Military = dying

That is meant in no way to minimize the sacrifices these soldiers and their families have made, but it puts reality into perspective. Yet, you will never hear someone say, "don't become a firefighter or police officer because you'll die". I have been in for 19 years 8 months and am still alive and kicking... The military has provided me and my family a very comfortable life that would be nowhere near what a service member under a communist regime would even be able to consider. As for sending other's children off to the military (And as you say "die"), I personally enlisted my own 19 year old son, who just graduated basic training as an MP and about a year ago I enlisted a nephew in the airborne infantry. We see it as an opportunity to keep future generations from having to send their children off to "die" for someone else's right to not have too. The less we do now means the shorter the travel time will be for them to the front lines...

 

KJ, Here you can still enlist straight into the career field. College or certifications can help bring you in with advanced rank. You can't have any misdemeanors or felony offenses in your past or an excessive amount of traffic violations.

Everyone who enlists in the Army now chooses the career field that they want to go into. However, the entrance exam score and moral or medical issues may limit the amount of jobs a prospective applicant has to choose from.

As you could imagine, some career fields are much more popular than others, so we offer substantial bunuses and other types of incentives to get people to enlist in the less popular career areas. The good thing about this is we allow soldiers with less than ten years of service the opportunity to change jobs if they decide to reenlist. So, there are many willing to do a certain job for a $10,000 or $20,000 bonus for maybe 3 or 4 years and then change over to another career field later on. Here at our office, we are next to a major college campus and the majority of the people who enlist are choosing the combat type jobs versus the support jobs. We generally have a steady flow of applicants, but our numbers are nowhere near what I hear they were prior to 9-11.

 

No surprise here. Especially about the Guard and Reserves.

The people that normally join them are looking for a supplemental paycheck and other opportunities in exchange for being a weekend soldier.

If they feel there's a pretty good chance they'll get called up for extended active duty tours, why join the Reserve or Guard? One of their main incentives is gone.

 

Of course, they have to send the majority of the troops to Iraq. It's the only army we have.

Yes, they are behind. It is difficult to recruit people to serve in dangerous situations. Doesn't matter if it is Iraq, Sudan, Kosovo, Bosnia, S. Korea or some other place in harms way.

The feminization and sensitivation of the Army is one contributing cause. The Marines openly make warriors of young men and don't apologize for it...and never have. They're not having as much trouble recruiting as the army is.

Another contributing factor is the political grandstanding of liberal politicians that are in the news hourly working for the Iraqi insurgents. The constant barrage of negative press about the war and the merits of it are bound to have their effect.

Liberal politicians do everything they can to discourage enlistment and then complain that enlistment goals are not being met. Then they hypocritically call for an increase in troop strength when they know the army is having a tough time recruiting against the negative press that they themselves create.

Democrats desperately want to force the Bush Administration to institute the draft for their political advantage. Therefore they will continue to discourage young people from enlisting in the military. The strength and effectiveeness or our armed forces is not nearly as important as their political agenda.