Posted on 11/25/2011 2:17:20 PM PST by Sub-Driver
Military advocates decry ‘illegal’ early terminations of 157 Air Force majors 44 mins ago
The Chapman University of Military Law and its associated AMVETS Legal Clinic are blowing the whistle on what they say is an injustice set to be perpetrated on 157 Air Force majors on the last day of November.
“The Obama administration has ordered massive reductions in forces, resulting in many officers who are near retirement being involuntarily separated without retirement or medical benefits,” explained institute director Maj. Kyndra Rotunda.
The Department of Defense specifies that service members within six years of retirement normally would be retained and allowed to retire on time with benefits, unless extenuating circumstances exist such as disciplinary issues.
According to lawyers at Chapman and the AMVETS Legal Clinic, the Air Force has deviated from the six-year protection “without any legal authority.”
“At the heart of the matter, is whether the Secretary of the Air Force [Michael Donley] can ignore protections that exist in governing regulations,” Rotunda told The Daily Caller. “The Air Force position is that yes, he may. Our position is that nobody is above the law.”
Air Force spokesman Michael Dickerson explained to TheDC that “selective continuation” is the process which has resulted in the premature separation of these 157 majors. According to Dickerson, officers who fail to get a promotion two times in a row are subject to involuntary discharge — unless they are within two years of qualifying for retirement. Officers subject to discharge can be retained if tapped for continuation by a selection board — it is at these selection boards where officers six years to retirement normally are retained.
(Excerpt) Read more at old.news.yahoo.com ...
That's how it was when I was in. Within 2 years you can stay, otherwise it's up or out.
Maybe NOW the military will GET IT about the enemy within.
Is it any wonder obammy is soooo disliked in our military???
This is jacked up. I wish more had been said about the enlisted guys that were getting kicked out with less than 2 years until retirement.
I’m sick of hearing all the calls for DoD to make sacrifices while Zero spends trillions on the welfare system, special interests, and his pet govt. agencies. DoD hasn’t had a reasonable budget in 20 years. Weapon systems are rusting to pieces and the people are RIFfed, force-shaped, and BRAC’d to death.
Here’s the applicable paragraph from the Marine Corps Separations Manual, Paragraph 5006.1:
“Each officer on the active duty list serving in any grade of chief warrant officer, first lieutenant, captain, or major who has twice failed selection for promotion to the next higher grade will be discharged from the service unless: otherwise continued on active duty, in the sanctuary zone with between 18 and 20 years of active service and serving until retirement eligible, retired, or, if a permanent limited duty officer, reverted to a warrant officer or enlisted status.”
I would think the same rules would apply for the Air Force?
I really feel bad for these guys. When you make Major (typically after 10 years in), you’ve got a choice: stay in the military for the rest of your career or get out and try something different (while you’re still relatively young). If you pick the former, then you know that its gonna be that much harder to get a job when you’re ten years older. However, you’ve got that retirement income (at the Major level at least) to cushion the blow. Now these guys don’t even have that.
I realize its tough out there, but they’re gonna lose a lot of good people if they get into the habit of kicking out experienced FGOs and NCOs just short of retirement. Maybe that’s the plan.
I have never served in the military, so I may be wrong about my opinion. But anyway, who cares? People get fired all the time when they aren’t good enough where I work. Couldn’t it be that the military is better off firing those who are not good enough to serve?
No doubt it’s going to make some life decisions for 27 and 28 year old captains a whole lot easier. They’ll bail then rather than take a trip into the unknown.
Active Duty/Retiree Ping.
Compared to the Army the Air Force runs a brutal promotion system.
How does anyone expect Obama to build a military that will shoot their own parents if he can’t weed out patriots and bitter clingers?
Anyway, more money is needed for wealth redistribution to Holder’s People and vacancies must be created in the military to provide slots for homosexual promotions.
Both my husband and I were “2-P”, so I’m familiar with the rules. I was retirment eligible when I got my second P; he wasn’t but he was within 2 years so he stayed until 20.
It’s “up or out”, even in the enlisted ranks. The days of the career corporal were over a long time ago.
Not saying it’s fair, just saying there’s nothing underhanded going on here.
“I have never served in the military” then STFU!
Couldn’t it be that the military is better off firing those who are not good enough to serve?
As I said, I realize its tough all over right now. But the military is different in that you often endure hardships and risks not inherent in civilian life. And you do so knowing you’ll likely be less competitive in civilian life when you get out.
The civilian equivalent would be a company that asks you to do an unappealing/dangerous job with the promise of being vested after X years. And you fulfill your part of the bargain, but then they lay you off after X-1 years.
The list, Ping
Let me know if you would like to be on or off the ping list
If the Military had a generous 401k plan there would be less temptation to do this and the service people would be less at the mercy of the system.
AMEN!
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