Posted on 09/28/2004 4:47:26 PM PDT by Shandon Belle
Just heard on Fox News with Shepard that USA today is claiming hundreds of soldiers not reporting for duty or are requesting deferrals for hardship reasons. According to Shep the army is considering charging the no shows with desertion. Shep also stated that the Ready Reserve will be called up shortly. Is Kerry and his VVAW attitude having an effect on our troops?
USA Today has refused to print an ad from Rightmarch.com unless they pay an exorbitant ad rate which they've never done before...so can this report be believed? Or is Kerry influencing another liberal MSM newspaper (USA Today)?
The story concerns the call up of soldiers from the Individual Ready Reserve, those who completed their active duty tour of four to six years but are still subject to call up. They don't normally get called up in peace so your suggestion is incorrect.
It seems only 8 soldiers may be in questionable stance.
Of the 1,662 called to active duty to date only 1,038 have reported. A bit more than 8.
Duh, they've been calling Ready Reservists, for years. The Ready Reserve is composed of the Selected Reserve, and the Individual Ready Reserve. The Selected Reserve is composed of the members of Reserve and Guard units, plus Individual Mobilization Augmentees, who serve with active duty units (mostly). The IRR is composed of individuals with some of their 6 year military service obligation remaining. Just like Kerry from 70 to 72, or Bush in his last few months (about 8) of his 6 years Military Service Obligation.
Both Unit and Individual Ready Reservists are already serving. In fact if you go to this DOD page you can find out how many of each, broken down by service and a list of affected reserve/guard units.
As of 22 September there were 140,174 Army Reserve and Guard troops called up (out of 168,340 military called up) of these 1,712 are IMAs and only 1,192 are IRRs. (The number of IRRs did about double from 8 September)
Individual Ready Reservists are folks who have not completed their military service obligation. Thus they knew, or should have known that such a callup was possible. Doesn't mean it is pleasant. I'm in the process of getting transfered 150 miles away, 9 months after buying a house. (I'll be working on a military installation) Them's the breaks.
I fell more sympathy for recently retired folks who get recalled to active duty. That is too is in their contract and is part of the reason they get retired pay as early as 20 years after enlisting or being commissioned. IIRC, the prime vulnerabilty for that lasts for 5 years after separation.
The IRR extends to 6 years after first enlistment, or until the expiration of ones Ready Reserve Service Agreement, if one signs one of those as part of getting a participating reserve assignment. IIRC I've signed at least 3 of those.
I saw the woman who is the manager/owner or whatever of USA Today on TV a few weeks ago and she is a "woman for Kerry".
I think it was on Neil Cavuto's show.
Hey, I just have one question...if this is Bush's war for oil, how come oil prices are at an all-time high? Where's that Iraqi oil we're confiscating to bring those prices down? HELLO! :)
Or you could just use Mozilla Firefox, and open another tab. ;-)
It seems only 8 soldiers may be in questionable stance.
From what I saw on Fox and heard on the radio.
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It seems only 8 soldiers may be in questionable stance.
Of the 1,662 called to active duty to date only 1,038 have reported. A bit more than 8.
Irr soldiers are not the only folks who get called up.
There have been reservists...who are not IRR....who were current and not done with their 6......who were called up for a full time deployment.
And there have been many who have filed for a medical and not gone on those deployements...that were in peace time.
Yes the story concerns IRR.....but odds are...the percentage filing for medical......is close to what goes on with the rest of the reserves.
I think a careful examination of the whole picture is required. There are alot of folks who have already pulled a tour in the last three years...and lost tons of money on their farm, job or business...and they have no intention of repeating that performance. I understand the national agenda, the need for reservists & guardsmen, and the laws of the nation...but lets look at reality here. If my business lost $100k while I deployed for 6 months last year...and you give me a warning notice that I may deploy again next spring of 2005...I wouldn't be very happy. And congress isn't about to pay me for my losses...nor will IRS recognize my dilemma and lower my taxes because of lost sales. This is the problem at hand. The guard and reserve folks all got comfy back in the 80s and 90s...and they had nice businesses and jobs. This guard job was supposed to bring in another $1000 a month upon retirement, on top of my social security. Life was supposed to be fairly nice with that...along with my regular job 401K.
2005 is a dark year for reservists...and the administration realizes that. If 500 reservists refuse to show up and you prosecute them...alot of other reservists will likely start to grumble and question showing up on weekends for drill duty. The whole Iraq campaign depends on reservists participating...and no one ever thought things would end up like this.
I did know that, but thanks anyway.
You are correct and make very strong points that are hard to argue with. It is a very bad time for reservists, and nobody thought things would end up as bad as they did. I do think the Reserve/NG components are close to reaching critical mass - where veterans won't stay in when their time is up, or where people won't join the Reserves/NG in the first place. Even those who join the Reserves/NG just to put themselves through college fill a role.
It's the veterans we are losing, that aren't going into the Reserves/NG after they are finished with active duty, that are most important. If we start losing those who are veterans, we lose institutional knowledge, and then we are up the proverbial s*** creek. The military is the last place we can afford to lose institutional knowledge. We lost too much when Clinton reduced the military and many retired short of 20 or 30 years. When NASA loses that kind of knowledge, they lose spacecraft and astronauts. When the military loses that kind of knowledge, they could lose a lot more.
Putting aside mistakes that Bush's administration made as well as Clinton's, we have to play with the cards that fate dealt us. It's going to take several years to get through this, and will be a while before the military is back to where it was in 2002, but God willing, we will prevail.
If we allow members of the IRR to weasel out of their commitments, then this sends a sign that those commitments don't mean anything, which leads to more problems down the road.
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