“Hell, the military must be way over sized...the Air Force has been “force shaping” or throwing huge numbers of officers out by Selective Early Retirement Board and Reduction in Force.”
It isn’t that the “military is over sized, it is that the Navy and Air Force are over sized, while the Army and Marines need men.
The “Blue to Green” program where Air Force and Navy people were offered the opportunity to transfer to the Army didn’t get many takers, but it was tried (I don’t know if it applied to officers).
“It isn’t that the “military is over sized, it is that the Navy and Air Force are over sized, while the Army and Marines need men.”
The air force, I don’t know. but the navy, well I believe it is just capable to manage the ships, planes, and shore facilites and commands. Now, obviously, the lack of soldiers available to fight two wars (iraq and afghanistan) AND to maintain our defensive capabilities elsewhere, means the navy has had to fill duties normally handled by army guys. Not a big deal, but after a few back to back deployments, people will vote with their feet, which may be what we are seeing. Bottom line is we do not have enough active duty troops to do what Bush wants to do. So we need to get them. We are trying to fight these two wars on the cheap. If these two wars are important as all the rhetoric professes (and which I happen to agree, although I’m not some glassy-eyed lemming sap) then why isn’t our nation on a war-time footing with a total war concept? What is so bad with having a draft? Let’s draft all the congress’s kids and let them fight for their country. I’m sure that there will be comments of, “we don’t need a draft, you only get druggies, and what-not, i don’t want draftees, yada yada.” Well, we don’t have enough troops based on that mode of thought. We needs troops that kill, and then these other nations need to step up and take over. You hang out too long and like welfare and Section 8 housing, they become dependent on the U.S. teat.
And if your comment is “Well congress would never approve a total war approach,” well then just what ARE we doing then? How in the heck can you fight two wars with not enough troops? The guard? Well, that machine is starting to break down. What about troops training for other wars, like in the artic, jungles, other parts of the world? They can’t because they are being over-rotated in Iraq and Afghanistan. I do hope all our future wars are in the middle east because that seems to be the only place we are currently able to train to fight. We do not have enough troops and we need to figure out a way to get them, or fundamentally change eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeverthing that we are doing, regardless of how it sounds.