WASHINGTON, Oct. 28 (UPI) -- Last Friday, the Army announced that 843 -- 36.8 percent -- of 2,288 Individual Ready Reservists ordered to report for duty by Oct. 17 have neither reported nor asked for a delay or exemption. Many other IRR members have requested exemptions for health or personal grounds.
Individual Ready Reservists are ex-soldiers. Technically, all enlisted soldiers join the armed forces for eight years. For example, if a soldier enlists for three years of active duty, upon receiving his honorable discharge from active duty, he reverts to the IRR for the next five years. During that time, he doesn't belong to a unit, doesn't drill and isn't paid. Basically, his name just remains on a list and he is subject to call-up in a war or other national emergency. The rules are different for officers. Upon finishing their active duty service, officers revert to the IRR indefinitely (the Army recently recalled a 67-year-oldpsychiatrist to active duty), unless they formally resign their commissions.
The Army has announced that it will call 5,674 members of the IRR back to active duty this year and next. Major IRR call-ups are rare. The last one was during the first Gulf War. It involved slightly more than 20,000 troops.
This is the second significant problem with the Army Reserve to arise in recent weeks.
The Army is investigating 18 reservists after they refused to take part in a fuel delivery mission in Iraq. The reservists are members of the 343rd Quartermaster Company, based in Rock Hill, S.C. The unit's mission is to deliver food, water and fuel to combat units.
The reservists said that the mission, which involved driving fuel through a route along which several ambushes had taken place, was too dangerous. They also said that their vehicles were not properly armored and were in poor shape.
As reservists and National Guardsmen have begun to complain about their treatment, many have unfairly accused them of whining.
There is no understanding this situation without understanding that the reserve component is designed as a backup for regular Army units, not a replacement for them.
The National Guard has eight Army combat divisions and has a target strength of 350,000 troops. Guard units fall under the command of their states' governors until they are called up for federal service.
The Army Reserve has a total strength of 205,000 troops. It consists mostly of supporting arms such as combat engineer, military police, medical, supply, transportation, civil affairs and psychological operations units.
There are more than 95,000 National Guardsmen and almost 35,000 reservists on active duty in the United States and overseas. This represents about a third of the National Guard and a fifth of the Army Reserves.
Guard and Reserve units are made up of men and women who, for family, professional or financial reasons, cannot meet the time commitment demanded by regular units but are willing to make themselves available for unforeseen emergencies. Many have already done tours in the regular Army.
The reservists being sent to Iraq are not responding to an unforeseen emergency, however.
The 10 regular divisions of the Army are badly overextended. To any competent military analyst, it has been obvious for a long time that the regular Army just isn't large enough to meet the demands placed upon it.
The Bush administration took office promising "Army transformation." The idea was that new technologies and "outside the box thinking" would enable brigades or even battalions to do the work that has traditionally been done by divisions.
However, the new technologies have been slow to develop, and key assumptions on which the Army of the future was based turned out to be wrong. As a result, the promised smaller, more lethal Army turned out to be a smaller, more fatigued Army.
By mobilizing reserve units for long-term service, the administration has been able to gloss over the problem. At present, over 40 percent of the troops in Iraq are reservists or Guardsmen.
Reserve and National Guard units are neither trained nor equipped to be used as a replacement for regular units, however.
Basically, these units train one weekend a month and for a few weeks each summer. Units sent overseas receive a bit of pre-deployment training, but nothing that will bring them up to the training standards of regular units.
Also, because regular units are expected to do the heavy lifting in a major war, they get the best equipment. Reserve and National Guard units make do with less.
This explains why about 40 percent of the National Guardsmen and reservists questioned in a recent Annenberg survey felt that they were properly trained and equipped.
There is an old saying in the Army: "Poor planning by you doesn't create an emergency for me."
As a result of a stubborn refusal to admit that the regular Army just isn't large enough, the Bush administration has created an emergency that has resulted in tremendous disruption in the lives of reservists and their families.
The same Annenberg survey of 655 regulars, reservists and military family members found that 59 percent said too much of a burden has been put on the National Guard and the reserves when regular forces should have been expanded instead.
This misuse of the reserve component strikes many as a violation of a covenant, and the fact that it is happening on the watch of a former reservist doesn't make it any easier for reservists to swallow.
It is pretty clear to most people in the United States that President Bush joined the Texas Air National Guard to avoid being sent to Vietnam. Most Americans, including most reservists, also know that serious questions have been raised as to whether Bush fully met the requirements of his reserve commitment.
It strikes many as hypocritical that a president who joined the reserves to avoid combat and who seemed unable to meet the minimal requirements of a reserve unit during the Vietnam War could be so casual about mobilizing reservists for a year or more and sending them into combat.
Strains on the reserve component are beginning to show.
The National Guard is already having trouble recruiting new soldiers and may finish the year 20 percent short of its recruiting goal. As a result, the Guard is currently several thousand soldiers below its target strength.
The only reason the Guard has gotten anywhere close to its recruiting goals is that it has been accepting lower caliber enlistees. Fifty-eight percent of National Guard recruits this year were rated as "quality recruits" as measured by military aptitude test performance. The National Guard has not met the Pentagon's target of 60 percent quality recruits since 2001.
So far, there has been no significant drop-off in Army Reserve recruitment. There are three possible explanations for this.
First, while a Guardsman has a roughly 1-in-3 chance of being called up, right now, an Army Reservist faces a 1-in-5 chance of call up.
Second, because the National Guard has a far higher proportion of combat arms soldiers, like infantrymen and tankers, than the Army Reserve, the possibility of call up involves a significantly higher element of physical risk for a Guardsman.
Third, with its emphasis on support, most Army Reserve jobs involve skills that have some civilian application. So, those joining to learn a trade are more likely to be drawn to the Army Reserve than the National Guard, which is combat arms-heavy.
It is difficult to gauge the effect these mobilizations will have on retention because there is a "stop-loss" provision in effect on mobilized units. This provision allows the Army to retain these reservists after their enlistments have expired. There are fears that once the stop-loss is lifted, there will be an exodus of soldiers from the reserve component.
In short, many reservists and National Guardsmen are being used in a manner that they didn't sign up for and some are being held longer than they signed up for. So, not surprisingly, trouble is beginning to arise.
The recent problems with reservists should be viewed not as evidence of a lack of dedication on the part of the reservists, but as a hint that the administration would be wise to take.
(Thomas Houlahan is the director of the Military Assessment Program of the William R. Nelson Institute at James Madison University.)
(United Press International's "Outside View" commentaries are written by outside contributors who specialize in a variety of issues. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of United Press International. In the interests of creating an open forum, original submissions are invited.)
