Usa, forze armate, reclutamento Nyt 06-04-10
USA – Forte tasso di abbandono dell’esercito tra i
giovani ufficiali
THOM SHANKER
Secondo anno di seguito con peggioramento del tasso di
permanenza in servizio dei giovani ufficiali americani di West Point, dopo i 5
anni obbligatori; analogo problema per i graduati dei programmi per gli
ufficiali della riserva, dopo i 4 anni di firma.
I nuovi incentivi offerti
quest’anno: possibilità di laurea durante il servizio a spese del governo ($13 000
a testa); scelta di un lavoro nell’esercito, possibilità di scelta del luogo di
lavoro a casa; risultato 1/3 di tutti i nuovi ufficiali hanno prolungato di 3
anni il servizio.
– Il tasso di permanenza per la classe 1999 di West Point, è stata nel
2004 del 71,9%, contro il 78,1% dell’anno precedente; nel 2005 è sceso al
65,8%, con una perdita del 34,2% di quella leva di ufficiali. Il maggior tasso
di perdita negli ultimi 16 anni tra gli ufficiali di West Point.
Nyt 06-04-10
Young
Officers Leaving Army at a High Rate
By THOM SHANKER
WASHINGTON, April 9 — Young Army
officers, including growing numbers of captains who leave as soon as their
initial commitment is fulfilled, are bailing out of active-duty service at
rates that have alarmed senior officers.
– Last year, more than a third of the West
Point class of 2000 left active duty at the earliest possible
moment, after completing their five-year obligation.
– It was the second year in a
row of worsening retention numbers, apparently marking the end of a burst of patriotic fervor during which junior officers
chose continued military service at unusually high rates.
Mirroring the problem among West
Pointers, graduates of reserve officer
training programs at universities are also increasingly leaving the service at the end of the
four-year stint in uniform that follows their commissioning.
– To entice more to stay, the
Army is offering new incentives this year, including a promise of graduate school on Army time and at government expense
to newly commissioned officers who agree to stay in uniform for three extra
years. Other enticements include the
choice of an Army job or a pick of a desirable location for a home post.
– The incentives
resulted in additional three-year commitments from about one-third of all new
officers entering active duty in 2006, a number so large that it
surprised even the senior officers in charge of the program. But the service’s
difficulty in retaining current captains has generals worriedly discussing
among themselves whether the Army will have the widest choice possible for its
next generation of leaders.
The program was begun this year to
counter pressures on junior officers to leave active duty, including the draw
of high-paying jobs in the private sector; the desires of a spouse for a calmer
civilian quality of life at a time when the officers can be expected to be
starting their families; and, for the past two years, the concerns over
repeated tours in Iraq or Afghanistan.
– Since the invasion of Iraq in 2003, the Army has had a far more
difficult time in its recruiting than the other services because the ground
forces are carrying the heaviest burden of deployments — and injuries and
deaths — in the war.
One member of the West Point class of
2000 who left active duty last year is Stephen Kuo, who took a job with a
medical equipment company in Florida.
Mr. Kuo said his decision was based on "quality of life." He is now
recruiting classmates for his company.
"With the rotation of one year overseas, then another year or so back at home,
then another overseas rotation — it does take a toll on you," said Mr.
Kuo, who served a year in combat in northern Iraq. "Plus, I was not
enjoying the staff jobs — desk jobs — I was looking at for the next 8 to 10
years. Furthermore, the private sector had many lucrative offers."
But the chance at a free master’s degree
persuaded Brandon J. Archuleta, a West Point senior, to sign up for an extra
three years in uniform.
"Education is extremely important
to me, and I know I want a master’s degree at the very least," Cadet
Archuleta said. "The Army has a wonderful relationship with some of the
top-tier graduate schools, especially in the Ivy League. I want to attend a
school of that caliber."
– In 2001, but before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, 9.3 percent of
the Army’s young officers left active duty at their first opportunity.
– By 2002, the number of those junior officers leaving at their first
opportunity dropped to 7.1 percent, and
– in 2003, only 6.3 percent opted out. But the number grew to 8.3 percent
in 2004 and 8.6 percent in 2005.
The statistics are even more striking among West Point graduates, who receive
an Ivy League-quality education at taxpayer expense — and, in the view of many
senior officers and West Point alumni, owe the nation and the Army a debt of loyalty
beyond the initial five years of active duty.
– The retention rate at the
five-year mark for the West Point class of
1999 was 71.9 percent in 2004, down from 78.1 percent for the previous year’s class.
– And for the class of 2000, the retention rate fell to 65.8 percent, meaning that last year the Army lost more
than a third — 34. 2 percent — of that group of officers as they reached the end
of their initial five-year commitment.
That is the highest rate of loss over the past 16 years among West Point officers reaching the five-year mark. For young officers receiving their commissions in 2006, the Army
will guarantee slots in the most sought-after branches of the service —
aviation, armor or intelligence, for example — in exchange for an extra three
years in uniform.
Similarly, if a young officer wants an
initial posting to a desired location or an opportunity to earn a master’s
degree, the Army will guarantee either choice in exchange for three more years
of active duty.
The West Point graduating class of 2006
responded at levels even higher than anticipated by senior officers at the
military academy, with 352 of the 875 seniors — 40.2 percent — signing on to
the program as they approached the date in late May when they would be
commissioned as second lieutenants.
"It is an amazing response,"
said Lt. Gen. William J. Lennox Jr., the West Point
superintendent. "It has exceeded how I thought the class would respond."
Across
the entire Army this spring, 3,420 newly commissioned junior officers are expected to enter active duty, according to the Army’s
personnel office. Of those, 1,124 — about one-third
— have agreed to serve an extra three years in uniform under the new program.
– According to Army statistics, 718 signed up to choose their career
track, 289 contracted for the graduate school opportunity — 257 of them from
West Point — and 117 wanted to pick the location where they, and their
families, would be based.
The graduate school program was
carefully structured to keep officers in uniform even beyond the extra
three-year commitment.
After completing a master’s degree
program, an officer also has to repay the Army with three months of service for
every month back in the classroom. This could push some officers beyond an
automatic 8 years of service, toward 12 years — at which point, goes the
thinking of the senior officers who devised the program, they may decide to
stay in for a full 20.
"Today’s officers make a career
decision to come or go at the three- or four-year mark, while a decade ago they
made it closer to the seven- or eight-year mark," said Lt. Gen. Franklin
L. Hagenbeck, the Army’s senior personnel officer.
"One of the salient issues in this information
age is that if they are going to be competitive when they leave the Army —
whether at the 4-year mark, the 10-year mark or after 20 — they have to
maintain critical skills," General Hagenbeck said. "They want to have
graduate schooling."
The cost of the program will depend on
how many young officers enter graduate school in a given year, but Army
personnel managers say that whatever the individual annual tuition fees, they
are far less than the cost of training and preparing a new officer. The Army will cap individual tuition at
$13,000 per year, although the service has already negotiated with a number of
schools to waive the difference in fees.
At the five-year mark in their career,
Army captains usually are in command of a company, a junior leadership position
putting them at the center of the day-to-day fight. The Army needs even more company-level officers today,
as it expands the number of its deployable brigade combat teams.
New York Times