Accession Waivers on the Rise
The Department of Defense Instruction 6130.03, Volumes 1 and 2 establish disqualifying medical standards for entry into and retention in military service. These standards are touted to be driven by both advances in medical care and analysis of first enlistment attrition, to include the results of candidates or members who received waivers.
These waivers are getting very popular.
Need for accession waivers soars amid historic recruiting challenges
By Rachel S. Cohen
At least 1 in every 6 military recruits were given waivers to enter service in fiscal 2022, the highest percentage in at least 10 years, Military Times has learned.
But in the face of historic recruiting challenges, the military’s recordkeeping is spotty.
Data provided by the Office of the Secretary of Defense in November 2022 doesn’t match figures provided by the Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force and Space Force in March 2023. The Army refused to provide the information for this story.
In November, the Pentagon told Military Times that 22,623 recruits with no prior military service had waivers approved in fiscal 2022, out of a total of 130,346 prospective service members. That means around 17% of incoming troops were accepted with caveats for their health, prior misconduct, drug use, dependents or tattoos.
That’s about 6 percentage points higher than the rate in 2013, after the percentage hovered around 12% for much of the past decade, according to Pentagon data.
Numbers provided by four of the five armed forces indicated waivers played an even greater role in accessions last year.
Sitting down? An Accessions Medical Standards Working Group develops policy recommendations under the guidance of the Medical and Personnel Executive Steering Committee, which in turn guides the Accession Medical Standards Analysis and Research Activity team. These worthies develop supporting analysis and research, validating whatever the Steering Committee told the Working Group was to be policy.
This amazing process allows unnamed “DOD stakeholders” to make informed accession policy decisions. Before my time, but someone thought Project 100,000 was a great idea.
Category: Big Pentagon, Government Incompetence, The Stupid is Strong
McNamara’s Project 100,000, another winner from the Whiz Kids.
Of this 17% that is costing the US Government tax money to train, how many will actually survive passing Basic?
The cynic in me says…most. Because intial military training cadre will be placed under massive pressure to keep attrition down and the problem will be passed to the line units to “fix” (although I’ve been told you can’t fix stupid).
Had one of McNamara’s 100k as a medic back when I was in the 1/506th. Reminded me A LOT of a special education student in my high school.
Just stickign my nose in here because only 1 comment.
I’ve been in and out but mostly out.
If there’s anything that needs my attention, I’m about a week and a half bnehind in my reading.
POKE ME HERE!!
C
POKE! Get your Happy Azz over to the phony thread. We have a motion a 2nd and an AYE! You are cleared HOT!
Thank YOU@!@ Exactly why I asked..noww….WHICH Phony Thread!!
LOL !
BRB.
COMPLETED!!
The coveted The As(s)teroid of Insults®™ is deployed on excrement container and Meat Munching Matthew Michael Morton
How much longer before the only requirement for enlistment will be “…you must have a pulse”?
Patriots need to be shoring up their blade of grass. You will be needed.
The Louisville, Kentucky Shooter.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/connorsturgeon
Connor Sturgeon, Age 23 or 25.
“Syndications Associate and Portfolio Banker for Old National Bank
Old National BankUniversity of Alabama, Manderson Graduate School of Business”
“I am a Syndications Associate and Portfolio Banker with Old National Bank in Louisville following completion of the ONB Commercial Banking Development Training Program in April 2022. I am certified in the RMA Lending Decision Process, hold a Master’s in Finance from the University of Alabama, and am on the Young Professionals board for Junior Achievement of Kentuckiana.”
“Syndications Associate and Portfolio Banker
Apr 2022 – Present1 year 1 month
Louisville, Kentucky, United States”
“Handled multiple roles at once, including managing a business banking portfolio, building digital infrastructure for new syndications team, and meeting with prospective and existing clients of all sizes.”
“Commercial Development Professional
Jun 2021 – Mar 202210 months
Louisville, Kentucky, United States”
“Completed ONB Commercial Banking Development Program, rotating through documentation, underwriting, and lending sections in both Louisville and Evansville.”
https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/local/2023/04/10/connor-sturgeon-what-we-know-about-old-national-bank-shooter/70100386007/
“Sturgeon, whose family lived in Greenville, Indiana, lived in Louisville on Taylor Boulevard. He graduated from Floyd Central High School, where he played basketball.”
“His father, Todd Sturgeon, was head basketball coach at the high school, where he was hired in 2014 when Connor was a 6-foot-4 sophomore.”
“Connor Sturgeon earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees, receiving his master’s in finance at University of Alabama.”
Mental Illness Is A Terrible Disease.
Please pray for the Victim’s Family:
Joshua Barrick, 40; Thomas Elliot, 63; Juliana Farmer, 45; and James Tutt, 64.
“Among the injured is a 26-year-old police officer who was shot in the head, according to police. He underwent brain surgery and is in critical but stable condition, police said.”
“He just graduated from the police academy on March 31.”
Please pray for him and his Family.
Please pray for the other victims.
I’m starting to suspect (and I hate that my mind goes here) that some of these shooters are actively encouraged in a real effort to further gun control.
My take is that alot of these are just kids. They have been told their whole lives how special they are. Then life hits em in the ding-ding and they cannot handle rejection, firing. getting written up etc. They then lash out like the video games they play, running over a bunch of people like Grand Theft Auto or just shooting people like a shoot em up game. They then cry in the court room and pee themselves at sentencing.
That’s why you make sure they don’t get to trial. Put them down on the spot. Kinda like the cops in Tennessee and, from what I read, the cops today in Louisville.
I don’t buy the video game explanation, but there is definitely something wrong with the soul of our nation, nowadays, and its impact on young adults is palpable.
As a whole, there is a growing neoteny among our populace.
For me much of the current apathy towards the value of the lives of other people stems from our efforts to remind each child just how special they are in order to build their self esteem…we decided somewhere around 1988 that the self-esteem of self-centered children was a really important issue and needed to be addressed by strengthening the child’s self-esteem and protecting them from negative outcomes that might make them question their self-esteem.
Once again proving we never solve a problem without creating unintended consequences with new problems of their own…we decided that mom and dad were not the center of the family but that children needed to be the center of the family with mom and dad orbiting the kids often at the expense of the family once the kids reach a certain age….divorce rose, and incidents of school murder rose dramatically.
Sometimes it’s good for a kid to learn they suck, that their mediocrity is a direct result of their lack of effort in a particular sport or area of study…we used to give a first place trophy and tell second place they were the first losers…but we also taught the kids who didn’t win that there was nobility and respect in the effort itself, that it was acceptable to not win all the time because that’s how we learned what to do to succeed. Losing was a lesson to take to heart and learn from, not a terrible personal affront that required a combative reaction.
Today we raise kids who believe they can’t fail, because we never let them experience failure as children. We raise kids without any fortitude or resilience so the first time they encounter a negative outcome their reaction is to act out…sometimes with words, sometimes with actions, and some of those actions are sometimes murderous.
We need to raise kids who understand the world doesn’t care if they live or die. So growing from failure is the best response to life and the world.
Word had it that he was about to be fired from that bank and he went full chickenshit.
Tattoos don’t effect fitness or job performance. Prior drug use shouldn’t mean an automatic disqualification, especially if we are just talking cannabis.
CDN troops have been able to legally use cannabis ( With restrictions based on MOC/MOS) for the last 5 years. On base Alcohol related incidents have been slowly declining ever since.
At least two bases are considering adding a vape lounge area in their Rank’s Mess as fewer young troops drink alcohol.
Entry-Level P3 profiles for everyone! What could go wrong?
Same people who think it’s ok for someone not to know if they are a man or a woman but think ADHD in any form cannot be waved. Felony, ok-Drugs, ok-a fraking 20 on the ASVAB no trouble.
I always liked the felony waivers. They pinky promise not to commit more crimes and we give them a gun and training.
I got a waiver, then spent the next 21 years serving honorably, including in highly selective and sensitive assignments that many Soldiers never experience.
It’s easy to read stuff like this and think catastrophically about where our military is going, but if we look at cases individually it isn’t all bad. Using myself as an example:
18-year-old high school dropout walking the line in terms of morality. Speeding ticket leads to a misdemeanor concealed weapons charge and conviction. Three years unsupervised probation disqualifies me for enlistment, and my GED is not accepted. Otherwise, I’m fully qualified: 84 on the ASVAB, motivated, and simply wanting to join the military and serve my nation. 9/11 happens shortly after my probation is done, my GED is now accepted, but I still need a moral waiver for a non-violent crime I committed through ignorance of the law. A 23-year-old finally enlists six years after he’d wanted to, and mistakes/misjudgments made as a teenager are gradually put into the past, leading to a remotely successful 40-something disabled Retiree.
Now, I’m not 100% on board with waivers of all sorts. As an NCO I had the “joy” of dealing with Soldiers who had received waivers but didn’t necessarily adapt to military service. I think that each waiver should be considered on a case-by-case basis.
Waivers exist for a good reason. It sounds like you made the most of yours. From your screen name, I assume you were in an MOS that required SERE – which says a lot on its own.
Exceptions on a case-by-case basis are a lot different from a blanket lowering of standards.
Well, one of my Drill Sergeants called me the “poster Child” for SERE School, but that was the closest I ever got. I picked my screen name back in the ’90s, well before joining, when I was into survival and happened to have FM 21-76 near the computer. Even back then, it was difficult finding an email address that wasn’t taken, so since then I’ve been fm2176 (and on occasion FM3-05.70) on a few sites.
“I’m not 100% on board with waivers of all sorts”
That is indeed the key statement. It’s one thing to recognize youthful ignorance or stupidity isn’t necessarily a lifelong personal trait and allow people the opportunity to serve and prove their value to the service, themselves, and the nation.
When waivers are used sparingly for such things you prove the value of those waivers.
When the entire military can’t achieve their recruiting goals without blanket “medical waivers” for one out of six potential service members I think we can recognize there is another issue at play that’s perhaps systemic as opposed to any general reflection on the quality of an particular generation.
I’ve written previously about the dangers of less than 1% serving and the trend towards a warrior culture where the children of service members are many times more likely to serve than the children of those who never served. We are now seeing that reality come to fruition.
Toss in a twenty year war without purpose or direction and couple that with mediocre or inadequate benefits post service for many of those who served often with multiple deployments and the message to the greater society is that the military isn’t to be trusted because the government can’t be trusted.
Toss in weak ass pay scales and retention slips as well. The current pay scale for an E-6 with 7 years of service is about $3700 a month…that’s shit pay, especially when you consider specialized skillsets, I know personally a veteran with 6 years who re-enlisted for 2 additional years with an intelligence skillset that required over a year’s training after basic…who left over pay and requirements that had little to do with the job…so instead of making that whopping $45k the government was offering this individual works for MIT and makes $120k using the security clearance they acquired along with the training….
We need to address these realities instead of accepting the blanket waivers.
“Stakeholders” was always my ‘favorite’ term thrown around during a briefing.
Any GO that says that word with a straight face should be eliminated from their service.
Regulations exist so someone can write a waiver.
There is an old saying, “Beggars can’t be choosers”. YOu want a volunteer military, you take whatever volunteers. And please stop whining about it.
I agree with your premise. The problem with volunteers is they need an incentive, there are those rare exceptions who just wanted to serve their nation but for many who volunteer they expect something in return for their signature on the dotted line, something of real value.
The military could, of course, actually offer competitive wages instead of pretending that an E7 with 12 years of service making $60k is a real wage, especially with a technical skillset or security clearances. I was making $60k more than 30 years ago with a decent skill technical skill set.
We need to also recognize that some job holders we’re seeking aren’t necessarily ever going to need to leave a desk or dark room….so maybe we need to consider whether those positions require a service member or a civilian with the necessary skill set who will never meet the weight or fitness standard…
If we are never going to utilize the draft again, and the draft isn’t a system that generates a lot of long term retention, then we need to recognize the reality of the world of today. The complex systems that work behind the scenes don’t require models of athletic fitness to maintain and operate.
Warriors will always need to be at peak fitness, but if we’re honest we have a lot of jobs that will never be exposed to a warrior’s day to day to reality…
The military was always a business as part of its core functionality, and when it was primarily a low tech endeavor the methods of control and training were useful. Perhaps it’s time to recognize this new high tech world offers new challenges and thus requires new solutions.
“the draft isn’t a system that generates a lot of long term retention”
Even with a draft there are still volunteers, and I don’t remember any shortage of “lifers” even during the Vietnam war.
“Stakeholder” is a communist code word. Whoever uses it believes in the core tenets of communism.
Well this was a series of depressing fucking reads….goddamn…