All I Can Say Is – It’s About Damn Time
Longtime TAH readers know my position on this subject, but in case some are reading this who don’t: IMO DoD has grossly abused the “Combat Zone/Imminent Danger Pay” designation for years. Year after year, many locations with absolutely NO active hostilities have continued to be designated IDP areas.
Yes, it’s nice for those stationed there. They get out of paying taxes (Combat Zone Tax Exclusion, or CZTE), and get extra pay (IDP) besides.
But that’s not what IDP and CZTE is designed to do. They’re designed to provide additional bennies for those assigned to locations where people are getting shot at – not the guys/gals “in the rear with the gear”.
Well, it looks like DoD has finally announced something that’s IMO long overdue. As of 1 June 2014, 20 locations lose Combat Zone/Imminent Danger Pay designation. Those areas losing IDP designaton are:
- The water areas of the Arabian Sea, Gulf of Aden, Gulf of Oman, the Red Sea, and the water area and airspace above the Persian Gulf.
- The land and airspace areas of Kuwait, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Serbia, and Montenegro.
- The land areas of East Timor, Liberia, Haiti, Oman, Rwanda, Tajikistan, United Arab Emirates, Kyrgystan and Uzbekistan.
As the title says: IMO, it’s about damn time. If you’re not in a place where shots are being fired in anger, in my book you’re simply not in a bona fide Combat Zone – you’re just on a remote/hardship tour. Hardship tours are nasty, and get their own special pays. But they’re also a part of military life, they’re not anywhere close to the same as combat duty, and don’t deserve combat zone bennies.
As far as I can tell, the vast majority (if not all) of the locations listed above haven’t seen a shot fired in anger at US forces in a decade or more. Hell, Saudi Arabia has been an IDP location continuously since 1991.
It always galled me to see folks in Kuwait and Qatar get combat decorations while others in Iraq or Afghanistan got equivalent peacetime awards. Maybe this will finally put a stop to that BS.
Category: Military issues
“not the guys/gals “in the rear with the gear”.
Yeah well, EVERYBODY in the military is a rough tough hadji killing special forces EOD rifleman these days. How dare you question the heroic acts of somebody that completed bootcamp and was deployed!
Now they need a way to identify enemy action QUICKLY – have they officially done that with Hassan’s shooting yet?
Next on the list would be the plethora of awards for anything and everything…. a modern E-5 seems to have a rack which could rival George Patton’s. Especially the ‘end of tour’ awards… giving the first sergeant of a REMF unit which never leaves the wire a Bronze Star as an “I was there” award just seems wrong.
I agree with one caveat: if you take fire in those areas then you should qualify for the pay.
@2 agree with you on that… see too many guys and gals taht were REMF’s coming back from deployment with a rack that makes them look like a South American field marshal…
I know this is going to upset at least one company that provides contractors for the KSA… it’s one of the “perks” of working over in Habibi land, and the company is always looking at ways for keeping “costs” under control
Green Thumb: nice in theory, but probably not workable in practice – it simply takes DoD too long to make decisions like that. And in any case, as far as I can tell none of those areas have had a single bona fide incident of hostile fire directed against US forces since before 2004. If one has happened I certainly haven’t heard about it.
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David, HMCS(FMF): can’t say I much mind that. Even if you never went “outside the wire”, if you were in a place where actual hostilities were occurring (Iraq, Afghanistan), you were at risk to some degree. Smuggled bombs and IDF don’t much care if you’re inside the wire or outside – they kill just as dead either way. And not all direct fire casualties are outside the wire, either.
What always p!ssed me off was seeing guys/gals in Kuwait or Qatar awarded combat decorations. In my book, no actual hostilities where you serve should mean no combat decorations. And neither of those locations had any hostile threat worth worrying about since, oh, 2004.
Gary D. Alexander (Facebook commenter): hell it was worse than that, amigo. During Vietnam, accounts I’ve read say it was fairly common for USAF crews to fly into Da Nang AB on the last day of a month, suffer “mechanical issues” requiring a RON while the bird was checked out, then return to Clark AB the following day.
The following day “coincidentally” happened to be the 1st of the following month. That got them combat zone bennies for BOTH months with one trip.
Yeah, luckily, Hondo, DoD did this: http://www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=67030
Huh.
Not that I disagree, at all, with the sentiment, but…
The way things have worked over the last few decades, might this mean that those named AOs are about to go wicked hot?
That used to be called hazardous duty pay, wasn’t it?
I always enjoyed the senior enlisted’s half-day company during GW-1, when they would fly in on the monthly logistics run, step foot on the ground to claim their monthly tax-free status, and fly out the same day.
This is a no-go subject for me. I will never begrudge whatever a service member can pull in pay. If you get shot at, fly, jump, whatever, give ’em the money–and then some. But, hey, that’s just me and I hate to see intraservice jealousies and pettiness that this sort of topic creates.
Old news, PFM. And, frankly, IMO that should have been done years earlier too.
I never did understand why arriving in a combat zone on the last day of a month – or leaving on the first day of a month – should entitle anyone to IDP and CZTE for the whole month. Those arriving on the last day or departing on the first day certainly didn’t take the same risks as those who were there all month, yet they got exactly the same “bennie”. To me, that never did seem exactly fair to the folks who left one day sooner or arrived one day later.
Hazardous duty pay is a different category of special pay, Ex-PH2. It’s a category that encompasses a number of hazardous occupations (parachuting jumping, toxic chemical handling, EOD, non-air crew flight, and several others).
Imminent Danger Pay is often confused with Hostile Fire Pay (which is technically different, but paid at the same rate). Technically, the former is defined by geographical region, while the latter is a commander’s call based on proximity to/danger from hostile fire. In practice, though, they do seem essentially equivalent.
I am personally happy about this. Used to irk (well, honestly still does) how the Air Force would brag about how they were getting paid the same sitting in Manas as those actually fighting in Afghan. Flew through Manas at 6 times, it was the same thing everytime.
@5.
Good point.
There are so many stupid inequities in the pay system that this one just isn’t that high on my list of priorities. Yes, I got hazardous duty pay in Desert Storm while sitting in a remote location that never came under fire. It was within range of a lot of nasty stuff at least part of the time. I felt stupid taking the extra pay because we were not at the front where most of the action was. However, we were under constant threat of attack and I always felt vulnerable.
But, I agree that there is a huge difference between being under fire and being under the threat of fire. We can argue the case that being in circumstances where a threat level is much higher than at home station might justify broadening the definition of who should be eligible for hazardous duty pay. And I understand completely why those at the front might say that we behind them deserve less pay than they get.
However, understanding all that, and agreeing with the principle of it, I would still say that we have much bigger fish to fry than this. This could well morph into another situation where it costs more for the bean counters to figure who does, who doesn’t, when it starts, when it stops and all that than to simply define an area and pay hazardous duty pay to all within it.
I will submit that this is another exercise in dividing we who need most to stick together. YMMV.
I know a lot of people who are supposed to leave with me for Qatar later in the year will be pissed to hear this. The tax free is a bit upsetting though. As long as they don’t tax me more to make up for the years of being exempt I’ll be fine.
OWB: during the buildup/prelude to hostilities and for a while afterwards, an expanded IDP/CZTE area makes sense and is IMO supportable. But when it’s been 2, 3, 5 years since the last hostile fire incident in a foreign nation, well, calling it a “combat zone” and granting IDP/CZTE has lasted too long IMO.
Kuwait reached the 5 year point in 1996. Post-9/11, it reached that same point in 2006. It was quiet for a loooooong time after each war ended. Ditto Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, . . . .
Rerun0369 IMO hits the nail on the head. It’s more divisive and corrosive to morale to have an expanded definition of the IDP/CZTE zones that isn’t justified. Those deployed where shots are being fired know the score.
“An’ Tommy ain’t a bloomin’ fool – you bet that Tommy sees!”
The biggest joke combat patches are ARCENT and AFRICOM. I don’t think that anyone wearing an AFRICOM combat patch has any idea what combat is. The only combat patche that I refuse to put on my ACUs is from my 2 years at ARCENT.
Bobo: how about a CENTCOM combat patch? (smile)
@2, it depends on where the REMF was assigned. I was assigned to an Infantry unit with an asshole former Infantry Sergeant turned S1. I have exactly seven ribbons for my nine years of service. His claim was that I didn’t need anything for doing my job of supporting my unit. Hell, they even denied my Purple Heart because there was “no enemy action at the time of my injury.” So, as I said, the awards thing can go either way.
As for pay, that’s an entirely different ball of wax. Some guys are in the nitty-gritty 24/7 to earn their monthly IDP. Then you have people like me who were nothing more than designated postal monkeys because we had a security clearance. I was earning the IDP every month, just like the combat troops. However, I was only setting foot in the IDP zones for three days of that month to ferry hardcopies (and sometimes hard drives) back and forth between forward and rear.
With that said, I do think it was unfair that I was getting the same thing for three days that the rest of my deployed unit was getting for thirty. They need to be able to make it day-by-day or weekly. That way a REMF doesn’t fly into the green zone once a month to collect something designed for the actual fighters.
Well, Hondo, I can’t really argue with what you said. My comment was limited to during hostilities. Of course, the end of hostilities has become rather difficult to define. Korea comes to mind.
Sucks to lose pay but you have to look at the intent of the entitlement to begin with.
I have an old “Willie and Joe” book by Bill Mauldin. It was mostly cartoons but he bought up the subject that at least for a time in the ETO Medics in infantry units didn’t get combat pay because “they didn’t fight”
Flagwaver: computing by day has been policy since 2012 for IDP. (I think that’s the case for CZTE now as well but I’m not positive about that.) See the link PFM provided in comment 7.
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Green Thumb: looking at the link in comment 7, it appears full month Hostile Fire Pay is authorized for anyone deemed by their CO to have come under enemy fire. That exception I can live with. Managing it for those TDY/transient will IMO be a huge pain, though.
@21, what do you mean there was “no enemy action at the time of my injury”? Are you saying the injury was received while deployed, but not due to hostile action? That statement really doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.
As for the IDP and combat pay, I am pretty sure they pro-rated it last year. I might be mistaken though, I do clearly remember them discussing it though. I do think pro-rating it is a good thing, as it helps prevent service-members from abusing the system, which in this case we can become our own worst enemies.
OWB: Korea lost IDP/HFP for virtually the entire peninsula long ago – in the 1950s, I think. Not sure if it was reinstated during the “second Korean War” (1966-1974) or not.
The DMZ area retained IDP/HFP authorization much longer, but even that ended decades ago. I’m pretty sure it had been discontinued by the time I got there in 1983, and if not was discontinued NLT when US troops pulled out of the last DMZ posts in the early 1990s.
Perfect name for the article, could not agree more. Hard to justify IDP and CZTE for folks in Kuwait worrying about what to wear to Salsa night or the folks in Qatar hanging out by the pool drinking a cold one. Should have stopped in Kuwait after the last Scud was fired in their direction.
@2 and 4, I am with you 1000%. We have gotten ridiculous with awards.
I got a few personal awards in my 25 year USN career. I barely think about them. What I do think about are the shipmates that I met and still consider friends and what they think of me. To me, the best decoration is the respect of your peers and seniors. I don’t need a medal to prove that I have that.
After seeing “The Pacific” and particularly the section on Peleliu, I decided to look up PFC Eugene Sledge’s bio. He received one personal decoration: a Good Conduct Medal. Basically, he got out with his life and I’m sure he was damn grateful for that. And I’m sure he couldn’t care less that he never received a personal medal for surviving that hell AND Okinawa.
Also, years ago I met John Finn, the Navy CPO hero of Pearl Harbor. I looked up his bio too. His personal decorations in a 30 YEAR CAREER were a Good Conduct Medal, a Purple Heart, and the Medal of Honor.
I know plenty of other veterans from that period who are the same.
We need to go back to that way of doing business.
Pretty much says it all to me.
IMO the over-use of IDP/CZTE was done for a few reasons. First of, it’s easier to simply say “everybody in XXX gets IDP and is exempt from taxes” than it is to say “these 40 guys in this transportation CO based in Kuwait get IDP because they run convoys into Iraq but the other 60 guys in the CO who don’t, don’t get the pay.”
Another reason: In an unpopular war, paying people (especially Guardsmen and Reservists activated out of thier hometowns) a little extra money is a way to get them to shut up and take the medicine, where otherwise it would bring (more) howls of protest not only from the troops but from their families.
So, in many ways, this was really sort of “hush money” for the troops. Just shutup and take your big $$ paycheck. Duty in Kuwait wasn’t fun, but it wasn’t like real combat, either.
@26: I was in Korea in the 2nd ID when we stopped patrolling the DMZ in 1992 and AFAIK nobody got IDP there at that time, not even the JSA guys.
@10: We had a similar situation when my USAR MP Co was deployed to the Balkans for OJG (the Bosnia mission.) We were headquartred at the ISB at Taszar, Hungary, which was outside the IDP zone (the good news is that this meant no General Order no. 1: We were allowed to drink when off duty and there were at least 3 “beer tents” where this could happen.)
The bad news, no IDP – except that as MPs, we had to escort convoys into Croatia. As Croatia was a FYR (Former Yugoslavian Republic) it was an IDP area, and all we had to do was make at least 1 convoy escort mission into Croatia each calendar month in order to qualify for our IDP and CZTE (we normally ran such missions 5 – 7 times a week so this wasn’t a problem for those of us in the line platoons.)
But you know, there was one weird thing. Seemed like every month, right around the 30th or 31st, the CO, the 1sg or one of the other big-wigs in the Ops section would need to “liason” with our platoon in Croatia. So they would go down on the 30th or 31st and gosh darn if they didn’t have to stay overnight and not return until the 1st – guaranteeing them not one but two months of IDP and CZTE.
The border between Hungary and Croatia was the Drava River. We used to joke that every time you drove over the Drava bridge from Hungary you could hear the cash register go “Cha-CHING!” 😀
counterpoint from my dad’s blog: http://silverfoxnavy.blogspot.com/2014/01/another-slap-in-face-of-our-fighting.html
James in Gulf Breeze: your dad and I will have to agree to disagree, amigo. I’d buy his argument if there was any shooting going on in those areas. But best I can tell, there hasn’t been any shooting for at least a decade in any of those areas that involved US forces.
Hondo: It’s why I posted a link – I personally think you guys should get millions for just enlisting…
I never understood why I received imminent danger pay in Somalia in 1993, but was denied tax free status because it wasn’t a “combat zone”. How can you have one without the other in Somalia? I think I’m owed money
SFC D: what, you want DoD policy to be logical and make sense? (smile)
Somalia and HOA should keep it. We had a cruise over there in 05-06 and we were engaging pirates, one sided and limited, but still, they did take some shots at the VBSS teams.
Also, anyone remember a DDG lobbing some shells into Somalia for gunfire support a couple years ago? Maybe the Gonzo?
There was a CHILE’s resteraunt right IN THE POOL at Qatar when I got a lucky R&R there in 2003… And yes, I was amazed at how they lived. Then four days later right back into Iraq I went for the exact same money they got…
#31, reminds me of the Navy practice of going out of one’s way to dip a toe into the Adriatic while transiting somewhere else, just to get the crew IDP/Tax Free for the month.
While I appreciated the extra money at the time*, in retrospect, it sure seems like a chickenshit way to do business.
*Remember, this was the 1990s, when sailors were getting fucked to get that “peace dividend” out of us, and good deals were few and far between. Especially given the declining ratio of platforms to missions. Just like today.
@35: Same for us in Haiti for OUD 94-95. We got IDP but no CZTE. What pissed me off about that was that the troops who got rotated to Kuwait at the same time got both, even though there was no actual combat going on.
Eleven months ago I was in Kyrgyzstan, collecting my hardship and other pays. That lasted a whole month before I got most of my unit to Afghanistan and then boarded a C-17 myself. Afghanistan was a bit different–even as a Fobbit this tour. Manas permits trips into Bishkek, has a Pizza Hut, Burger King and other luxuries (never did eat there, though), and even allows permanent party personnel two beers a day. I finished the last book in the Inheritance Cycle and got most of the way through a decent Chesty Puller bio before getting called forward. Baltika No. 9 was my reading companion. Again, I was a Fobbit but was at least on FOB Shank for half the deployment. We got rocketed fairly often, though every time some POG over-dramatized it I’d remind them that it was not Verdun, the Ardennes, or Khe Sanh. Went to BAF to work with Division for my last 4.5 months and outside of the occasional rocket it was almost as nice as Manas (the lack of beer is inexcusable). As for the awards, this deployment has permanently soured me on the system. We had a female E-7 who essentially told the MAJ in charge of her section that she was getting a BSM–she got one but it may be her last award after getting her second DUI last month. We had Battle NCOs who essentially ran the JOC and left with ARCOMs while senior NCOs who had no real job finished their degrees and got their check the block BSMs. Everyone got their three medals/ribbons for showing up (NATO, ACM, Overseas Service Ribbon), and some of us got another Good Conduct as well. A CPT I was working with was ordered to draft a memo for a unit commendation before we were halfway through. I am assigned to a brigade headquarters company. We lost no one in the company and only had a few rockets land within 300 meters of where we worked and/or slept. Yet almost everyone who didn’t have a combat badge was put in for one. My 1SG finds it… Read more »
I think the waters in the Persian Gulf can still be considered an area of imminent danger. Every time a ship passes through the Straits of Hormuz they are in danger of a silkworm missile attack from Iran. Plus Iranian gunboats are always challenging naval vessels.
@28……..I like your comment about respect of your peers. When I left the Nam in Jan. 1972 I could have cared less about Air medals, campaign medals or Vietnam service medals. I have four things I cared about then and I care about now: I got out with my life; the respect of my peers; My CIB and my aircrew wings.
As for pay I think I received forty or fifty dollars monthly for combat pay I think about the same for flight pay.
As for Eugene Sledge, a really good read is With The Old Breed written by sledge.
I used to agree with this… then I came down on orders to Kuwait as an 11A. Tried to get out of it and my branch manager said they need maneuver officers there. It is a PCS and since I’m single I won’t get BAH. Loosing this pay means I’ll be making $500 less a month in Kuwait than I would make in the US! (That is including all the benefits I’ll get for being forward).
That being said, in the interest of fairness, how is it fair I am making less money being forward deployed than if I was going home to my girl and sleeping in my own bed every night?