About That “Lack of Diversity in Army Officers” Claim . . . .
To put it succinctly: based on publicly-available data published by DoD, the claim appears to be bullsh!t.
The “lack of diversity” claim appears in this article by the Washington Times, and in this article from USA Today. In each article, senior Army leadership appears to indicate that Blacks are “underrepresented” in the Army’s Commissioned Officer Corps. The claim that specifically caught my interest was the claim that that Blacks make up “less than 10%” of the Army’s officer corps.
Based on the latest publicly-available data I could find, these articles appear to be factually incorrect. They also IMO appear to be the result of someone attempting to create the appearance of an issue where no legitimate problem exists.
The Fiscal Year 2015 Defense Manpower Requirements Report was released in June 2014. Information on pages 69 and 76 of that document directly contradicts the claim that “10% of the Army’s officers are Black”.
Page 69 of the 2015 DMRR gives demographic data for the Army’s active duty forces as of 30 September 2013. On that date, the Army had 82,916 commissioned officers. Of that total, 10,173 were Black.
That works out to 12.269+%. Last time I checked, 12.269+% is not “less than 10%”.
Page 76 of the 2015 DMRR gives the same data for the Army’s Selected Reserve (USAR and ARNG). On 30 September 2013, the Army’s Selected Reserve had a total of 68,601 commissioned officers. Of that total, 8,701 were Black.
That works out to 12.683+%. Last time I checked, 12.683+% isn’t “less than 10%”, either.
Even if you restrict the analysis to only those individuals who are considered (or perhaps consider themselves) “non-Hispanic Blacks”, the fraction of Army Commissioned Officers appears to be substantially greater than 10%. For the Active Army, the number of non-Hispanic Black officers was 9,426 – or 11.368+% of the Army’s commissioned officers. For the Army’s Selected Reserves, the number of non-Hispanic Black officers was 5,537 – or 12.467+% of the Army Selected Reserves’ commissioned officers. (Both of these latter totals/calculations exclude the number of Black officers counted as “Black-unknown”.)
So much for the “less than 10%” claim being factually correct.
Now, let’s look at the claim of “underrepresentation”. Well, based on US population demographics that’s essentially bullsh!t too.
According to data from the 2010 Census, the percentage of the US population that was Black in 2010 was approximately 12.6%, while the non-Hispanic Black percentage was 12.2%; I doubt those figures have changed very much since. Comparing those percentages with the ones listed above, it seems to me that the US Army’s commissioned officers today are a fairly accurate representation of US population demographics – at least when it comes to Black Americans.
But that’s just me. I’m just looking at the actual numbers published by DoD and doing a little math. I’m not trying to sell Army leadership a bottle of snake oil.
Category: Big Army
…Almost wondering if someone in the Echelons Above Reality has decided that there aren’t enough African-American officers and that there are going to be more, whether the evidence backs it up or not. When I recruited for the USAF (89-93), there was constant pressure to get ‘minority’ applicants on the grounds that they were under-represented, even though our own numbers were telling us that we were not only mirroring the population as a whole, but exceeding it.
Mike
Statistcs bear out that 2 % of the population are F’n idiots, DOD says they are well over quota in this category for commissioned officers, where most are disproportionally O-6 and above.
hah! good one, Cato
It’s a self perpetuating population. I am CONSTANTLY beating my head against the wall after dealing with fucktard O6s (especially the Pentagon sub-category)eventually I’ll be mentally qualified to be an Airborne Ranger O6………..
I’m calling a flag on this one, cato. Please cite your source.
The ever-reliable Wikipedia says the number is closer to 51.1%:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2012
Your points are accurate and irrefutable, your source is clearly ever-reliable and unbiased.
I stand corrected.
And they are mostly found in a pentagonal building.
I have a feeling they are trying a push to use Affirmative Action in OERs and/or ROTC/OCS/USMA programs. They don’t want a highly-trained fighting force, they want a diverse group of free-thinkers that look spiffy in their new annual uniform change that will make Americans feel better about themselves.
Bingo!
Flagwaver…+100
Man am I fed up with this numbers crap! Jobs, ranks and commissions should go to those qualified. Period. Don’t care what color they are. They are parsing this down so much now. As in Black, non-Hispanic Black, Hispanic, non-White Hispanic, non-White White, Non-Hispanic_Hispanic, Self Identified White-Black Hispanic Native America in some degrees. Klingon, Vulcan and Vulcan Human. Shit, why don’t the guys just do what they want in the Pentagon as they have been doing for years and tell everyone out loud what they tell them between the lines. That being, fuck off and mind your business, we’ll do as we please.
Besides, with the Mid-East becoming what it is, shouldn’t the Pentagon be concerning itself with bigger more, you know, military readiness type concerns than social shit like this? I mean by the time we take care of harassment (smoking a troop for discipline) tattoos, rolled up sleeves and such, we’ll be a kinder, gentler, prettier military but all that shit doesn’t help one iota on the battle fields to come.
Sorry. I’m on a tear this morning.
To use their logic, there’s not enough white people in jail for murder or drug related crimes.
We need to start diversifying and putting more whites in jail for these crimes regardless of the fact that there are not enough available being convicted of said crimes to be put in jail for.
Buncha horseshit.
If we were to follow leftist logic in hiring quotas, the majority of the NFL and NBA would be white.
What’s next, LGBT quotas? If a “Joe” shows up dressed as a “Jane”, will that put him ahead of his peers because of diversity quotas? I’m beginning to wonder if receiving a lobotomy is prerequisite for working in that five sided asylum?
Yes and yes.
While I don’t disagree with you on the inability of various newspapers to do basic math, when it comes to ‘underrepresentation’, it’s probably best to compare not to US population at large, but rather to the racial demographics of the US Army. And there, black officers do seem to be underrepresented.
Using the active duty numbers, I see 527,557 active duty soldiers, of whom 110,755 are black, for 21.0%, yet they only make up roughly 12.3% of the officers, a pretty sizable difference in magnitude.
Now lest you pounce on me and claim I’m arguing for all sorts of PC-crap, I’m not – I’m just pointing out what the numbers show. Yes, it’s not what the papers argue, but it might be what someone argued TO the papers, and then it was written up differently by someone without basic math skills. And I’m also not saying the cause is racism or anything – officers require degrees, and fewer blacks complete college than whites. There’s also tradition, etc.
In short, I don’t think a comparison to the US population at large is as fair as a comparison to the actual racial make-up of the US Army.
There are very few African American Infantry Officers.
So I guess this begs the question. If there numbers had shown say, 15% Black Officers and that being disproportionately high as a percentage of the general population, would they then thin them out to keep the numbers in line? So I guess I am asking, what is the point of this?
Green Thumb…I meant my post above as a separate post not as a reply to yours, sorry. I agree with you. In my time, long ago, I remember the number of Black Infantry Officers I saw on one hand.
LC: I was waiting for someone to bring up that absolute canard. That is a negative. Such an assertion is false, and shows a basic misunderstanding of the role of a military officer. Officer accession uses far different programs than does enlistment. The objective is not to provide personnel in bulk for the military. Rather the objective is to select the best possible potential leaders, period. The officer corps should therefore be expected to mirror general US demographics, not necessarily overall military demographics. I’ll explain. Entry into the Army in general is non-competitive and voluntary. If you (1) qualify, (2) want to enlist, and (3) there is a vacancy, you’re in. That’s it. Voluntarily joining the military also offers substantial future benefits – namely, the GI Bill. Thus, voluntary enlistment has traditionally been seen as a “way out and up” for those who are economically disadvantaged. This is precisely why Black, Hispanic, and poor rural Whites have been overrepresented, statistically-speaking, in the US military since the 1980s. Race has nothing to do with that fact; it’s all about economics. In contrast, obtaining a commission is the result of a highly competitive process. Yes, anyone can apply. But at that point, objective competitive selection takes over. Only the best qualified on an objective basis make it. Such a fair competitive process is precisely what you want to select military leaders. You don’t want to entrust the lives (literally) of tens to thousands of soldiers to anyone else. If one assumes (and the assumption is reasonable) that all racial and ethnic groups are substantially equal in overall natural ability, the results of any such fair competitive process that selects the “best and brightest” for leadership positions should thus very closely mirror population demographics. If they do not, something other than inherent merit is skewing the selection process. Or, to be blunt: you no longer have a fair process based solely on merit. The Army has essentially achieved precisely that, at least with respect to Black Americans, in selecting its officers in the aggregate. The percentage of Black Army officers is quite close… Read more »
Hondo, although what I’m about write is highly subjective and as such, not the hard data you’re looking for, I think I can provide some light on Blacks in combat arms.
During the time I was in uniform, a mechanized infantry platoon consisted of roughly 30 men. In every platoon I served in we had no fewer than five black soldiers, all EMs. The platoon I was in Iraq with was 36 soldiers, nine of them black, once again all enlisted, including our Platoon Sergeant.
I never had a black officer in my chain of command in any capacity at least up to the division level. There was a black platoon leader in my company at one point, but he’s the only one I remember.
Overall the numbers you posted from the DoD match my experiences.
Former 11B: that doesn’t surprise me. The article linked by FrostyCWO below provides some additional data. That additional data indicates that about 7% of combat arms officers are Black; it further states that only about 6% of junior officers in the combat arms are Black. Those percentages work out to about 1 in 15 and 1 in 17, respectively.
I remember the statistical dearth of African -Americans in combat arms was the subject of study about 15 years ago. As I recall, the answer was pretty much that whereas caucasions GENERALLY enlist for intangable reasons, African_americans join GENERALLY for benefits/opportunity to move ahead with job skills and training. Bot saying lesser patriotism, just mixed in with a sense of potential financial self improvement If this was in fact the results reached then, could it not be true now as well as in the officer corps?
Hondo, I think this is someone drawing a direct parallel from the over-representation of African-Americans in the enlisted/warrant side to the commissioned side. Either that, or the demographic data they’re using is weird. The USA TODAY article says<10% officers are black and 18% of enlisted for AD. My own math from your linked report:
AD Enlisted: 20.9%
AD Warrant: 18.6%
AD Officer: 12.2%
Anecdotally, as a signal guy, of my 10 battalion/brigade commanders I've served under to date, I've had 5 black, 5 white.
Signalcat, my signal experience is about the same. And I’ve had more black PL’s than white. Just my own 24 years of data, other branches may differ. I’ve had 4 black female CSM’s, does that count double?
Reposted as a separate post which it should have been. Not as a response to Green Thumb above. Sorry.
So I guess this begs the question. If there numbers had shown say, 15% Black Officers and that being disproportionately high as a percentage of the general population, would they then thin them out to keep the numbers in line? So I guess I am asking, what is the point of this?
The point is what W.E.B. DuBois warned us about:
“There is another class of coloured people who make a business of keeping the troubles, the wrongs and the hardships of the Negro race before the public. Having learned that they are able to make a living out of their troubles, they have grown into the settled habit of advertising their wrongs – partly because they want sympathy and partly because it pays. Some of these people do not want the Negro to lose his grievances, because they do not want to lose their jobs.”
Colin Powell also alludes to this in “My American Journey,” when he expresses his frustration that during peacetime the military is harangued for not providing enough opportunities to minorities but as soon as conflict looms, the same people begin to yell loudly about the disproportionate numbers of minorities that will be going into danger’s way.
And I must correct myself, the quote is from Booker T. Washington (from his book “My Larger Education”) vice W.E.B. DuBois.
While there is no excuse for inflaming tension or citing inaccurate facts, maybe this article will clarify the point.
http://www.armytimes.com/article/20140911/NEWS/309110066/Army-commanders-White-men-lead-diverse-force
There is a diversity problem if at least roughly 12% of COMMANDERS are not black. As we all know, Command, more specifically Command of Combat Arms units (or in the current Army parlance, Maneuver, Fires and Effects, MFE), is the ticket to GO/FO grades. The point of this article is that there is a dearth of black commanders headed for the senior ranks of the Army Leadership because so few occupy Combat Command positions.
If the officer ranks mirror the enlisted ranks, then most black officers will not be in a combat arms job. Most blacks in the Army enlist in support and service support jobs rather than in a combat arms MOS. If blacks are under represented in the GO/FO ranks, then who’s fault is that? Certainly not the Army’s. Those officers chose to branch out of a combat arms assignment. So to mirror the question asked by Sparks, what’s the point?
FrostyCWO: that article is indeed substantially better than the two that hit the national newswires, and more accurately discusses the problem.
Two issues with your statement that, “There is a diversity problem if at least roughly 12% of COMMANDERS are not black.” That may or may not be true – for two reasons.
First: the figures today are a snapshot in time. The fact that at a particular time a given racial/ethnic group may be underrepresented tells you very little. The pattern over time is what counts.
Second: a fair selection process should result, over time, in a distribution of commanders that mirrors the population in question. However, the population for command selection for Army units is NOT “all Army officers”. Rather, the population is officers within a particular branch. Infantry commanders are selected from among Infantry officers; Armor commanders are selected from among Armor officers, and so on.
At present, Black officers as a group appear to be non-uniformly distributed among the branches. The article you linked indicates that only about 7% of current combat-arms officers are Black. If so, then only about 7% of combat arms commanders should be expected to be Black officers if the command selection process is fair. Next year, there will be 2 of 25 combat brigade commanders who are Black. 2/25 is 8% – almost precisely the fraction expected by a fair selection process from a population that is itself 7% Black.
Why Black officers are underrepresented in the combat arms is a different question entirely. The article you linked above discusses one possible reason for that. Army officers have some degree of input/control over their branch on accession. That, plus the factors indicated in the article you linked, may well be precisely what is behind the skewed distribution.
Addendum: currently, the Active Army has
277319 GOs. Of those, 30 – or10.83+%9.40+% are Black. This includes 3 of the 12 Active Army four-star Generals – or 25%.I’d say this is fairly persuasive evidence that the Army’s officer selection and promotion system has no significant inherent racial bias. YMMV.
(Correction above due to math error in original.)
Looks like the Army has 14 full generals & 3 that are AA…still over 20%.
Page 69 of the cited report gives the number of Active Army (e.g., Active Component) O-10s as 12.
Page 76 gives the total of SELRES Army O-10s as 1, which is not included in the Active Component count. I consciously elected not to include that individual – I believe that is the Chief of the NGB, which as I recall was fairly recently elevated to 4-star rank – in my discussion as it is not an Active Component billet and the basic discussion concerned the Army’s Active Component.
That is also the same billet listed on page 74. Page 74 of the report is for the ARNG, page 75 is for the USAR, and page 76 is the consolidated Army SELRES total (ARNG plus USAR).
That is correct Hondo. The NG has a much bigger lobby than the Reserves. Hence, when they said “we deserve a 4-star” they got one. When the Reserves said, “we do too!” they were told to go pound sand.
The Chief of the Army Reserves is a 3-star. I don’t ever see that changing.
The NG’s justification was the Air and Army components of the NG and the necessity to coordinate with 50 different state Adjutant Generals “TAG” (Commander of the NG for the state), especially in regards to federalization and mobilization for conflicts. Also, because of the Air/Army components of the NG, I believe that O-10 could be Army or Air NG which would change up the statistics of it.
MOS are not distributed in a perfectly racially balanced fashion because the reason people join the army varies according to culture, which is highly correlated to race. If you join the army because you see it as a stable place to have a long career and raise a family you make different MOS choices then if you join up to spend a few years jumping out of airplanes and shooting automatic weapons before going getting out.
More social justice warrior bullshit.
Tribalism. Minorities can’t be told or listen to anyone that isn’t the same skin color these days.
ATC: The point is that as a public institution, the Army does not do the best job of ensuring diversity in its senior leadership. That’s the Army’s contract with society. That responsibilit does not completely fall with a black Cadet who chooses Logistics Corps for a branch over being an Armor Officer. It also ensures that we have the largest available pool to select the absolute best and brightest to lead the Army in the future. That future, by the way, will be more diverse than it is currently. Striving for diversity AND competency do not have to be mutually exclusive enterprises.
Hondo: Excellent point on the numbers you site. Truly not enough data to establish the trend. Anecdotally, I’m inclined to believe it based on personal experience, but there needs to be a more convincing argument than personal experience. As to your second question, I think it may come from the historical legacy of the segregated Army. Black Soldiers rarely served in white units unless they were supply or mess specialists. While some units, such as the 369th Infantry Regiment “Harlem Hellfighters”, the 555th Parachute Infantry Battalion “Triple Nickle”, and 92nd Infantry Division (colored), served with great distinction, the experiences of the men of those valorous units did not represent the normal experiences of black Soldiers in the Army prior to 1948. Bringing that experience forward to the present, the sociological example of using the Army to achieve upward mobility and the idea that you have a historical trend driven by tradition appears to have some merit.
“Striving for diversity AND competency do not have to be mutually exclusive enterprises.” Perhaps not, but they usually are.
Hondo, while the statistics appear to show that there is sufficient diversity at the GO level, is there diversity outside of the Commanders that will LEAD the Army and not just administer its Administrative, Logistics, or Signal functions? Two black COCOM Commanders out five or six billets in the almost thirty years since Goldwater-Nichols created the Combatant Commands is not an encouraging trend.
Actually, FrostyCWO, that’s about exactly what you’d expect to see if the selection process is indeed absolutely fair, given the current fraction of US Army combat arms officers who are Black.
I don’t want to go through a big research effort, so I’ll accept your assertion of 2 Black Army COCOM commanders and do a “quick and dirty” estimate. If someone wants to come up with better numbers, I’ll crunch them and give an update.
There are 10 COCOMs/Unified Commands. The number 10 is fixed by Federal law. The Army at any one time commands on average about 3 of them. Tour lengths average somewhere around 3 years. Since it’s been roughly 30 years since Nichols-Goldwater (28 actually – but I’ll round up), this means that the Army has filled somewhere around 30 COCOM command tours. Let’s say 30.
If there have been 2 Black Army COCOM commanders, that works out to roughly 1 out of 15 – or about 7%. That happens to be roughly the current fraction of Active Army combat arms officers who are Black.
The Army is not going to recommend the POTUS nominate a non-combat arms officer for a COCOM command.
Hondo,
Yes, I know they are divided in joint billets. And while there are ten COCOMs, the Commanding General of United States Transportation Command is not going to be the next Army Chief of Staff. That’s universal for the services at large. I know of no other African-Americans that have served as COCOM Commanders. That’s the reality I was driving at.
The Commander, USTRANSCOM, is not going to be a Army officer, either. That was the basis of my reducing the total number of slots filled by the Army to 30%.
The reality I was driving at is that, based on the observed percentage of Army combat arms officers who are Black (7%) and the total number of COCOM command tours filled by Army GENs (30), two would be the expected number of COCOM tours filled by Black Army GENs during the past 30 years.
Why the distribution of Army officers is skewed such that Black officers are less likely to be in a combat arms branch is an entirely different question. Given the article you cited and my limited knowledge of the Army officer accessions process, I’m guessing personal choice and pre-commissioning advice/guidance given the individuals is the primary factor. But that’s just a guess on my part.
The raw numbers do not support the existence of prevalent racism in the Army’s officer accessions process. The existence of such is precisely the implication of the two articles I originally cited.
I totally agree that it’s not racism. More likely it is a combination of cultural and societal attitudes that affect accessions, interests and career progression.
I would argue that it is in the best interests of the Army and society at large to get more black officers into combat arms both to ensure that a representative population of African-Americans is present in senior Army leadership and to widen the pool to choose the next generation of the nation’s leaders.
Only 9 COCOMS now…Joint Forces Command was shuttered back in 2011 (GEN Odierno was it’s last commander).
Correct.
But they established Cyber command as a 4 star billet bringing the number of 4 stars back to 10.
Not a COCOM. Cyber Command falls under authority of Director NSA (a tri hatted joint four star billet). The Director NSA is a subordinate to COCOM U.S. Strategic Command, The SECDEF, and Under Secy of Defense for Intelligence.
No yet….
But they did recycle the “excess” 4 star joint billet.
Expect it to be elevated to a full COCOM (but without the dual hat as Director of NSA) during the next COCOM review.
It looks like the 10% being representative for blacks only applies between grades O5 thru O7 according to the 2015 Manpower Report. I guess that’s how they technically spin the lack of leadership roles between Battalion and Division levels. This is what happens when Army sociologists are NOT pushed for details in their press statements.
I’m also curious to see the 25 “relevant’ commands USA Today used to identify by race and what they have been from year to year since anomalies are bound to happen especially if you’re looking for a discrepancy.
What would be useful would be to know what the make up of that O-5 to O-7 cohort was at commissioning, at the end of the initial ADSO +1. If the 10% number was consistent across the board, or if the ratio was smaller than 10% and is now above than I would have to say that the Army is doing a pretty good job.
More social engineering? I am a “minority” officer and honestly, I don’t care about the race or ethnicity of my superiors or subordinates. To me, you’re either squared away or a shitbag. I want the best leadership possible so my Soldiers and I get home safe, period. Apparently, there are too many folks in government with WAY too much time on their hands. Glad to see we won in Afghanistan, the Russians gave up on Ukraine, ISIS packed up and went home, the Iranians gave up their centrifuges, and the Chinese stopped their shenanigans in the Pacific. Wait…they haven’t?
I’m a 20 yr lifer. Army and retired in 81. I taught in Ft Gordon Commo School 2 tours. Right before I retired there was close to 50% black males, 30% black and white females and 20% white males. The dirty little secret is during the Vietnam War the infantry was over stocked with black soldiers and 2 things were happening. White officers leading patrols were being shot in the back and black soldiers were being killed disproportionally to the Army’s black male population. So…. Now look at any picture of a group of soldiers during the Iraq War and now during the Afghan War. You will be hard pressed to find 2 black soldiers. Now what am I saying. I’m saying that the Army has recruitment tools to direct white men to combat arms and black men to all other branches of the Army. This is your PC all volunteer Army. Good luck finding the job you want if your white and God Bless You if your black, go for it.