The Army wants you to stay
According to Fox Business News, the Army has been told by the new sheriffs in town that they’ll be expanding their ranks to meet their commitments in the war against terror and beyond.
Under the current plan, the active duty Army will grow by 16,000 soldiers, taking it to 476,000 in total by October. The National Guard and the Army Reserve will see a smaller expansion.
To meet the mandate, the Army must find 6,000 new soldiers, convince 9,000 current soldiers to stay on and add 1,000 officers.
“We’ve got a ways to go,” Gen. Robert Abrams, head of U.S. Army Forces Command, said in an interview at his office in Fort Bragg, N.C. “I’m not going to kid you. It’s been difficult because a lot of these kids had plans and their families had plans.”
In just the last two weeks, the Army has paid out more than $26 million in bonuses.
It always happens that way – a Democrat president will slice up the Defense Department is an effort to show that they’ll jeopardize our national security to save a coupla bucks and the realist Republican president has to come in and restore those cuts – and be branded a war monger spending irrationally on defense.
So according to the Fox article, the Army is offering up to $90,000 per for bonuses to remain in uniform for some of the folks who made plans to get out of the Army this year. The Army is doing their best to retain quality troops so they don’t have to lower the enlistment standards to meet their manpower goals.
Category: Army News
OK, I see this as a good thing because it will encourage some quality troops to stay in with my son – improving the quality of men he gets to train and work with, improving their lethality and survivability.
I’m sorry that with the America-hating leftists in power they end up having to do something like this when the adults take charge again, but it gives me hope.
Gee, if only they hadn’t kicked out tens of thousands in the last couple years for any excuse they could find just to reduce the force. Maybe so many wouldn’t be pissed off and disgruntled about it?
Oh but it was Obama’s fault. The bureaucrats had NOTHING to do with it at all….
Hey, they had to make room for all those transgender deviants who would make such great Soldiers!
/sarc
Yeah and by kicking out ten thousand, they’d be able to afford the medical and mental therapy costs of all four of them.
If they were smart they would be calling on those NCO’s and be spending some bonus money to bring a bunch of them back.
Oh they already started that a couple months ago.
Anyone who got out in the last 3 years is being offered at least 40 grand to come back in for only a 2 year contract, or more if they want.
That doesn’t apply to those separated for other issues, they have to do the appeals process, but I’m thinking it’ll be quite likely there will be more leniency for those kicked out for one piece of paper.
I wonder if they were offering bonuses to those who were due to re-up in the NG? My son just re-upped for 6.
I think he expects Trump to be re-elected.
That is good to hear.
The Army moved the RCP rules back to the old standards just a few months ago, reducing the time an NCO can still serve by a couple of years on average.
They could have kept some pretty decent NCOs if they hadn’t been so quick to pull the trigger on reducing the force.
Unfortunately, when the Commander in Chief says, “Reduce the force” the bureaucrats actually obey an order AND become as efficient as possible. Because, the more troops they get rid of, the less work they have to deal with. Especially at places like the Army High Royalty Command (HRC).
$90,000? Where do I sign up? I still work in my rate. I can document that. Age is just a number.
Oh – did you get your recall letter yet, Jonn?
Guessing that may be why I haven’t received my retirement orders, even though I submitted paperwork to brigade 3 months ago….
Nah, brigade has to sit on it for at least 4 months before they move it to the next level.
My retirement packet is at the brigade level as well, but it has been traveling smoothly. the average timeframe, that I was given, was three months, which means I could see my retirement orders post next month. I keep doing a status check on it from my end.
OK, thebesig, but my $1.00 says they extend you anyway, ‘cuz they can’t do without your wisdom.
I remember the shitty looks I got from Disbursing when I asked where my $11k reenlistment bonus check was. That was half of the $28k I actually got, after taxes.
And now $100k in my rate is the norm.
Hey, all they offered me was a lousy $10K, I’d still go back for that, I’m still able to perform my duty! They should be happy to take us old farts, we are grumpy and would kill somebody just because they pissed us off! All they have to do is take away our coffee and we would be ready to kill anybody!
I’m with you, but I want the big bucks. They’d be better off recalling the old timers, anyway, because we have no patience with the sjw/PC crowd.
So, you’re saying the old timers answer Mattis’ question of “how does this improve lethality?” quite well?
Sure, why not?
works for me
They might actually save a bunch of $$ for those of us already under Medicare…
90k, plus free Ben Gay {seems more like a question instead of a name of a liniment} ;), and a supply of glucosamine, and I’m in!!
They are adding 16,000 to the Army? According to my math, that is 1,000 officers and 15,000 enlisted. The number of officers needed seem a bit off to me.
Why do we need so many officers? That is a 15:1 enlisted/ commissioned ration. When I was in the infantry back in the early 1990’s, it seems like we were lucky if we had an officer for every platoon of 26-30 enlisted.
But hey… I know that these are just starting numbers and can be adjusted.
It could mean that more officers are getting out, like pilots, and there is a greater attrition rate…
You also have to realize certain bullets and commands tend to be officer-heavy.
Seems to me I remember hearing somewhere that O-5 at the Pentagon meant you were almost senior enough to fetch someone’s coffee.
Billets. Fucking autocorrect.
bullets…officer heavy lol
You have forgotten about all those officers needed to man those critical REMF/fobbit slots.
Good to see some of the sheer idiocy of the period 20 Jan 2009 through 20 Jan 2017 being reversed by adult leadership.
In 2010 I got a message from a buddy of mine who got out and was wondering if I was interested in moving to Cali to teach Marines how to intel for $180k a year. I said no and reenlisted in my MOS for a $50k+ bonus and orders to stay in Okinawa for another year. Several weeks after signing that additional four year contract, I got orders to recruiting duty. That last awesome year in Okinawa was the prelude to a shitty 3 years of 100 hour work weeks and a hostile-as-fuck command that nearly resulted in the end of my marriage in bumfuck Wisconsin.
Anyway, I survived, got promoted, GTFO and became a contractor at a significantly lower salary than I would have worked for in 2010, even with a college degree. Plus, I lost nearly 3 years of relevant MOS experience (which meant lower pay as a contractor) being a glorified salesman.
In retrospect, I should have just GTFO. The money wasn’t worth it.
“In just the last two weeks, the Army has paid out more than $26 million in bonuses.”
Time to bring back the draft.
It’s a shame. While it is nice to see the army is going to expand a bit more, doing so after all the previous cuts means inducing higher selection and promotion rates. The only good thing about the cuts was that it cut some deadweight in the mid- and senior grade officers and NCOs and started promotions being competitive again. Let’s hope we can keep that part intact.
Their gonna need more troops to cover for all the pregnant Infantry men/gals/people/other.
All they have to do to fix retention is restore retirement. A smart kid would be nuts to stay in under the current system.
You hit the nail on the head. Why on earth would somebody reenlist when they could go to college on the government dime to increase their economic mobility, enjoy a lot more freedom, have rights again, and vastly improve their quality of life by doing 4 and getting out? Most don’t stay in long enough to retire anyway. Treating the military like it’s some cushy 9 to 5 government desk job is an insult to those who put their lives in harm’s way when the vast majority of Americans either can’t or won’t.
They are guessing the “up to $90K over six years” will do it. While it is not an insignificant amount of money, an E4 who goes back to school and gets the right degree could easily beat it in earnings income within 10 years. Offering money means they are going to reward the kid who wants to do it anyway for the right reasons and keep the rock with lips who sees short terms dollar signs. Hopefully not too many in the second category.
Over my 24 years of service I saw the ebb and flow quite a bit from the Cold War build up to the post Cold War reductions to the “oops, we got rid of too many of these and have too many of those”. Gutting retirement was a mistake the lst time they did it and it was a mistake this time.