The Looming NCO Crisis Part 2: Why is the Recruit Base so Low?

 

Part 1 of this series discussed the low recruiting base for the Army and how that will translate into an NCO crisis. The Chief of Staff of the Army reports that only 23% of Americans in the target age range are eligible to serve and only 9% want to serve. Why?

Part 1 gave some reasons: cognitive capabilities, physical conditioning, criminal records, apathy, and a sense of entitlement. These are symptom though and trying to treat them without looking at the root cause will give us results like the debacle in Afghanistan. It is like treating a runny nose to cure a sinus infection. It may provide some temporary relief but does not address the infection that causes the problem.

The common denominator in these systems is a lack of virtue. Virtue signaling notwithstanding, virtue is missing from American society and dialog.

Virtue has at least three levels:

• Basic virtue is taking responsibility for oneself and contributing back to society rather than taking from it. For most of US history, Americans had this level of virtue. The New Deal and the Great Society stripped away this level of virtue. As the federal government and assistance programs grew, they eroded the foundations of this level of virtue.
• Core virtue is doing the right thing without hope of reward or fear of punishment. The key issue of core virtue is determining the “right thing”. On a foundational level, we can relate it to duty—what does your position in life, your organization, etc. say you should do? On a living level, ethics shapes it. Anyone who has studied ethics understands is not always cut and dry. For me, the foundational ethical statement is Kant’s Categorical Imperative: People are ends in themselves and not a means to an end.
• Altruistic virtue is a higher level that simply doing the “right thing”. It is potentially putting your own well-being aside to benefit the greater good.

The first level applies to the discussion on the recruiting base and why it is so low. The second two levels apply to training soldiers and NCOs. Low or no basic virtue drives most of the symptoms of the low recruiting base, as shown in the table below.

Table The Virtue Problem
Symptom	Issues
Cognitive Capabilities	Part is nature and part is nurture Low concern or care about learning Low skill development
Physical Conditioning	Part is nature and part is nurture Poor diet leading to obesity Lack of exercise Examine drug use
Criminal Records	Low respect for the rule of law Need to look at the type of crime and the motivation Take what you want/do what you want
Apathy	Low concern for the commonwealth and other people Few ideals and governing philosophy Poor understanding of history
Entitlement	“Society owes me” Participation vs. Competition Government will take care of me

The issues listed in Table 1 are all indicative of problems with basic virtue. Attention to basic virtue can address all of them except the “nature” components of cognitive capabilities and physical conditioning. The problems are caused by changes in American culture that replaced self-reliance with government reliance. The new emerging American culture denigrates self-reliance and self-responsibility with collective/government reliance.

This new culture uses “virtue” to purchase wealth and sacrifices liberty for power. It also flies in the face of President Kennedy’s “ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.”

The three levels of virtue are critical to restore the recruiting base. The question is, does the current military leadership really desire this change? The answer is directly related to the emerging military culture based on social engineering. Part 3 will look at this culture.

 

Virtue Blogs:

Virtue: Honor and Integrity

Virtue Leadership and Power

Virtue and Courtesy are Requirements for Effective Solution Development and a Healthy Society

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