Military Recruiting Challenges are Becoming Systemic, Part 1

The only thing this administration seems to be learning-lessons in conjugation-although that is racist-and then there is pronoun use for the military that defies thought, logic, and reason-even utility! Hell, when I was in-a while back-your name was on your uniform for a reason…didn’t need pronouns, first names or none of that…I can think of dozens of soldiers I worked with every day as a private-I don’t know or remember their first names…

These senior “leaders” should be called in (hahaha-by who? Good question-tax payers-parent groups-congress) and provided a training packet that includes a little tactical shaving mirror. When leadership is bad-the best reason-answer-is usually the mirror-the problem is in the mirror.

If I were giving a speech that called for “bold changes” would it be unreasonable to expect-and then demand-that I tell you about some of them???

But just like the wokesters in the other services, the USMC Commandant quoted in this article-who have all saluted and stayed silent providing at a minimum tacit approval and support for the national idjiotcy of the renaming commission spreading morale undermining turd sandwiches throughout the land, have embraced wokeism, Critical Racism Theory-with a message that “whitey” was-is-and will be-bad, the problem, also seemingly required accommodating things through a lot of policies that undermined key discipline and existing military regs-grooming standards-beards, earrings, hair, also team building disrupters-pronoun use, gay and transgender friendly policies-mandatory training-focused on what might be 1-2% of the force on a generous day-all say that “everything is on the table” at this point????

Social media invasion for clearances, relaxed tattoo policy, pregnancy flight suits, breast feeding additions to Joint Travel regs, allowed civilian authority to question the loyalty of military personnel with no evidence whatsoever, totally f’d up attempts to make the physical fitness test “gender” friendly-over years and embarrassing years, had senior leaders insist that ~10% of the force are white supremacists with no evidence whatsoever-held a useless down day to reinforce this ignorant and evidence-free belief-that was debunked by the most senior commanders in the military testifying to congress who dismissed it as “ridiculous”-although senior diversity officials in the SECDEF’s office/staff-believed they knew better than our most senior commanders.

And Austin let it all play out with all his experience-which provides key insight on what he really apparently believes, but never acted upon in his 30+ years of service at our most senior levels. He allowed it and never bitched about—he never stood up on principle for-or caused a stink-forced our civilian leaders to clarify the mission-the goals-the execution methodology-nothing-when “they” (and you have to wonder who “they” are here-unit commanders? Politicians-DC authorities-civilian control of the military?) forced troops-who were deployed to DC for no discernable or mission based reason–to hang out and sleep in parking garages to keep them out of sight-not as a deployment tactic, but because of “the optics:” our “elected officials” were embarrassed or ashamed or don’t support our-their-own military showing their faces in uniform in the capital of this great nation-our own military sons and daughters-in DC-and it’s not for anything obvious that comes to mind, except-that there was no reason for them to be there in the first place-and some of them were likely scummy Orange Man Bad supporters-Patriots-“icky.”

We just had a total clown fest with this Chinese balloon-why didn’t we hear about it when it was enroute-after it arrived-nothing-until it was over our Intercontinental Ballistic Missile Silos in Montana. How big-or small an Electro-Magnetic Pulse device would it take to dose this area down to the point of malfunction? How bad is the Orange Man that he acted like it never happened before-but they might not have told him-or maybe we lack the capability to detect them, or maybe “Little Johnny did it?”

We are coming up on a year since our most senior military leaders embarrassingly advised congress and POTUS that the Russians would be done in Ukraine in 72 hours—a year and ~100B US taxpayer dollars spent since that sage and prescient advice to US leaders. Hand in the back? Yes-we might have reacted or responded differently-earlier-had we not totally blown the combat assessment. But take some solace that Central Intelligence Agency Director Burns was comfortable observing that they got it “much less wrong than others:” how could anything go badly with the bigotry of those low expectations?

Of course there was Afghanistan, where we totally bolloxed up the withdrawal, our military leadership was totally flummoxed about the Afghan govt falling within 11 days-after touting the security and training efforts and progress made for the previous year-300K Afghan security forces-equipped by the US-far outgunned the rag-tag Taliban—-these fools totally disregarded their folks on the ground, as well as reporting that in the months leading up to our precipitous withdrawal, the Taliban controlled in excess of 60% of the routes into Kabul-lines of communications-as evidenced by Taliban manning the checkpoints-where was this 300K Afghan government security force-they certainly were not manning the checkpoints…and we decided-anyway-that we had to give up the most secure and modern airbase in that part of the world-Bagram-nearly 100B in military weaponry-and manage the retreat at the International Airport-which could not possibly be secured—except by the Taliban-while forcing US citizens and those Afghans we promised to help-to try to make it on their own through a gauntlet of Taliban and irate Afghanis who suddenly realized Uncle Sam was cutting and running-abandoning them-and OBTW-we left Bagram in the dead of night without telling anyone—like a Jethro Bodine move (we didn’t leave the lights on for them.)

Parents who would recommend the military for their sons and daughters are in the absolute single digit minority, as are the school kids looking at their options for the future and thinking about the military. Anyone who recommends the military at this point is frankly a bit suspect at this point.

Just curious, but if everything is on the table according to these experienced but apparently suffering in silence military leaders responsible for overseeing this slide in mediocrity, how many already trained and capable of performing-right now-military have been brought back-how many of those in one of the top two most invulnerable categories at risk from COVID (after children) did they decide to bring back-trained military personnel forced out because of COVID? None that I have seen or heard about—so apparently everything is on the table—but not that….I think what should be on the table-call it a chopping block-is these idjiotic sycophants heads! I’ve made the case in many previous articles that it should start with SECDEF and his useless JCS Chief.

I have a different sense of humor than many, but I think it would be great-the ultimate in accountability and self-ownership-if Austin gathered up the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the JROC-his Combatant Commander’s and his most senior staff-and got to the root cause of these recruiting issues: it would be like an Alcoholics Anonymous session or maybe a self-triggered cross-fire ambush…(I’m firing-myself!)

The standards have already been watered down to where-for the Army-AR600-9 (weight control) and the physical fitness standards-recruits are getting in at as low as like ~60% of standards (so if you need ~200 to pass the gender fitness test at a minimum, they get a pass at ~120-like, c’mon, just 1 pushup and sit-up—whereas for weight it might be the limit is 200 based upon age, height and weight-and somebody that weighs 240 has like 6 months to meet the standards (upon completion of Initial Entry Training-which is typically ~6 months, although it has always been somewhat problematic when you have military schools that can be a year or more and qualify early based on time-but it is somewhat of a problematic dichotomy.)

And I know what you are thinking-suppose a female waivered in gets pregnant after a few months and all of a sudden is in a different category all together? That just shows that you are racist-ableist or some type of “ism” just for bringing something like that up. Not that she could get pregnant, but the fact that you are thinking about sex and not gender-so according to the literature being provided by the military and our government-that is not exclusively a female problem-could happen to any recruit (oy vey) and we just have to deal with it.

Somewhat reminiscent of those mid-western recruiting scandals of yesteryear where many with disabilities and other disqualification showed up at MEPS (Military Entrance Processing Station)-so they helped contribute to the monthly quota, but never saw the inside of a combat boot.

If leaders believe pushing the monetary aspect of the military is the worthwhile tact to recruiting-the delusion is much deeper and worse than I thought. Besides watering down the retirement aspects to where military qualify for 40% of the average of their last three pay rates, and 60% after 30 years (which formerly were 50% and 75%, respectively,) it doesn’t take a genius to figure out the pay scale is far inferior to civilians-and the medical has been watered down significantly, with the VA having one of the worst reputations for medical care in the business: it was recovering and getting “adequate” but then COVID and gender, racist and other distractions confused them on their actual mission-and its 2023. Also-you pay for dental and a stipend for medical anymore-albeit a lesser rate than most, but money out of your paycheck and/or retirement- which is particularly grating for those of us who joined during the “free medical for life” BS era.

I mentioned before about trusting the Air Force, have I mentioned about trusting the government? Similar to the inspector general or when I was administering the Command Inspection Program, the inside joke is: “We are here to help” and the proper response is “We are glad to see you.” I well remember a softball buddy who was a relatively new Company Commander who responded-with a straight face-that he “welcomed the CIP opportunity and team because he had no way of knowing how F’d up he was” (where is the video when you need it-one of those malaprops that grows on you the more you consider/look at it…)

Now in truth the pay is up considerably and remarkably since I entered as a buck Private in 1975 at 360 bucks a month-and yes-my father-in-law (RIP) was in the USAF-residue of the Army Air Corps-taking care of flying stuff in the fifties and he would have killed for that kind of money-for him it was uphill in the snow both ways kind of stuff making ~50 bucks a month.

Now I had worked jobs making $1.25 an hour with tips and free food, and up to $2.80 an hour before service. When you look at today’s pay scale a Private is entering in the $9-12 an hour rate, while a Lieutenant is about $20. But it is somewhat misleading using a standard year to calculate the rate when field time, deployments and “stuff” make it 24×7. There is also the little irritant about moving every few years-uprooting, dealing with housing, schools, stuff…

Maxdribbler77@gmail.com

8 February 2023

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