Some Troops Don’t Get Fair Share of Deployment Burdens

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By Sandra I. Erwin

A Pentagon advisory panel suggests that Army and Marine Corps troop-rotation methods may be partly to blame for the stress in the force. The Defense Business Board, made up of former Pentagon and industry officials, parsed military payroll data from 2001 to 2008 and concluded that, over those seven years, certain groups — mostly senior enlisted, non-commissioned and junior officers — have been deployed nonstop while others have never been in combat.

“The data indicates that current policies and practices are potentially creating two groups — those that repeatedly deploy and those that don’t,” said the DBB. The panel is recommending that Defense Secretary Robert Gates examine the service policies that appear to create excessive deployments of certain portions of the force while at the same time isolating others from deployment.

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Reader Comments

Re: Some Troops Don’t Get Fair Share of Deployment Burdens

As a retired US Army Special Forces Officer, I'd like to add the following to the implied 'lack of fairness' in this issue:

This occurs in every 'deployment' undertaken by every unit within the military because there are always those who "want" to deploy and those who "do not want" to deploy (for whatever reason). I always sought to be with those who "wanted to" for obvious reasons and never wasted time thinking of the "did not's."

There are more theaters demanding our commitment in general and the GWOT in particular than OEF/OIF, and many of those in the military have specially developed skills for those specific regions which would add nothing if committed to OEF/OIF...and would, in fact, lessen our effectiveness in those other areas.

"Experience" is always in demand, whether in the military or in business, and those with the most experience are most likely to be used most often to (1) increase the chance of success and (2) to aid those with less experience survive to gain that invaluable teaching tool.

Anyone who doesn't understand that the 'backbone' of our combat and supporting forces are historically the E-4s to E-8s and the 0-1s to 0-5s has--IMO--little business passing judgment on an issue which can so easily be turned into another media-bashing of the Pentagon by an MSM talking head seeking 'face time' on the nightly news.

JMHO.

F. Richard Hayse on 02/18/2009 at 11:32

Re: Some Troops Don’t Get Fair Share of Deployment Burdens

Sandra: Good catch ... thanks for keeping your editorial eye on the important issues of rotation policies and dwell time. Best, Gordon

Gordon Peterson on 02/13/2009 at 13:51

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