Looks like the Pres is taking one heck of a vacation before he leaves office.

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If there is a deficit in manpower in some areas, then salaries need to be bumped up to try to get people to stay. But if there are more applicants than positions, then those salaries don't need to be changed (at least, they don't need to be changed upward).
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Yeah, I'd argue that there probably isn't much need to increase salaries at the E1-E3 (or maybe E4) level. Those are mostly going to be kids on their first enlistment, and to be quite honest there are a plethora of non-salary benefits (VA benefits, MGIB benefits, etc.) that seem more than adequate to attract new recruits...along with signing bonuses. It's convincing people to reenlist that gets trickier. But again, I believe it's mainly the Army suffering on retention (both among NCOs and officers), and a pay scale increase affects all the services...better would probably be targeted incentives just for the Army (and possibly Marines, not sure what they're situation is) to increase retention just in those branches. Plus such incentives can actually be target at critical positions (pay grades, MOS's, etc), rather than across the entire branch.

Of course, what's really needed is a reduced optempo...there's only so much money can do to convince somebody to stay in, especially if they have a family. But that would require either a vast increase in the size of our forces (which would be expensive) or a significant reduction in the number deployed (may happen, may not).
 
Yep, the same george Bush who gave the Mexicans a hack on the railroading of two innocent Border Patrol agents just gave the Shiite "government" of Iraq a hack on the US defense bill.

Bruxley; at least the dastardly Democrats did pass a defense bill before the end of the year. The Republican 06 congress picked up their shattered marbles and went home after getting trounced in the election; leaving the defense bill for the dastardly Democrats to pass.

Here it is right from FAUX news:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,318785,00.html

Texas — President George W. Bush headed toward a constitutional confrontation with Congress on Friday over his effort to reject a sweeping US defense bill.

Bush announced he would scuttle the bill with a "pocket veto" — essentially, letting the bill die without his signature 10 days after he received it, or the end of Dec. 31.

But that can happen only when Congress is not in session; otherwise, the bill becomes law without a formal veto in 10 days. And the Senate maintains it is in session by holding brief — sometimes only seconds long — meetings every two or three days with only one senator present.

The White House's view is that Congress has adjourned.

It was unclear how the executive and legislative branches would determine whether, in fact, Bush's lack of signature would amount to vetoing the bill or turning it into law.

"My withholding of approval from the bill precludes its becoming law," Bush said in a statement of disapproval sent to Congress.

The president said he was sending the bill and his outline of objections to the clerk of the House of Representatives "to avoid unnecessary litigation about the non-enactment of the bill that results from my withholding approval, and to leave no doubt that the bill is being vetoed."

Democratic congressional leaders complained that Bush's move was thrust upon them at the last minute. The controversy centers on one provision in the legislation dealing with Iraqi assets. The bill would permit plaintiffs' lawyers immediately to freeze Iraqi funds and would expose Iraq to "massive liability in lawsuits concerning the misdeeds of the Saddam Hussein regime," said White House spokesman Scott Stanzel.

""The new democratic government of Iraq, during this crucial period of reconstruction, cannot afford to have its funds entangled in such lawsuits in the United States," Stanzel said in a statement.

House and Senate Democrats said Friday the first time they'd heard of any White House concerns with the legislation was after Congress sent the bill to Bush for his signature.

"The administration should have raised its objections earlier, when this issue could have been addressed without a veto," Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said in a joint statement. "The American people will have every right to be disappointed if the president vetoes this legislation, needlessly delaying implementation of the troops' pay raise, the Wounded Warriors Act and other critical measures.""
 
"Bruxley is correct. I think Bush was right to veto this. I agree with Bush that a raise for the military is not needed right now. We are meeting our recruiting needs at the present time, so the salaries must be OK with the new recruits."

You forgot to mention that the US military has had to lower recruitment standards to meet their goals. The Army is now taking aliens and felons. It seems that those red-blooded male keyboard war hawks are reluctant to put their names on the dotted line and defend this country, preferring instead to send females into harms way.

On one of my job sites i have six recently discharged military NCO's working for me; two E-5s, two E-6s and one E-7 who got out with 16 years in the Army. They all got out because they were tired of having their butts ran off.

The US military is much too small. The active strenth of the US Army and USMC should be doubled. That, however, would cost a lot of money: After all, the so-called "war on terror" is a war on the cheap.


US Army
M/Sgt. Retired
 
You forgot to mention that the US military has had to lower recruitment standards to meet their goals. The Army is now taking aliens and felons. It seems that those red-blooded male keyboard war hawks are reluctant to put their names on the dotted line and defend this country, preferring instead to send females into harms way.
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And some people make a career out of the military because they are unemployable in the private sector.
 
"And some people make a career out of the military because they are unemployable in the private sector."

Oh, really. How much military experience do you have? Sounds like you talked with those "unemployables" in combat, in the barracks and on the firing ranges for decades.
 
And some people make a career out of the military because they are unemployable in the private sector.
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I continue to be amazed at what I read in this thread, so many statements from people who have no military experience. We owe the soldier more then ever can be paid especially now when we have so few willing to enlist.

The military cannot be run on a civilian basic and should not be. We have so much of our population who do not want to serve and believe that service is beneath them need to wake up and understand the reason you have any freedom at all is because of the soldier and his rifle.

We appear to have become a nation of wimps who want someone to pick our fruit, clean our bathrooms, wash our cars, and yes raise our child from birth, god forbid if we dirty our hands and now I see people on a gun board stating soldiers should not get a raise, very sad and disappointing.
 
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