Recruitment within the army started back in 1776 in the United States. The soldiers who were being recruited were to fight during the revolutionary wars. The recruiting stations were situated in Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York but today the recruitment is quite open with many stations situated around the major cities of the metropolitan area in the U.S. During this time the recruitment within the army was directed by the Army Adjutant general’s office but this was then transferred to the U.S continental Army command in 1964.
The command recruited the regular army and supervised the whole process of recruiting. In 1972, the USAREC body was given the mandate of recruiting personnel for the army. It also assumed the duty of recruiting for the army reserve in 1978. Volunteer-ship was the major way of recruiting but this has changed over the years. Various changes have taken place in the recruitment of the United States Army as the challenges dictate a transformation of policies that would suit today’s needs.
Among the major challenges that have been demanded is reform, including the diversity of recruitment within the U.S military personnel. Another area of reform has been collaborating the active duty with the reserve personnel to form a stronger fighting force (Rod, 2008). This paper analyses these two challenges and looks at the factors that have led to the need to transform in addition to the policies that have been enacted to ensure adherence to these reforms. It also looks at the forces which have shaped the policies and finally assesses well these policies have been achieved.
Factors that lead to the transformation of military recruitment
Equal demographic representation
Issues related to demography within the military personnel were raised with the concern of the army who were involved in fighting especially in the terrorism war. It was discovered that the U.S population was unequally represented in the army and this resulted in only some groups dying and getting injured in the war. Demographic characteristics have been a major concern within military personnel.
The factors that were mainly considered were age, ethnicity, education among other demographic factors such as gender. The period of service was also considered as for how long individuals had served within the military and how efficient their service had been. Recruiting from the minorities in the population ensured that the military did not discriminate against the Hispanics and also the African Americans (Anni, 2008). The transformations in recruitment under a diversified program have also worked to improve opportunities for the minorities within the society
Sufficiency and efficiency of service personnel
Another major factor that led to widening the diversity of military personnel was the need to ensure that the military has enough personnel who is well trained and educated to cope with the security threats that have been facing the U.S. Some of the major events that have taken place include the terrorist attacks on Iraqi freedom, the Noble eagle, and the need to ensure operations that endured freedom.
These events have lately increased the operations within the military and this has called for the need to increase the number of military personnel. It has also been a necessity to ensure that the personnel that is hired are quality and highly qualified for the service. This raised the need to widen the diversity of recruiting to net individuals who would quickly adapt to the system and perform the immediate operations the U.S military was looking forward to. Recruiting from a diversified cultural background was also meant to help the military to gather information especially on al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups.
The U.S army is known to have a lot of soldiers who are not natives and this has worked well with the spy’s duty of gathering information required to set ambush by the military personnel. This strengthens the military and improves its efficiency in matters related to war and security. Such diversity has seen the military recruiting from schools such that they can train the soldier’s rights from their youth and they mature in the performance of the duties. This also ensures that the career taken by such individuals is started early enough and most of them are likely to serve the military for a longer period.
Stop-loss policy
This is a policy that was enacted to ensure that the soldiers who are recruited in the service will remain in the service. This ensured that the army will reduce its continuous process of recruitment due to the leaving of the soldiers (Anni, 2008). The policy also affects the active army. The policy was instituted in 2001 and remains in force. This policy is entirely used to ensure that the soldiers within the force work with the army and offer their services beyond their obligation.
Collaboration of active duty and the reserve personnel in the military
From the fiscal year 2000 to 2004 there has been the increased collaboration of the reserve army with the army national guard and also the active army. The major difference between the recruitment within the active army and the reserve army is that the reserve will mainly recruit individuals who have former experience of serving within the army. Some of the major reasons that led to the collaboration of the active army and the reserve army include the following:
Strengthening of the army
The active army was faced with a shortage of soldiers following the rise of security threats such as terrorist attacks. The active army on its own could not handle all the security threats ahead on its own. The ongoing recruitment process did not guarantee efficiency in service since the soldiers recruited did not have any experience to go to war on their own. This further weakened the active army. The move to strengthen the army could only be achieved by combining the active army with other bodies of the army such as the reserve army to strengthen it and also improve its efficiency. The collaboration also helped to increase the number of soldiers serving within the active army thus reducing the problem of shortage.
Dismissal of soldiers
The active army has been largely involved in dismissing soldiers who are not active in the army. This includes those soldiers who have low performance or have low productivity with the army (David, 2005). Other soldiers dismissed include those who are largely involved in drug-related cases such that they cannot be able to perform their duties. The army requires that all the soldiers working in the army execute their duties well enough to ensure competency within the force. Those soldiers who are dismissed must be replaced immediately to avoid further problems of labor shortage within the active army. This is one of the major reasons for meshing the active army with the reserve army.
National Defense Authorization Act
Some of the policies which have been advocating the strengthening of the army include the National Defense Authorization Act. This act seeks to strengthen the army following the need to face the security tasks ahead of it. This policy requires that congress puts and additional recruitment to all the bodies of the military that is the army, the navy, the Marine Corps, and also the air force (Great Britain, 2006). The policy also authorizes the secretary of defense to collaborate with the active army and the reserve personnel to support the operations that were taking place in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Forces leading to the implementation of policies
The force that has largely been associated with the foreseeing of transformations within the U.S military recruitment is the All-Volunteer Force (AFV) which was enacted in 1973. This force has very major transformations both in the active duty and also the reserve army personnel. Its major success has been foreseeing the transformations of demographic representation in the recruitment of the army.
The efforts of the force have ensured that the military personnel is both young and well educated to ensure the quality of service within the military. Other factors that it has pushed through include the proportionate representation in terms of ethnicity, race, gender, and also couples. The department of defense and Congress has also been involved in ensuring that the reforms and transformations within the military are successful.
The DOD for example has been mandated with the gathering of statistics and gathering of data on the issues that have been of the challenge to military recruitment. The U.S government accountability office has also been on the front line to air the current challenges and transformations needed within the military. It has also been active in ensuring equal representation of the minority within the U.S military personnel (Can 2004).
The implemented policies on the demographics especially by the all-volunteer force have been very successful. In today’s military personnel there is a great change especially in terms of demography. The military now recruits very young personnel who are well educated. The representation of the racial groups within the force has also seen a great improvement. There is a lot of racial diversity with all the races given opportunities to serve within the military. Gender representation has also been considered with more women recruited into the military personnel. However, women in the military force are still at a lower percentage of 16% as compared to the U.S civilian female workforce
(David, 2005). The requirements of the department of defense to file reports on racial and ethnic recruitment by the government have not yet been fully implemented and this has made it very difficult for Congress to monitor the situation. The collaboration of the active army and the reserve army has also worked well to spread risks, especially during the war. The active army is stronger in matters of facing security threats and challenges.
In contrast, both policies were directed towards the better performance of the U.S military. The issues related to widening the diversity of recruitment were directed to netting down individuals who were very qualified to serve within the army. Giving a chance to all the ethnic groups within the U.S population would diversify the abilities that are posed by the candidates. This is because all individuals do not have the same capabilities in terms of physical abilities and also education.
The diversity in recruitment also strengthens the army by fetching more soldiers from the collaboration of guards from the reserve army. Reserve army though does not concentrate on the recruitment of fresh candidates but concentrates on individuals who have former experience within the army. The changes in the recruitment and also strengthening the force with the reserve army were both directed to ensuring efficiency of the U.S army in executing the tasks ahead especially the Iraq and Afghanistan war. Both transformations are directed to the efficiency of the end performance of the army.
The move to recruit from a wider diversity was also meant to reduce the number of soldiers dying and getting injured from one particular ethnic group. This is why the recruitment was diversified to reduce the effect on particular groups within the population. On the other hand, collaborating between the active army and the reserve army ensured that the soldiers going to war were not entirely from one group of the army. This diversified the risks of death and injuries, especially during the Iraq war.
Both transformations in the army were not entirely for strengthening the army but they also ensured that risks during the war were spread out not to affect one side of the population or one secretion of the army. The transformation of recruiting from a wider and diversified angle has provided the immediate community with new job opportunities that are not discriminated against by the minority. This has been a move to bring equality within society.
The transformation of merging the active duty and the reserve personnel has however not provided any new job opportunities but it has brought about added tasks to the reserve military (Rod, 2008). No new opportunities have been created for the society even though the end goal for both transformations was similar. The active army has reduced the discrimination especially against the African Americans but this is not the case in the reserve recruitment where the African Americans feel much discriminated against.
Both reforms were directed towards reducing the shortage of military personnel. The reforms also have done the minority in the U.S population a great justice of ensuring equal opportunities to work within the military. However, the future challenge of the military will lie with the increasing minority hiring and the decreased hiring of the whites into the military (Anni, 2008). The risk posed to the minorities within the population during the war will be very high.
This might risk the community losing most of its men who are in service. The challenge of collaborating the active personnel and the reserve personnel might lead to a lack of specification of duties and also overburdening of tasks for one side of the army. Individuals interested in working with the reserve army might as well not be interested in working with the active army and the collaboration of the duties by the policies to strengthen the army might go against their wishes. The future of the active army should be focused on recruiting more of their own and develop strategies for retaining them.
References
Anni Baker, 2008. U.S military recruitment reforms. Greenwood Publishing Group.
Can Du and Matthias Scholar, 2004. Policy options for U.S military recruiting. National Defense Research Institute (U.S.).
Congress, 2008. U.S. Military regulations at the library of congress. Web.
David S. Loughran and Beth J. Asch, 2005. Active and Reserve recruiting. Benefits of collaboration in the U.S Military. Rand Corporation.
Great Britain and National Audit Office Staff, 2006. Ministry of Defense: Recruitment and Retention in the Armed Forces. The Stationery Office.
Rod Powers, 2008. Transferring from Guard/Reserve to Active Duty. McGraw hill Publishers.