Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!rutgers!att!cbnews!military From: walt.cc.utexas.edu!rdd@cs.utexas.edu (Robert Dorsett) Newsgroups: sci.military Subject: Re: _Military_Incompetence_ by Richard A. Gabriel Message-ID: <11918@cbnews.ATT.COM> Date: 4 Dec 89 01:42:26 GMT References: <11763@cbnews.ATT.COM> <11861@cbnews.ATT.COM> Sender: military@cbnews.ATT.COM Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas Lines: 52 Approved: military@att.att.com From: walt.cc.utexas.edu!rdd@cs.utexas.edu (Robert Dorsett) In article <11861@cbnews.ATT.COM> bobtl%toolbox.wv.tek.com@RELAY.CS.NET writes: >> The last chapter makes some >>specific recommendations for reform, including fewer officers, >>people around less), slower promotions, and moving retirement >>from 20 to 30 years of service. >> >>Has there been movement towards any of these ideas? > >I have seen movement to stabilize command tours, but little else within >the last ten years. The army seems to be reducing its selection rate >(forcing officers out of the service) to keep the time required for >promotion constant. However, maybe somebody closer to the subject >(still on active duty) could better answer this question. Officer-purges are cyclic in all the services. The bean counters occasionally discover that they have too many officers, and start incentive programs to get rid of them (this aside from the automatic dismissals when officers fail to get promoted within certain time constraints). Then when they do get rid of the surplus, they usually find they overdid it, leaving them with few officers, and go into panic mode--resulting in quick promotions (this is particularly absurd in military aviation--during all the carping about a military pilot shortage the past couple of years, a couple of these "purges" were launched by the bean counters. It's hard to reconcile these patterns with Gabriel's thesis that fewer officers result in an optimized military force--I doubt that's what the military has in mind. :-) As for retirement, screwing around with that is a Bad Idea. Retirement (and associated benefits) are a MAJOR carrot in inducing people to remain with the military. Screw with it even ONCE, and it'd take years to recover. Increasing the term of service before retirement would require that the payoff be increased considerably (say, retirement at full salary), or you'll find people that won't try. Increasing the service-time before retirement would also discourage people from long service periods (it is, for example, conceivable that a military pilot could be hired by an airline while in his late 30's/early 40's and still have a productive civil life, but not if he's in his late 40's/early 50's). In all, Gabriel's book, as described, doesn't sound very realistic. Qualified people are not going to enter into situations that are high-risk/ low-reward, which means that people who CAN be recruited will be of lower calibre. Robert Dorsett Internet: rdd@rascal.ics.utexas.edu UUCP: ...cs.utexas.edu!rascal.ics.utexas.edu!rdd Brought to you by Super Global Mega Corp .com