A FORCE TOO SMALL

Sobering forecasts for the US forces.

As the issue simmers inside the Pentagon, a rising chorus outside — of auditors, defense analysts and advocates for military families — suggest the administration already is late in pressing Congress for more people, given the dangerous and daunting contingencies U.S. troops now face.

A new General Accounting Office report (03-670) looks at the strain on U.S. forces just from new domestic missions since 9/11, and criticizes Defense officials for delaying force structure changes to address homeland security needs until the next Quadrennial Defense Review in 2005...

Meanwhile, the pace of operations for units involved in homeland defense is high enough that thousands of military personnel are exceeding personnel tempo ceilings set by Congress to protect troop morale. As a result, GAO warned, they face “future personnel retention problems.”

Michael O’Hanlon, a defense analyst at the Brookings Institution, studied the troop rotation plan for Iraq, which would maintain current force levels using replacement brigades that will serve there for up to a year. Despite that hardship, reminiscent of combat tours in Vietnam, O’Hanlon said the Army’s rotation base could be exhausted by late 2004.

“That means we will have to take the unthinkable step of sending back to Iraq people who returned from there a year before,” said O’Hanlon. “Many American soldiers, as dedicated as they are, will choose not to re-enlist rather than accept such an unpalatable — and frankly, unfair — demand upon them and their families.”