Numbers Game

Army recruitment goals continue to delve into fuzzy math territory--one month, goals are met (thanks to dialing down), next month, hmmm...

The Army, which expects to miss its 2005 recruiting goal by about 12,000, already is falling behind for next year.

The pool of recruits who sign up as much as a year before they report for training is dwindling...

Stephen Cheney, a retired Marine brigadier general and recruiting coordinator, said the small size of the delayed entry pool would make it extremely difficult for the Army to meet its 2006 target.

Next year's recruits may also not be as qualified as this year's, because the Army will be looking for enlistees it can quickly ship to basic training. That means recruits whose options are limited, "are not in school and not in a job," said Cheney, chief operating officer of Business Executives for National Security in Washington, D.C.

The Army is offering unprecedented enticements - including enlistment bonuses as high as $20,000 and service stints as short as 15 months - but so far has been unable to persuade enough young men and women to join.

Secretary of the Army Francis Harvey recently proposed increasing the top enlistment bonus to $40,000 and is about to add 800 additional recruiters to the force. Even the new recruiters and higher bonuses "may not be enough for everyone," Rochelle said.

Well, good to see they're offering bonuses of up to $40,000 dollars--maybe that'll keep the new soldiers from doing this:

A company of the California Army National Guard has been put on restricted duty and its battalion plunged into disarray amid allegations that battalion members mistreated detainees in Iraq and extorted money from shopkeepers, according to military officials and members of the unit...

Among the allegations now under investigation is that at least six soldiers from the battalion took part in a scheme to extort money from Iraqi shopkeepers, apparently in exchange for protection from insurgents.

The payments allegedly exceeded $30,000, two sources said, and were made in U.S. currency, according to one member of the battalion who has been briefed on the investigation. Another soldier said the scheme allegedly was carried out during night patrols in the Baghdad area.

It is unclear whether any soldier has been charged in connection with those allegations.

The military revealed earlier this month that 11 U.S. soldiers have been charged with dereliction of duty in connection with the alleged mistreatment of detainees in Iraq but did not identify their names or unit. Baldwin confirmed on Tuesday that the soldiers are members of Alpha Company of the 1st Battalion of the 184th Infantry Regiment.

Extortion, dereliction? Sounds like they can't afford to be real choosy about who enlists...

On the other hand, maybe that's just a first step towards a career in GOP politics for some of these soldiers--where at least they'll never get swiftboated.