Spring, from a "leg", please tell your son-in-law, that we appreciate his service.
L.Brown, During the post Viet Nam confusion converting the "Draft" Army to the Volunteer Army they did many things designed to make it seem they were keeping their promises. They held illegally constituted promotion boards to "pass over" officers after they had already "Riffed" the number they said they would limit the "Rif" to and wanted to make more reductions (at least courts intervened). When they couldn't support what decided to do, other times, they would set up a "test" and structure it to show what they had already decided was in the "best interest of the government". They converted many Military "slots" to "civilian" and changed "Construction" Engineer Battalions to "Combat Heavy", in order to improve the perception of the " tooth to tail" ratio. Instead of saving money over all, it cost more, but the additional costs were in different "appropriations". It was mostly smoke and mirrors. It is the same after every war.
Mike
Mike, I worked with Riffed officers in the mid-70's. They were given something like $10-15,000 as they went out the door. Since then, if nothing else, they've gotten more generous. I remember a Rif in the 90's and an active duty CPT who was assigned to our Reserve Center. The offer to him was $1500 per month until he hit age 60. Nothing after that. The other choice was waiting for the roll of the dice to see if he'd make major. He was a bachelor, took the money, and went back to college to get an MBA.
I remember waiting for my truck to be repaired, back somewhere between 2005-2010. I struck up a conversation with a National Guard NCO. Turned out he was in my original Guard unit (which I'd left back in the mid-70's when I found a more appropriate home in a Military Intelligence detachment.) I knew that my old Guard outfit had spent a couple tours in "the sandbox". I asked him how that was working out. He said they were losing a lot of young NCOs as a result, and was worried how the unit might do as a result should they be ordered to active duty again. The Army National Guard went from 400,000 to 300,000 under Clinton, and the Army Reserve from 300,000 to 200,000 . . . while being expected to pick up the slack for all the cuts on the Active side. All of that from cashing in the so called "peace dividend" when the Wall came down, the Soviet Union self destructed, and the Cold War ended. One of the CIA directors from that era remarked that while we'd manage to slay a very dangerous dragon, we still lived in a jungle world populated by a variety of poisonous snakes. One of which struck on 9/11.
Last edited by L. Brown; 04/02/23 06:56 AM.
