Conference Call with Senator Jack Reed (D-RI) and Michele Flournoy, President and Co-Founder, Center for a New American Security Subject: the State of

Interview

CONFERENCE CALL WITH SENATOR JACK REED (D-RI) AND MICHELE FLOURNOY, PRESIDENT AND CO-FOUNDER, CENTER FOR A NEW AMERICAN SECURITY
SUBJECT: THE STATE OF THE U.S. ARMY AND MILITARY READINESS

SEN. REED: Well, thank you very much. This is Jack Reed, and I'm just delighted to be joined by Michele Flournoy. And let me make a few general points, then ask Michele to comment, then open up to your questions.

The Army and the Marine Corps, our land forces, have been in incredible stress over the last several years because of the deployments in Afghanistan and in Iraq. Particularly with respect to the Army, the 15-month tours have put huge burdens on individual units and the family members of soldiers who are deploying. It has not only increased their length of time in the combat zone but it's also decreased the dwell time back home, as they have to train and reequip and get ready to go again.

There are also other personnel policies that exacerbate this stress: the stop loss, where thousands -- roughly 50,000 soldiers at one time are under stop loss.

This has led to a situation in which the readiness of the United States Army has deteriorated significantly in the last seven years. General Casey was reporting to the Senate Armed Services Committee yesterday. In our discussions, he readily admitted that of the 44 active brigades in the Army, except for those in Iraq or Afghanistan, all those just ready to deploy, the others are reporting, either because of training, equipment or personnel, not ready. That's roughly half of the active brigades in the Army. That is a significant deterioration of the quality of troops over the last several years -- not the quality of troops but the readiness of the force. The troops continue to do a magnificent job, despite all of these difficult challenges they face.

Related to this issue of readiness of course is the issue of recruiting and retention. Recruiting is very difficult in this environment. The Army is making its numbers, but they're doing that by lowering standards, drawing on the delayed entry pool, more so -- they ever done in the past. And Michele, I think, will provide some very specific indications on those issues.

All of this has an effect on morale. I was struck, as I think many of you were, when the reports of Admiral Mullen's trip out to Fort Sill -- and he spoke to young company-grade officers who expressed real concern about their futures in the service because of these extended deployments and also suggested that there are challenges in troop units now because of some of the recruits coming in, but just a feeling that we're on the cusp, and if we don't take appropriate action, this could become an increasingly more complicated and difficult problem.

Their equipment issues are very challenging across the board. The Marine Corps has indicated that, as in -- in 2007, they need about $12 billion for their reset, re-capitalization.

The Army indicates they need about $12 billion every year we're in Iraq plus two. That's a lot of money that is still not fully allocated to the services.

And then a final point I'll make is with this operational tempo the training, particularly the training for full spectrum operations, is severely constrained. Essentially these units are preparing for counterinsurgency operations, deploying for 15 months, coming back and getting ready again principally in counterinsurgency. So the full spectrum operations are being not stressed enough as they should be, and this, I think, is another contributing factor to the condition of readiness of the services.

Let me stop right there and ask Michele to comment.

Michele?

MS. FLOURNOY: Okay. Senator, thank you very much. Let me just elaborate a little bit with some additional facts on what the senator said about the near-term readiness of the force, and then I also want to make some comments on what I would call longer-term readiness, the ability to recruit and retain people in the all-volunteer Army.

I mean, one of the things that was most striking about General Casey's testimony yesterday -- and he'd actually said -- made similar comments to the HASC -- was that readiness is being consumed as fast as we can build it, but the demand actually exceeds the sustainable supply of forces. And so the demands of the current fight in Iraq means that the Army's really not able to provide ready forces as rapidly as necessary for other contingencies.

And as Senator Reed said, about half the active Army brigades are not ready. There is really no -- what that means in practice is there is no strategic reserve of ready Army brigades to protect U.S. interests under threat elsewhere, and that really increases strategy risk to the nation. In addition, as he mentioned, very limited dwell time, 12 months or less, between deployments; means that our soldiers aren't having that much time to train and certainly not time to train on any other mission except the next one they're going to, which is usually Iraq.

The other thing that's not talked about as much is the incredible strain that's being placed on families, and I think you've seen at least some indicators in terms of both higher divorce rates, domestic violence rates, that speak to the enormous strains that are being put on families.

Turning to longer-term readiness, recruiting and retention. Although the overall numbers that the Army puts out in terms of meeting recruiting goals, meeting overall retention goals, they're still telling, you know, a, frankly, better than expected story. There's some worrisome facts underneath the surface. You all remember in 2005 the Army missed its active duty recruiting target by a very -- significant by historical standards measure. But since then, since 2006, they've been making their goals.

But they've had to take some very worrisome steps to do so. First, they've had to give more waivers. Waivers are for people who don't meet the Army's health, educational or, quote, unquote, "moral" standards; meaning, they have some kind of criminal record. And the number of waivers has got now 18 percent, which is, again, historically very high; it's 160 percent growth since 2003. In addition, the Army's accepting a much larger number of people who don't have high school diplomas. The Army has been very persistent in sticking to the goal of 90 percent of recruits having high school diplomas.

In FY '07, they've accepted -- only 79 percent of the recruits have high school diplomas. They've also turned to much more -- shorter contracts with more lucrative financial and educational incentives. So now, they're actually offering a two-year contract with cash bonuses and G.I. Bill entitlements, which again indicates the level of pressure that they're feeling, the level of difficulty they're experiencing in actually making those recruiting numbers.

On the retention side of the equation, again the overall numbers look pretty good. But there's some very disturbing anecdotal information. For example, when you look at some of the more recent West Point classes, the class of 2000, the class of 2001, around half of those classes are leaving the Army as soon as they complete their contractual obligations, their service obligations.

They're leaving at -- that's a historically very high, almost unprecedented number. And the reason most often cited in the exit polls of these young officers is that they -- the wear and tear of multiple back-to-back combat tours has either -- has just become, you know, too much for them. And they're ready to leave.

What's happening overall is that there's becoming a growing shortage of line officers, at the captain and particularly the major level, in the Army. And that in turn is forcing the Army to relax its promotion standards. So much higher percentages of people are being promoted just to fill the ranks. So you're having an erosion of the sort of up-or-out culture at the field grade level.

So all of these things are significant concerns. And when you contemplate the expansion of the Army, they're likely to become even more difficult challenges in the next few years. Let me stop there.

SEN. REED: Thanks, Michele.

Your questions, please.

Q Well, I'm curious. You know, the story has been bad for a number of years now and it keeps getting worse. What's really the solution in mind? And you know, I mean, it --

SEN. REED: Well, what General Casey suggested to me yesterday was -- the solution, as he described it, is rebalancing, which is premised on drawing down our forces in Iraq principally. I made the point when I was talking to him that this whole notion of getting to one-year deployments and at least one year back at home station, better opportunities for training, better opportunities to be with family, is almost entirely dependent upon reducing our force footprint in Iraq and, to a much lesser degree, in Afghanistan. So that is something that we've been trying to do as a matter of policy, not just a suggestion to the president, but as a matter of policy.

Q This is Marc Heller at the Watertown Daily Times from New York.

I got the sense from General Casey yesterday that he believes that an active-duty Army of 547,000 is not going to be big enough. And I wonder, what's at the end of the water over there to get them to agree with you all on the end strength question? But also do you think that they -- you know, how confident are you that they can meet that 547 when they need to?

SEN. REED: Well, I think that his instincts are right. If you have this strategy that the president's pursuing to significant counterinsurgency operations, one in Afghanistan, one in Iraq, and the potential of other incidents around the globe requiring reserve, you need a larger Army. I think they made a tremendous decision -- mistake, the administration, in not recognizing this early on. I can recall in 2003 going to the floor of the Senate with Chuck Hagel and suggesting a very modest increase in the size of the Army and was rebuffed rather vigorously by the administration. They thought Iraq was going to be a transient and short-term operation.

So I think that they've got it right, but emphasizing what Michele has said, they're having an extraordinary difficult time just maintaining this force level. To expand it and maintain quality is going to be a huge challenge, and I'm not that optimistic that they can meet that challenge given the present situation. Now if they can withdraw forces and begin a phased redeployment out of Iraq, if they can begin to stabilize, then they might have a better chance of maintaining quality and raising the size of the force, but I think it's going to be a very difficult challenge for them.

Michele?

MS. FLOURNOY: Yeah, no, I would agree with that. All the polling of parents and coaches and other influencers, who, you know, advise people thinking about joining or not, all indicate that the Iraq war and the unpopularity of the war is a major factor that is causing a fair number of people who would otherwise think of military service to at least stay on the sidelines for now and sort of wait a couple of years before making that decision, see what happens with the war.

So I think if the country was put on a path towards phased redeployment and some sort of stabilization and reduction of our commitment there, you would actually see some uptick in the recruiting, the number of recruits coming through the door or coming to the recruiting stations. I think the real practical question for General Casey and the Army leadership is the pace of expansion. I agree that the Army needs to grow, but the -- growing the right Army means growing an Army of high quality, and so you've got to modify the pace of the expansion to be able to grow while keeping quality high. And that may mean growing more slowly than currently planned.

SEN. REED: Anyone else?

Q This is Megan Scully with CongressDaily. Yesterday, General Casey also mentioned the need to get funding on time and pointed to the reset funding that was included in last year's Defense appropriations bill and how he was able to quickly reset Army and Marine Corps -- or Army equipment.

I wanted to see if there were any concerns -- the Pentagon has raised concerns about the effects of delayed war funding. I wanted to get your thoughts on that, Senator Reed, and if there's any concerns on your part about any sort of delayed reset effort.

SEN. REED: Well, information that I've seen from the Department of Defense is that they can continue to conduct operations until February or March of next year with very minimal reprogramming, which is within their capacity right now. And I don't think anyone's suggesting that there is any mission-critical items that are currently being jeopardized in terms of the pace of appropriations.

So this issue, I think, is an important one, but it's equally important, I think, to establish a new direction, a new policy in Iraq, and particularly given this conversation, where so much of what General Casey spoke about yesterday and what we're speaking about depends upon -- the future depends upon a careful, thorough, but deliberate phased redeployment of our forces from Iraq.

MS. FLOURNOY: I would just underscore the sense of -- I think there really is a growing sense of urgency that -- the force is not broken, but as Admiral Mullen said in a speech last month, it is breakable. And there are lots of -- you know, we're seeing some canaries in the coal mine. You know, we're seeing those early warning signals, the indicators that some serious long-term damage to the all- volunteer force is starting to happen. And so I think that there really is a sense of urgency to address the larger drivers of this situation, which is the demands in Iraq.

Q Senator, a quick question about an earlier comment you made regarding our full-spectrum capabilities. It seems that that's an idea that's kind of been echoed by a number of senior military leaders, but as far as your opinion on what kind of balance that should take, where do you think -- where do you think that line should be drawn between a focus on counterinsurgency, counterterrorism-type operations and more towards the conventional, full-spectrum-type capabilities?

SEN. REED: Well, it has to be much more balanced than it is today. I mean, I've talked to young officers. There's some -- and this might be sort of more anecdotal than analytical, but some young officers -- armor officers who have never really been in a tank firing range because they deployed with their unit into Iraq and they've been doing other things. You've got field artillery units that have been effectively military police or transportation units for the last two or three years. And so if you're a company grade officer, a lieutenant, first, second lieutenant getting to be captain and you've never really operated some of your major equipment in your branch because of the nature of the counterinsurgency operations, that's a shortcoming. That has to be rectified.

I mean, these young men and women, as they progress, you know, have to have basic skills, which you can learn but they're best learned as young platoon leaders and company grade officers doing the artillery job, the armor job and not necessarily just in a counterinsurgency.

So the balance is way out of line, and that was admitted quite readily by both Secretary Geren and General Casey yesterday. You know, because of this op tempo, you come out of Iraq, you get a chance to rest a bit, be with your family, and the next thing you know you're preparing for the next mission, which is Iraq or Afghanistan, which is a lot of counterinsurgency very specific to the Iraq situation, i.e. counter-IED tactics, convoy tactics, even cultural immersion. It's a very narrow focus.

And so now we're going -- we need a broader focus, and I think military leaders would be the first to admit that. The balance -- right now, it looks like 99 percent of counterinsurgency to one. Something maybe closer to 50-50 I'd be more comfortable with, but the exact ratio I'll leave to General Casey.

Q And a question actually related to Army contracting, the recent release of the Gansler report reviewing some of the shortfalls within the Army's process and a parallel commission or a panel being conducted by General Thompson.

I think their report's scheduled to come out relatively soon.

There were some recommendations made in the Gansler report that Congress may or may not take up in order to kind of rectify the situation. I think some of the issues included making a permanent sort of waiver process regarding specialty metals and that sort of thing. I was wondering, can you comment on some of those recommendations that were made in the Gansler report and whether or not those could be implemented?

SEN. REED: I think we're at a juncture now with the defense authorization bill which would be the logical place to do these things, almost completed; that that would probably wait till, I think, the beginning of next year for some careful consideration by the committee and action.

We recognize there's some significant contract problems, and some of the problems are caused by the nature of the way the administration chose to fight the battle, which is a relatively small, uniform force supplemented by a rather large contingent of contractors, both security contractors and other kind of contractors.

I think institutionally the Army, the Department of Defense is probably not as well prepared as they should be. I know some of these reports talked about making sure that, you know, we developed a much more defined and well-trained or better-trained cadre of contract officers, including, you know, the responsibilities by general officers in contracting.

We'll look at all those things, but I sense the time will be probably at the beginning of next year with the next reauthorization process.

Q Thank you.

SEN. REED: Thank you. Anyone else?

Q Yeah, John Mulligan from the Providence Journal, Senator. You made a point of getting General Casey on the record yesterday to the effect that it would be difficult to mount another surge after the middle of next year. Why was it important to have him agree with that point, and how was it pertinent to today's vote on the bridge fund?

SEN. REED: Well, I think it's very relevant because it indicates to me that the force structure of the Army is determining to a significant degree the ability to maintain large forces in Iraq. And when you have the chief of staff of the Army essentially saying the forces have to come down so that we can rebalance, and that rebalancing can only take place if this is a deliberate and constant redeployment of forces out, not various surges in and out, suggests to me that this is the strategy that the administration not only should pursue, but must pursue. And we want to make that the policy of the United States.

Any other questions?

Q Yeah. I just wanted to follow up on that. Do you see any signs -- I mean, is Casey's testimony yesterday a sign that the administration is beginning to take that course?

SEN. REED: Well, I think the -- I don't know if the administration is, but I think within the uniformed military services they have come to the realization that they have to start a process of redeployment. I think also significantly yesterday General Odierno's comments in The Washington Post about the lack of political progress on the ground, and even his comment that, you know, if we don't see any further progress in the next several months, we have to, I think, quote, "Re-look at our strategy," unquote, which suggests to me is that they are beginning to recognize and to speak openly about the fact that, you know, we cannot maintain a 170,000 or 160,000 presence in Iraq indefinitely. We have to start redeploying and have to start transitioning to missions that are more central to our security and more feasible given a smaller footprint. And that's a very similar, if not identical, to what Senator Levin and I have been talking about for more than a year.

MS. FLOURNOY: Let me just in chime in. Both Admiral Mullen and General Casey have now repeatedly talked about the need for demand to come down, to rebalance, to reset the force, and to build some greater flexibility to be able to respond to other contingencies that may arise. And I think that from, you know, the perspective of people whose job it is to manage -- you know, organize, try and equip the force, manage the force, make sure that we're balancing risk across all the possible areas where our interests could be threatened, I think they're sounding -- again, sort of raising the flag and saying, you know, we've got to begin that process. Obviously, their perspective may sometimes be at odds with a field commander who's worried only about one mission, but they're both looking at the strategic landscape and trying to ensure that we balance risk as a nation across multiple defense needs, both current and potential future ones.

SEN. REED: Let me make a follow-on point to Michele's excellent point, and that is if -- you know, if you look across at the region now -- in Pakistan, where the stability of the Musharraf government is under question -- he's imposed emergency rule; where there's growing indication that the tribal lands of Pakistan are no longer just a haven for some al Qaeda elements, they might even be an incubator for insurgents, both crossing the border into Afghanistan and perhaps even posing some threat to the government in Islamabad; and then the situation in Afghanistan. I'm hearing growing concern about, you know, the progress -- or lack of progress -- in Afghanistan, the increased activity of Taliban, the inability yet to fully deploy all the assets through NATO that we need.

This is just another area where we would need the flexibility, and perhaps, you know, to shift forces or do something. But it underscores what Michele said about, you know, the strategic risk we're running given the current state of the Army and the huge, huge sort of commitment of forces relative to our end strength in Iraq.

Thank you all very much.

Thanks, Michele.

MS. FLOURNOY: Thank you. Thank you very much, sir.

SEN. REED: Bye bye.

MS. FLOURNOY: Okay, bye bye.

Source